Elizabeth Holmes convicted of fraud

[james_s]

If its a contract, why was I never asked to agree to and sign a copy? Its an imposition, not a contract.

You would rather it be up to the individual to administer justice? Personally I think it's good to have that be centralized and consistent, but if the government is not going to do their job then individuals ought to be allowed to do it for them.

[coppice]

If its a contract, why was I never asked to agree to and sign a copy? Its an imposition, not a contract.

You would rather it be up to the individual to administer justice? Personally I think it's good to have that be centralized and consistent, but if the government is not going to do their job then individuals ought to be allowed to do it for them.

I didn't say the imposition was not necessary for an orderly society, but calling it a contract in any way shape or form is bogus. A contract is an agreement between two consenting parties.

[Nominal Animal]

Part of the "social contract" is that the State deals with criminals, in return for citizens not taking the law into their own hands.

If its a contract, why was I never asked to agree to and sign a copy? Its an imposition, not a contract.

"Social contract" is a theory or model for how a community/governance works, originating from Jean-Jacques Rousseau's 1762 book The Social Contract.

The basis for calling it a contract is the explicit, implicit, or tacit agreement at exchanging some personal freedoms for protection and maintenance of social order.  Using current international law, license (from population to their states/governance) would be more apt, but the term is already over a quarter of a millenium old; and "social license" would be too easy to misunderstand (as something the state/governance allows for the populace).

[james_s]

I suppose if one doesn't agree to the "contract", the alternative is to either leave and settle elsewhere under terms that you find more agreeable, or overthrow the government and replace it with something else. It's a contract between the government and society overall, not you the individual.

[coppice]

Part of the "social contract" is that the State deals with criminals, in return for citizens not taking the law into their own hands.

If its a contract, why was I never asked to agree to and sign a copy? Its an imposition, not a contract.

"Social contract" is a theory or model for how a community/governance works, originating from Jean-Jacques Rousseau's 1762 book The Social Contract.

The basis for calling it a contract is the explicit, implicit, or tacit agreement at exchanging some personal freedoms for protection and maintenance of social order.  Using current international law, license (from population to their states/governance) would be more apt, but the term is already over a quarter of a millenium old; and "social license" would be too easy to misunderstand (as something the state/governance allows for the populace).

I know where it comes from. Manipulative language sickens me. I don't know if the terms used in the original language are any less bogus and manipulative, but calling it a contract in English is really bogus. Its an autocratically imposed order, not a contract. It dates from the time of monarchies with serious power, and was explicitly an imposed order where those imposing it didn't give a damn about individual or group agreement with it. Nothing much has changed, but its imposed by an oligopoly these days, so its very slightly broader than just the monarch.

[Nominal Animal]

Part of the "social contract" is that the State deals with criminals, in return for citizens not taking the law into their own hands.

If its a contract, why was I never asked to agree to and sign a copy? Its an imposition, not a contract.

"Social contract" is a theory or model for how a community/governance works, originating from Jean-Jacques Rousseau's 1762 book The Social Contract.

The basis for calling it a contract is the explicit, implicit, or tacit agreement at exchanging some personal freedoms for protection and maintenance of social order.  Using current international law, license (from population to their states/governance) would be more apt, but the term is already over a quarter of a millenium old; and "social license" would be too easy to misunderstand (as something the state/governance allows for the populace).

I know where it comes from. Manipulative language sickens me. I don't know if the terms used in the original language are any less bogus and manipulative, but calling it a contract in English is really bogus. Its an autocratically imposed order, not a contract. It dates from the time of monarchies with serious power, and was explicitly an imposed order where those imposing it didn't give a damn about individual or group agreement with it. Nothing much has changed, but its imposed by an oligopoly these days, so its very slightly broader than just the monarch.

I'm not sure it is manipulative language, because a contract based on tacit agreement is still a contract.

If you do not agree to something, you can contact your favourite politician to change that, or become a politician to change that.  You could claim that 'social contract' is not a real contract, because it isn't drawn up by both parties, and one is imposed upon you when you become of age or move to a new country.  Yet, most contracts private individuals daily execute are exactly like that, with changes to the contract difficult to initiate.  Whether that is right or wrong is irrelevant, because it is necessary for a relatively stable society to work in practice.  If every single contract is negotiated separately, the society will be frozen in red tape.

With the Western type of justice and governance, the same rules ought to apply to everyone, equally.  This means that the negotiation power of a single individual wrt. the social contract is minimal, because any change would affect everyone else too.  I don't mind subjecting myself to laws I don't exactly agree with, as long as the majority agrees the law is valid/proper/useful.

What I really hate, is when laws are selectively applied, like seems to be the case here with Elizabeth Holmes.

[Ed.Kloonk]

With the Western type of justice and governance, the same rules ought to apply to everyone, equally.  This means that the negotiation power of a single individual wrt. the social contract is minimal, because any change would affect everyone else too.  I don't mind subjecting myself to laws I don't exactly agree with, as long as the majority agrees the law is valid/proper/useful.

What I really hate, is when laws are selectively applied, like seems to be the case here with Elizabeth Holmes.

The laws do contain penalties, sometimes quite specific sometimes very vague. The prosecutor and defence lawyer can argue with each other if they think there is a precedent where a penalty was either too harsh or lenient. And the judge is supposed to examine the individual situation of the perp in order to settle on a spot within the range brought by both parties.

[coppice]

I'm not sure it is manipulative language, because a contract based on tacit agreement is still a contract.

If I do business with someone, they usually have a set of rules for the transaction that I am expected to follow. That is reasonably described as a contract. Most of the time we don't bother to read all the rules, but they are something we can choose to accept or go elsewhere. This is tacit agreement. If I object to aspects of a "social contract" I have no choices. Its compulsion, plain and simple. I might be able to leave the country, but for most people that's not an option. Unless you are content to spend the rest of your life on the oceans, or sneak in somewhere as an illegal immigrant, you can only leave one place if another will accept you. As I said before, most of the rules in most western countries are OK by me, but call them what they are.

[Sal Ammoniac]

Now, it seems, she's making a play for sympathy: https://news.yahoo.com/liz-holmes-wants-forget-elizabeth-140939820.html

[magic]

That's not how it works. She has to cut her boobs first, then every American will be bending over backwards to forget her name

[james_s]

Now, it seems, she's making a play for sympathy: https://news.yahoo.com/liz-holmes-wants-forget-elizabeth-140939820.html

She's just trying to create a new persona, just like the fake voice was part of a different persona. I think it's very likely she has BPD, she exhibits a lot of the symptoms, they tend to be chameleons.

[floobydust]

What's interesting in all this, is the research proving that prison time is basically ineffective. As far as "negative reinforcement" it does not deter as much as we think.
There are countless recidivism papers, most research results are behind paywalls unfortunately. There is also a mix of offender stats for druggies and violent types. Females re-offend less than males.

"Relative risk statistics at one year indicated that psychopaths were approximately three times more likely to recidivate—or four times more likely to violently recidivate—than were non-psychopaths."
2018 Prison population forecast and
Annual recidivism report 2014 cohort

"Psychopathy, as measured by the Levenson Self-Report Scale (LSRP; Levenson et al., 1995), consists of 3-facets: the interpersonal, affective, and behavioral facets.
The interpersonal facet of psychopathy includes symptoms of grandiosity, conning and manipulative behaviors, superficial charm, social dominance, and selfishness (Sellbom, 2011).
The affective facet is characterized by callousness, lack of empathy, and a lack of remorse (Sellbom, 2011).
The behavioral facet measures boredom susceptibility and unstable, angry, impulsive attitudes and behaviors (Garofalo et al., 2019; Thomson et al., 2020a). Research has demonstrated that the interpersonal facet is related to low agreeableness and higher levels of narcissism and moral disengagement (Garofalo et al., 2019). The affective facet is related to a lack of empathy, guilt, and morality, low agreeableness and conscientiousness, and higher levels of cold-heartedness (Garofalo et al., 2019). The behavioral facet is related to chronic antisocial behavior, emotion dysregulation, and impulsivity (Christian and Sellbom, 2016).
Gun Violence and Psychopathy Among Female Offenders

So she doesn't have to go to prison at all, it won't help anyway

[james_s]

The point of prison isn't to help the prisoner, it's to punish them, and to help the rest of society by keeping the offender out of circulation. A huge majority of the prison population has personality disorders and other psychological problems that can't be fixed, you can't teach a person to feel empathy, but you can keep them away from the rest of us.

[EEVblog]

Now, it seems, she's making a play for sympathy: https://news.yahoo.com/liz-holmes-wants-forget-elizabeth-140939820.html

[magic]

So she doesn't have to go to prison at all, it won't help anyway

Exactly. The whole point of insanity is gaining power over others while resisting their power over you. At least the healthy insanity; of course you can be unhealthy insane and end up a hobo on the other hand.

People seem to forget that the goal of life is not living up to the unrealistic expectations of Asperger's types and enlightenment philosophers

[HighVoltage]

She will most likely never go to prison.
Mother twice or not, any normal person would have been in prison a long time ago.
Maybe she is protected because she knows too much ?


Criminal Elizabeth Holmes Deemed 'DEVOTED MOTHER' In NYT Fluff Piece: Rising Reacts

[John B]

Don't be too hard on her. She had to look behind the couch and crack open the piggy bank to find enough coin to pay an international media outlet for a fluff piece.

[.RC.]

Oh come on. White, quite attractive, smart and wealthy.   

Whether you like it or not she has already ticked most of the important boxes, she is on a winner.

[Kjelt]

Oh come on. White, quite attractive, smart and wealthy.   

There is your main point, if someone has committed a crime, being a white collar crime or not, all profits from that crime should be taken back by the government to refund the victims.
The only thing that really works is to take away everything from criminals, because otherwise it keeps on being worthwhile to commit such crimes.

[floobydust]

She's got money stashed away somewhere, a net worth of $4.5B down to zero? Yeah right. Wealthy people game the legal system, first by using an armada of lawyers. Otherwise- she did piss off investors government and big business so I thought her legal bias would be against her, but no.

Talking with a engineering peer, he thinks these criminals "need to go to the chair". I thought that's a bit harsh. "no, just put them in the electric chair, throw the switch!"

That's when I looked at prison stats and find it's pretty much useless, and expensive:
"Fifty studies dating from 1958 involving 336,052 offenders produced 325 correlations between recidivism and (a) length of time in prison and recidivism or (b) serving a prison sentence vs. receiving a community-based sanction. The data was analysed using quantitative methods (i.e., meta-analysis) to determine whether prison reduced criminal behaviour or recidivism."
"The results were as follows: under both of the above conditions, prison produced slight increases in recidivism. Secondly, there was some tendency for lower risk offenders to be more negatively affected by the prison experience."
"The essential conclusions reached from this study were:
1. Prisons should not be used with the expectation of reducing criminal behaviour.
2. On the basis of the present results, excessive use of incarceration has enormous cost implications.
3. In order to determine who is being adversely affected by prison, it is incumbent upon prison officials to implement repeated, comprehensive assessments of offenders' attitudes, values, and behaviours while incarcerated.
4. The primary justification of prison should be to incapacitate offenders (particularly, those of a chronic, higher risk nature) for reasonable periods and to exact retribution.

source: https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/rsrcs/pblctns/ffcts-prsn-sntncs-rcdvsm/index-en.aspx

[rdl]

I don't see how locking her up makes sense. This was a "white-collar" crime. Make the punishment fit. Take her house and as much of her money as needed to equal the crime.

[rdl]

Yes, I know that's not how the laws work, I'm just saying how I think they should work in situations like this.

[floobydust]

Take away all her money, her house, leave the babies starving etc. - it's just more incentive for her to scam again. She's going to do it anyway.
Martin Shkreli is still at it, banned from Twitter over his start up Dr. Gupta medical chatbot.
It's been said, punishing these people for who they are, doesn't change them.

[james_s]

Nothing will change them, the hardware required to feel empathy is not hooked up and no amount of software tinkering can fix that. That's why you keep them locked up as long as possible to limit the amount of damage they can do.

[SiliconWizard]

I don't see how locking her up makes sense. This was a "white-collar" crime. Make the punishment fit. Take her house and as much of her money as needed to equal the crime.

I don't agree with this. I don't think the punishment should fit anything. It should just be proportional to the law offense and damage done.
Damage should be paid, which may take up a sizeable chunk of what she has, if not most of it, anyway.

A jail sentence is not just to isolate dangerous people. It's a fundamental deprivation of freedom, something that is historically considered the ultimate punishment, after death.
People that have committed serious enough crimes should be sentenced to jail. The point is not whether it actually solves anything and makes people better. The point is that it's a strong symbol that shows a given society won't let you get away with crimes, whatever they are.

It's interesting to witness that more and more people now see freedom as non-essential which leads to the deprivation of freedom not seen as much of a punishment in itself anymore. Would be a whole other topic. But yeah.

For others, deprivation of freedom is actually a lot worse than losing money.

Just a thought.