I think the priors here are very low, so while I agree it looks suspicious, I don’t think it’s remotely suspicious enough to have the correct posterior be “about zero chance that wasn’t murder”. Corporations, at least in the U.S. really very rarely murder people.
That’s true, but the timing and incongruity of a “suicide” the day before testifying seems even more absurdly unlikely than corporations starting to murder people. And it’s not like they’re going out and doing it themselves; they’d be hiring a hitman of some sort. I don’t know how any of that works, and I agree that it’s hard to imagine anyone invested enough in their job or their stock options to risk a murder charge; but they may feel that their chances of avoiding charges are near 100%, so it might make sense to them.
I just have absolutely no other way to explain the story I read (sorry I didn’t get the link since this has nothing to do with AI safety) other than that story being mostly fabricated. People don’t say “finally tomorrow is my day” in the evening and then put a gun in their mouth the next morning without being forced to do it. Ever. No matter how suicidal, you’re sticking around one day to tell your story and get your revenge.
The odds are so much lower than somebody thinking they could hire a hit and get away with it, and make a massive profit on their stock options. They could well also have a personal vendetta against the whistleblower as well as the monetary profit. People are motivated by money and revenge, and they’re prone to misestimating the odds of getting caught. They could even be right that in their case it’s near zero.
So I’m personally putting it at maybe 90% chance of murder.
I think the priors here are very low, so while I agree it looks suspicious, I don’t think it’s remotely suspicious enough to have the correct posterior be “about zero chance that wasn’t murder”. Corporations, at least in the U.S. really very rarely murder people.
That’s true, but the timing and incongruity of a “suicide” the day before testifying seems even more absurdly unlikely than corporations starting to murder people. And it’s not like they’re going out and doing it themselves; they’d be hiring a hitman of some sort. I don’t know how any of that works, and I agree that it’s hard to imagine anyone invested enough in their job or their stock options to risk a murder charge; but they may feel that their chances of avoiding charges are near 100%, so it might make sense to them.
I just have absolutely no other way to explain the story I read (sorry I didn’t get the link since this has nothing to do with AI safety) other than that story being mostly fabricated. People don’t say “finally tomorrow is my day” in the evening and then put a gun in their mouth the next morning without being forced to do it. Ever. No matter how suicidal, you’re sticking around one day to tell your story and get your revenge.
The odds are so much lower than somebody thinking they could hire a hit and get away with it, and make a massive profit on their stock options. They could well also have a personal vendetta against the whistleblower as well as the monetary profit. People are motivated by money and revenge, and they’re prone to misestimating the odds of getting caught. They could even be right that in their case it’s near zero.
So I’m personally putting it at maybe 90% chance of murder.