I assigned a relatively high probability of guilt for Amanda Knox because of a combination of ignorance and over-correction. I read material on the website of the innocent side first, and felt fairly convinced largely because of their assessment of the DNA evidence. The other website had a conflicting assessment of the DNA evidence, which I didn’t know how to adjudicate without trying to learn more about how DNA evidence works. I didn’t do this, and so remained uncertain but still thought that Knox was innocent with fairly high probability.
Additionally, I recall at the time that I was afraid of being “wrong.” The original post had the feel of setting up a “gotcha” and my instinct was to avoid being gotcha’d, so I started to hedge. I realized this wasn’t a good reason to change my assessment of the situation, but I discovered something else to blame it on: my own personal biases. I used to be a pretty hardcore libertarian and am wary of politics hijacking my mind (again), so I blamed the hedging on a correction of my own biases—I think I even mentioned this bias in my original comment. I also probably overweighted the fact that Knox was accused in the first place in my assessment.
In any case, I also recall changing my mind after reading the followup article and comments—partially because more research was put into that article than I put into my own assessment, but also partially because they considered the relevant data more honestly than I had. I don’t really recall the details of this update or, for that matter, the real reason why I now think Amanda Knox is innocent—it’s all cached thoughts at this point.
I assigned a relatively high probability of guilt for Amanda Knox because of a combination of ignorance and over-correction. I read material on the website of the innocent side first, and felt fairly convinced largely because of their assessment of the DNA evidence. The other website had a conflicting assessment of the DNA evidence, which I didn’t know how to adjudicate without trying to learn more about how DNA evidence works. I didn’t do this, and so remained uncertain but still thought that Knox was innocent with fairly high probability.
Additionally, I recall at the time that I was afraid of being “wrong.” The original post had the feel of setting up a “gotcha” and my instinct was to avoid being gotcha’d, so I started to hedge. I realized this wasn’t a good reason to change my assessment of the situation, but I discovered something else to blame it on: my own personal biases. I used to be a pretty hardcore libertarian and am wary of politics hijacking my mind (again), so I blamed the hedging on a correction of my own biases—I think I even mentioned this bias in my original comment. I also probably overweighted the fact that Knox was accused in the first place in my assessment.
In any case, I also recall changing my mind after reading the followup article and comments—partially because more research was put into that article than I put into my own assessment, but also partially because they considered the relevant data more honestly than I had. I don’t really recall the details of this update or, for that matter, the real reason why I now think Amanda Knox is innocent—it’s all cached thoughts at this point.