SilasBarta comments on Debunking komponisto on Amanda Knox (long) - Less Wrong
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Comments (116)
So, Rolf, do you understand how this post failed? Hint: Others are not to blame.
I'll admit I'm a bit confused as well. I red komponisto's previous posts and agreed with him. rolf_nelson's posts seem to raise important points about the issue. I honestly don't see what justifies the severe downmodding he's getting. Could someone fill me in?
Rolf raises a number of points that were already widely discussed (and widely dismissed) in the comments on komponisto's posts. He has not added any new information to the discussion that was not already contained in the voluminous commentary surrounding those two posts.
More importantly, he seems to have missed/ignored a fairly central point from komponisto's posts as relates to rationality (which is what we are generally here to discuss) which is that all of the physical and circumstantial evidence against Knox and Sollecito is irrelevant within a wide range of plausible weights assigned to it in light of the prior probabilities surrounding a case of this type. The reason this case is interesting as a test of rationality is that you can reach a likely-correct conclusion without examining any of the evidence discussed here in detail. You would need orders-of-magnitude more compelling evidence to outweigh the very small priors that should have been assigned to the joint guilt of Knox and Sollecito given the compelling evidence against Guede.
Click.
That much I understand. And I did read a lot of the previous discussions. But just to take a random example, rolf_nelson brought up how DNA of random people couldn't have easily gotten onto the bra clasp, that there had to be some more direct contact. And, RS's DNA is clearly on it.
Where was that specific point already addressed in previous discussion?
Here for one.
This CNN story covers some of the doubts around the handling of the bra and the validity of the DNA results:
Here's a source for the 'three unidentified individuals' DNA' claim:
Emphasis mine. There is sufficient doubt around the DNA evidence to render it largely irrelevant in light of the prior probabilities for this kind of crime.
Okay, thanks -- I wasn't sure if the rolf_nelson's claim about the three other people was the consensus at this point. I assumed he said it because he had found a good refutation of that point [1]. Confusion resolved. Disappointment with rolf_nelson's posts on this matter understood.
[1]Note: This is not a common practice of mine, but due to the factors at play for this specific discussion.
ETA: Changed phrasing to be less personal.
Can we say "disappointment with rolf_nelson's post"? I feel more comfortable with that.
I wasn't endorsing the general dislike of rolf_nelson, just saying why I understand the hostility now. And the issue is about more than just his top level post, but the broader exchange between him and komponisto.
(And why do you insist on the underscore?)
ETA: Come on, it's a joke, people. I criticized wedrifid for simply following my usage (plus making it the possessive form), even though I use that exact form all the time. I was jokingly making it look like it's wedrifid who insists on the practice of adding underscores. Get it? Ha ha? No? Okay then...
Who are you and what have you done with Silas??
LOL! :-)
ETA: I notice that many people have since picked up the practice of referring to other users with their exact username, and replacing spaces therein with underscores. I'm not going to say it was because of me ... but I had been doing that since way back into the OB days, when no one else was ...
I'm confused. I just added 's post in this instance. More generally I tend to refer to a user by either their username or their first name. Maybe a last name instead if the reference was towards a more formal academic contribution.
whoosh! ;-)
Updated phrasing to a happy medium.