Great review. Brilliant excerpts, excellent analysis. My only quibble would be:
What Michael Lewis is not is for sale.
What leads you to this conclusion? I don’t know much about Lewis, but based on his prior books I would’ve said one thing he is not is stupid, or bad at understanding people. I feel you have to be inconceivably ignorant to stand by SBF and suggest he probably didn’t intentionally commit fraud, particularly in light of all the stories presented in the book.
Bizarre statements like “There’s still an SBF-shaped hole in the world that needs filling” have me speechless with no good explanation other than Lewis was on the take.
If you think it’s quite likely, IMO it would be worth setting up a manifold market on whether evidence will come out through Bankman-Fried’s prosecution showing this to be the case any time over the next year. You could get a lot of mana if this comes out!
(While we’re discussing it, I’ll say that I currently assign <10% to this probability, the Lewis doesn’t seem sleazy enough to publish such a positive book while Bankman-Fried is on trial for fraud and not mention that he’s getting money from the guy.)
No idea how likely it is. I’m not going to create a market but welcome someone else doing so. I agree the likelihood “evidence will come out [...] over the next year” is <10%. That is not the same as the likelihood it happened, which I’d put at >10%. More than anything, I just cannot reconcile my former conception of Michael Lewis with his current form as a SBF shill in the face of a mountain of evidence that SBF committed fraud. I asked the question because Zvi seems smarter than me, especially on this issue, and I’m seeking reasons to believe Lewis is just confused or wildly mistaken rather than succumbing to ulterior motives.
Great review. Brilliant excerpts, excellent analysis. My only quibble would be:
What leads you to this conclusion? I don’t know much about Lewis, but based on his prior books I would’ve said one thing he is not is stupid, or bad at understanding people. I feel you have to be inconceivably ignorant to stand by SBF and suggest he probably didn’t intentionally commit fraud, particularly in light of all the stories presented in the book.
Bizarre statements like “There’s still an SBF-shaped hole in the world that needs filling” have me speechless with no good explanation other than Lewis was on the take.
If you think it’s quite likely, IMO it would be worth setting up a manifold market on whether evidence will come out through Bankman-Fried’s prosecution showing this to be the case any time over the next year. You could get a lot of mana if this comes out!
(While we’re discussing it, I’ll say that I currently assign <10% to this probability, the Lewis doesn’t seem sleazy enough to publish such a positive book while Bankman-Fried is on trial for fraud and not mention that he’s getting money from the guy.)
No idea how likely it is. I’m not going to create a market but welcome someone else doing so. I agree the likelihood “evidence will come out [...] over the next year” is <10%. That is not the same as the likelihood it happened, which I’d put at >10%. More than anything, I just cannot reconcile my former conception of Michael Lewis with his current form as a SBF shill in the face of a mountain of evidence that SBF committed fraud. I asked the question because Zvi seems smarter than me, especially on this issue, and I’m seeking reasons to believe Lewis is just confused or wildly mistaken rather than succumbing to ulterior motives.