 |
|
O. J. Simpson -- upon hearing the "not guilty" verdict in the criminal trial. Photo Credit: Captured off video feed from courtroom |
O. J. Simpson:
The Case that won't go away
By Grisso*
+-------------------------------------------------
| Message-ID: <328225E2.6596B64A@decan.com>
| Date: Thu, 07 Nov 1996 13:09:38 -0500
| Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american
| Subject: Re: Did We Shoot Our Wad on O.J.?
|
| Wayne Johnson wrote:
| >
| >
| > >Wayne Johnson wrote:
| >
| (( cuts ))
|
| > >I'll ask just one question: how do you explain the blood
| > >drop on the rear gate?
| >
| > The murderer dripped blood on it.
|
| That was what we were supposed to think, clearly.
| But then why was that blood drop absent from crime scene
| photographs taken of the rear gate on June 13,
| only to show up in photographs (similar as to angle
| etc.) taken much later, on July 3. Why did that blood
| drop then test positive for EDTA? And why did it
| contain abnormally high (by several orders of magnitude)
| levels of DNA? Do these facts suggest reasonable basis
| to suspect fabrication?
|
| (( more cuts, in the interests of coherence ))
|
| > If you can't keep it straight what we're discussing, drop it. You
| > talk about lynch mobs one minute, the jury the next, and you can't
| > keep your own claims straight.
|
| My claim basically is that there was nothing *illogical*
| about the verdict in the criminal trial. A secondary
| claim is that media hysteria about the case was/is fuelled
| basically by the same base passions that fuelled the lynch
| mobs of yesteryear, for the same sort of reason: black
| man taking objectionable liberties with a white woman.
| A third claim is that black people who assert their own
| superior intelligence in not falling for the Cochran
| peroration, while deploring the jury conversely for its
| supposed lack of intelligence, are themselves in the grip of
| an affliction known as Stockholm Syndrome. I'll take these
| claims in order.
|
| First, there is nothing illogical about the verdict: I
| reproduce an old post of mine (from alt.fan.oj-simpson
| before it was captured by crazies) which addressed the
| logical framework of the Simpson trial:
|
| +-----------------------------------------------------------------
| | Newsgroups: alt.fan.oj-simpson
| | Subject: Re: NOT A RACE CASE? READ THIS!
| |
| | Lance Simmons (aj161@yfn.ysu.edu) wrote:
| |
| |
| | : >You forget the fundamental philosophical principle. It is the piece
| | : >of data that doesn't fit the theory that falsifies it. A thousand pieces
| | : >of data that do fit are as nothing compared to one piece that doesn't.
| | : >If you don't believe me, read Shelock Holmes, or ask Arn or Dmitri.
| |
| | : You would be hard pressed to find even a single reputable philosopher
| | : of science who would accept the principle of falsification you have
| | : formulated above.
| |
| | How about Karl Popper, not that I am impressed by argument from
| | authority.
| |
| | : It is widely accepted now that _every_ major scientific
| | : theory has had standing counter-examples which have had to be explained
| | : away as anomalies.
| |
| | If there are anomalies it means that your theory is false. It may
| | still be a useful theory, for many purposes, but it would still be false.
| | Consider the very simple theory:
| |
| | All rich men are happy -- Theory 1
| |
| | All it would take to falsify it is to find one rich man who is unhappy.
| | It does not matter whether you have to go through a thousand, a million,
| | a billion rich men before finding the one who is unhappy, Theory 1
| | would still then be false. Now, faced with this inconvenient anomaly,
| | you have two choices: fuzzify your theory, eg:
| |
| | The vast majority of rich men are happy -- Theory 1+
| |
| | or, add to or change entirely your explanatory variables, ie. maybe
| | happiness derives from more than just wealth, then try again. As a
| | clue to how you might want to change your theory, you of course
| | look at your anomalous rich man and try to find out why it is he
| | is unhappy. So you may come up with:
| |
| | All rich men not charged with murder
| | are happy -- Theory 2
| |
| | That takes care of your anomaly (although Occam wouldn't like
| | Theory 2 very much), and meanwhile your Theory 1 or
| | its approximation, Theory 1+, would be pretty useful most of the
| | time. If that is what your "reputable" philosophers mean,
| | then I have no difficulty, but I would also maintain
| | that the existence of an anomaly is a strict falsification
| | of the theory for which it is an anomaly.
| |
| | : What one is to make of this phenomenon is another
| | : question, but the principle you state is no longer a candidate.
| |
| | I disagree, for the reasons stated above.
| |
| | : Another way of putting the point: one man's modus ponens
| | : is another man's modus tollens.
| |
| | I disagree again. Modus ponendo ponens (MPP) and modus
| | tollendo tollens (MTT) are rules of deduction, both
| | tautologically true, and therefore unassailable, purely on
| | semantic grounds. The issue in real-world theory, as distinct from
| | rules of deduction which are necessarily true based on
| | purely semantic considerations, is whether the rule of material
| | implication contained in the physical theory actually
| | corresponds to the real-world facts, and secondarily, if
| | the theory is materially correct, whether, in a particular
| | case where the theory is sought to be applied, the material
| | premises contained in the theory are met.
| |
| | In the Simpson matter, we have a theory roughly as follows:
| |
| | IF... F, O, and M ... THEN... G -- Theory S
| |
| | where F is all the forensic evidence taken at face value, O is opportunity,
| | M is motive, and G is guilt. If the prosecution can establish
| | F, O, and M, then the case is proven, and as a purely logical
| | proposition, none would disagree. Let us agree to leave
| | aside questions of opportunity and motive. Motive is not
| | necessary to prove crime, and lack of opportunity has not
| | been demonstrated, although the timeline is tight.
| | Under MPP, the prosecution attempts to assert F,
| | from which G follows under Theory S. The defense
| | asserts "not-G", which if it concedes Theory S, leads logically,
| | under MTT, to the conclusion "not-F", there must be some
| | mistake, or something "far more sinister". The battle-ground for
| | the trial therefore is not Theory S, per se, which is
| | conceded, rather the validity of the premise F, and neither
| | MPP nor MTT have any further bearing on the matter. Although
| | Simpson knows categorically whether the fact of the matter
| | is G, or not-G, the rest of us do not. So the battle is joined
| | as to whether F, or not-F, is the case. F may be divided into two
| | categories, Fa and Fb, say, where Fa is the forensic evidence
| | for which there appears to be no reason to doubt its validity.
| | Unfortunately, the rest of the evidence Fb, does not appear
| | valid, or at least there is a prima facie showing that it
| | is not what it appears to be. Blood on the sock, apparently
| | from Nicole, may have gotten there via a reference vial,
| | rather than from action at the scene of the crime at the
| | time of the murder, as the prosecution would have us believe.
| | Otherwise, why is EDTA detected where none should be, and
| | why these little red "microbes" where there should not be. As
| | long as Fb is a non-empty set, we have to question whether
| | Fa is all that it, also, appears to be. It does not matter
| | how many thousands of pieces of evidence appear to be in Fa,
| | if there is a single piece in Fb, the whole of F is called
| | into question, requiring, under the presumption of innocence
| | provision in the law, that the jury assume not-F to be the
| | case. If after the battle we are left with not-F, then Theory S
| | cannot be invoked, and we can conclude nothing about the
| | guilt or innocence of Simpson.
| |
| | Thus, in the case of scientific theory, the anomalous case
| | conclusively falsifies the theory, whatever your "reputable"
| | philosophers may say, while easy fuzzifications may still
| | leave the theory more or less useful. The challenge
| | would exist for not-so-easy extensions of the theory, or
| | complete changes of paradigm, to explain the anomaly.
| | It is in this manner that science progresses. It is the
| | anomalous case that acts as the spur to scientific advance.
| | In the Simpson case, a single anomaly explainable by
| | police malfeasance would infect the entire case, because
| | we would have no way of knowing, in the presence of
| | malfeasance, or perjury, where the truth ends, and fabrication
| | begins. Therefore, one anomaly has the power to outweigh
| | 1000 "fits".
| |
| | : --
| | : Lance Simmons
| |
| | Cheers!
| |
| | PS. Btw, I may not qualify as a "reputable" philosopher,
| | but see my book "a mathematical treatise on decision analysis under uncertainty" (ISBN 0-9649049-0-X;
| | $29.95; 320 pages; soft-cover; ACG Press, 1995) which
| | addresses some of the philosophical issues discussed here.
| |
| +-----------------------------------------------------------------
|
| So, what I'm saying, logically, is that in the presence of
| fabricated evidence (Fb is a non-empty set) even if some
| non-fabricated evidence Fa exists sufficient to prove guilt,
| (establish the premise required to trigger Theory S), justice
| nevertheless demands that Fa be disregarded, because it
| cannot be known, in the presence of a non-empty set Fb,
| whether Fa can be trusted. As to specifics, I assert that
| Fb contains at least the evidence related to the blood
| drop on the rear gate, about which I have posed certain
| questions above. There are other items besides, but I'm
| taking them one at a time.
|
| I think the foregoing, broadly, is the logic which
| forced the jury to disregard completely the forensic evidence.
| When, in addition, the timeline presented by the prosecution
| was iffy at best, the case was a lost cause. Racial animus
| need not have come into it; just the compelling requirements
| of reasonable doubt. In my opinion, it is those who point
| to Fa, disregarding doubts engendered by Fb, who are being
| illogical, if not wicked.
|
| (Note well: none of what I say *exonerates* Simpson; it
| merely explains, logically, how it is he could be found
| not guilty under a reasonable doubt standard, in the presence
| of a so-called mountain of forensic evidence F which however
| includes a subset Fb of fabricated evidence or perjured testimony.)
|
| So, quit maligning (implicitly) this jury. By my analysis,
| they appear to have been more perceptive than you.
|
| Second, the lynch mob scenario: I continue to maintain
| that after the 911 tapes were released, the tenor of the
| news coverage changed. In my estimation, the media set
| out to "get OJ!". I remember vividly all the posts on
| alt.fan.oj-simpson which said, in so many words, "Hang the
| nigger!", "Gas him!", "Fry him!", etc. ad nauseam. The
| coverage in the media was more circumspect, with expletives
| deleted and racial slurs expurgated. But the sentiment
| was palpably the same. If you did'nt "get it", well see my
| third point below.
|
| I'll add just one vignette, from a
| conversation I had with two white American men at a
| restaurant in Nassau, in August, 1994. These gentlemen
| were perfectly charming, as we chatted about this and
| that, both they and I were in an expansive mood, induced
| by good food (the lobster, grilled at table, was fabulous)
| and good drink. Then the topic turned to OJ.
| One of the two treated me to a little lecture. In America,
| he said, star athletes are pampered. They can have any
| woman they want. The cheerleaders and others fall all
| over these guys. They get the most beautiful girls.
| But why did he (OJ) have to go and *hit* her and humiliate her
| like that? It was a heartfelt lament. I did a kind of double
| take, because the guy was, after all, charged, not with
| hitting her, or humiliating her, but with *killing* her.
| What did all that stuff about cheerleaders and hitting her (as opposed to
| killing her) have to do with anything. But, as I
| pondered the encounter afterwards (you gotta connect
| those dots!) it struck me that it was almost like OJ and
| other star black athletes are granted a sort of honorary
| white exemption: here, go screw "our" women, even the
| most beautiful ones, but don't get the idea that you're
| really equal, and be sure to treat them real well. So
| when the honorary white black athlete violates the terms
| of his exemption, the sense of betrayal felt by the
| whites who granted the exemption is acute. They feel
| shamed, almost as though they were pimps for Nicole and
| all the other white girls he may have abused or humiliated
| in some way. It is that that is the lynching offense.
| White supremacy requires that white be *over* black, and
| there is a special rage reserved for those blacks who
| are "given" special privileges, only to abuse them,
| putting black *over* white or forgetting their *place*. That,
| I believe, is the psychological dynamic that explains
| why, for example, this case is bigger than the Oklahoma
| bombing for example, and the grave threat posed to the
| republic by home-grown terrorists. Surely, absent
| the racial dynamic, that would be more newsworthy than
| the murder of just two individuals, no different really
| from individuals murdered every day in this country.
| That's just my opinion, of course. But it seems grounded
| in the historical reality of this country, and it fits
| the facts of conversation with a white American male who
| was not threatening to me in any way, yet
| revealed some of the emotions that might have fuelled
| a lynch mob in the past. So much for that. Take it or
| leave it.
|
| Third, the Stockholm Syndrome in black folk:
| I am tempted to dub it Acquired Idiocy Disease
| (Stockholm Syndrome), or AIDss. Because, like AIDS,
| it's a form of immune deficiency, but of the mind,
| as opposed to the body. It happens when someone is
| taken captive, then subjected to a brainwashing.
| The captor applies physical
| and mental stress and abuse to the captive, in an
| active attempt to rearrange the mind and/or behavior
| of the captive. Under those conditions, a strange
| thing happens... the captive begins, willingly, to
| take on the mind-set and assumptions of the captor, and
| begins willingly to cooperate in the reconstruction
| of his own mind into the shape and form desired by the
| captor. It is a form of what I choose to call
| Acquired Idiocy Disease, when the natural immune
| response of the mind breaks down, and the captive
| hands his "head" over to the captor, who then interprets
| the captive's reality for him, and the captive no longer
| trusts the evidence of his own senses.
|
| We see that here when certain blacks, in the midst of
| the media onslaught baying for Simpson's blood, not only
| proclaim loudly their own belief in Simpson's guilt--
| to which I do not object per se, since it is possible
| for reasonable minds to differ as to the full scope
| of the set Fb discussed above--but also proclaim, even
| more loudly, their belief in the *stupidity* of fellow-
| blacks with whom they happen to disagree. Wait one
| minute, here. Part of what the captors are about precisely
| is the inferiorization of blacks. They are supposedly
| less "intelligent" than the "superior" whites. Thus,
| in the presence of F, the forensic evidence, observers such as
| Bugliosi would have us believe that these black jurors
| simply could not arrive at the compelling validity of
| Theory S (If F then G). They are too stupid, it is
| alleged, to comprehend Theory S. But as elaborated
| above, that's not the issue. The issue is that F=Fa+Fb,
| and that at least part of F, Fb, is fabricated, and
| the *quantity* of F relative to Fb is not persuasive
| when Fb calls into question the *quality* of F as a
| whole. If the premise F is not established, then the
| Theory S cannot be triggered, and we cannot assert G.
| Thus, if anybody's intelligence is to be called into
| question, it is that of those who keep trumpeting
| what a mountain of evidence there is, as though crap
| when piled sky-high is still not *crap* nevertheless.
| Yet certain black folk, in the grip of AIDss, anxious to
| distance themselves from those "stupid negroes" on the
| jury, and in the public, pose their own belief in
| Simpson's guilt, not in terms of their
| different take on the evidence supposedly in Fb, but
| in terms of their *own* superior intelligence. Hence
| we are treated to statements like "I'm open-minded,
| but my brain isn't falling out," and the suggestion
| that engineers are dismissed from jury duty because
| they are presumptively too "intelligent." I'm
| sorry, but their AIDss is showing. Like "house negroes"
| anxious to distance themselves from lowly "field negroes",
| they rush too soon and too loudly--Stockholm Syndrome
| being what it is--to assert their own intelligence
| (which btw is contradicted by a careful analysis of
| the situation) to join with the captors in their
| general derogation of blacks, while the captors,in
| the grip of base passions, collectively take leave of
| their own senses.
|
| I'm sorry. That's my take on the matter... I see what
| I see, and I say what I see. I would be happy to be
| proven wrong.
|
| Regards,
| "Free your mind; all you have to lose is AIDss"
|
+--------------------------------------------------
Grisso
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