on par with all sklansky's OPs, so we're good.

Barely know the details. But the reason questions like this can be important is because they could be helpful for those who want to improve their skills in evaluating non mathematical probability problems.

OOT ain't those people.

Yeah, I'm afraid Minimalist is right.

Dershowitz rhymes with Berkowitz.

GUILTY!

lol

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could you be any more awkward or evasive in not answering the question?

of course he is guilty of having sex with 14 year old girls. the odds are like 100.1% that he is. The extra 0.1% is just in case any one was foolish enough to believe it is not true

If only there was a math or probability forum

but this is a non mathematical problem.

Dersh was spittin hot fire today on CNN New Day!

It wasn't your standard mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore, grandpasimpsonyellingatcloud.jpg old man rant either. He seemed legit shook and dared opposing side to come onto the program and say he had sex with those girls on camera.

Whether he's guilty or not, the guy knows how to command an audience. Alisyn Camerota, who is usually a loudmouth that cuts guests off regularly was silenced because he just kept ranting. Her being quiet would be a good thing imo.

You're an idiot.

Dershowitz is a badass arguer. He has a really sense of drama and presence when he speaks.

Dershowitz is a staunch supporter of torture and so he is very likely amoral/sociopathic. More evidence to that is he defended OJ.

It's hard to imagine anyone legitimate would come at him with something obviously bogus. Dershowitz is extremely influential as well as vengeful. He once ruined another professor's academic career because that professor outed Dershowitz as a plagiarist. Incidentally, the charges of plagiarism were accurate. There is a link to that whole episode through the link above- fascinating story.

And then there is the tell I picked in the CNN video (yes, I am kinda joking). In about the middle of the interview Dershowitz says "I am filing today a sworn affidavit, denying categorically the truth."

Given all this, I feel that his probability of being guilty is about 80%.

Why can't other people answer as well as you?

There are several different conceptual approaches to probability. Incorporating "feel" or subjective judgements into probability estimates is legitimate under one of them. So this is a math problem.

That no one ever imagined a connection between Dershowitz and Prince Andrew seems to up the probability that Dershowitz is guilty. It's hard to imagine his accuser randomly conjuring up Dershowitz.

This is the idea man behind the OJ defense. Deny everything categorically and attack is always the best strategy when you are guilty. Also he is a very talented debater. To my mind this behavior ups the probability of guilt.

is this Dershowitz? because this response is much like his TV interview rants...... all bark and no substance.

yes this, I like how poker players like to rationalize and it applies to most cases but in this case that's just wrong.

This seems pretty poorly reasoned to me. It seems like you had all of this stuff about Dershowitz in your head, and you were just waiting for him to be accused of something. He defended OJ so he probably ****s kids. He supports torture so he probably ****s kids. He plagarized something and attacked his accuser so he probably ****s kids.

For me, the best publicly available information that could sway things one way or another is how much he hung around this Epstein guy in private settings. If he was regularly spending weekends at this dudes private island, making overnight visits to his other houses, etc., then I think he is easily 80%+ to be guilty. None of the stuff you posted has even the slightest impact on my estimate of his guilt.

Bayesians ITT

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I think I was pretty damn clear in my original post that the probability of Dershowitz having had sex with underage women is close to zero percent. To be somewhat more specific, Dershowitz is 76 years old, has no criminal record, and has specific responses to the vague allegations being made against him (i.e. that he was at Epstein's island with his wife and child and was never out of sight of his wife etc.). He also has no history whatsoever of bar disciplinary proceedings or crime in any respect. He has also challenged the accuser and her counsel to repeat the same allegations in the press or in another context which is not immune from libel.

If the question instead is whether or not Dershowitz knew that Epstein was a scumbag who paid teenagers for sex, well, that's a very different question. I don't know how to assess that probability except to say that it's higher than what I say above.

This is coming up in a somewhat unusual setting, however: the statements in question about Dershowitz are not being made in a claim against him or one in which he's a party. Rather, they're being made in an effort to undo Epstein's plea bargain because federal prosecutors didn't follow the law when they crafted Epstein's plea deal: prosecutors are required, apparently, to discuss such a deal with victims -- and did not do so here. The allegation clearly is that Epstein, being a politically powerful Democrat who hobnobbed with Bill Clinton, exerted political influence to get a sweet plea deal -- 18 months' sentence for multiple counts of underage prostitution. Dershowitz was Epstein's lawyer for some or all of that process.

Actually, it's not. Dershowitz was Epstein's lawyer on the plea deal that the victim is trying to flip. The single best way to do that is to exert political pressure on the issue, and making scandalous allegations that are splashed all over the newspaper is a fine way to do just that.

I'll be pretty surprised if the accuser repeats her allegations out of court, for the reasons I articulate in my other post.

Who brings their wife and daughter to some billionaire hedonism-bot's massage getaway?

When you need good cover and an alibi...

I agree.