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Pastimes : Murder Mystery: Who Killed Yale Student Suzanne Jovin? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MNI who wrote (279)	1/12/2000 7:33:00 AM
From: Jeffrey S. Mitchell	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1397

Regarding the use of 'creative writing' as you named it, I oppose you. I think you are doing most of the 'creative writing' yourself; even if you think you do it only to repeal others, your objection is not valid. You surely look like reserving a powerful tool for yourself. If you object by creative writing, and decide that your own harvest in the fields of creativity have yielded the most likely scenario, you will sure follow me to call you too partisan to be a moderator - a role you assume whenever you try to fix the rules of the game. The best way I can answer that is by repeating my paradox: What is the difference between an innocent person with no alibi and someone who has committed the "perfect crime"? Nothing! The point is the only way for an innocent person to "prove" they didn't do it is to have some evidence they were somewhere else when the crime occurred. Barring that, you can always concoct some scenario to explain why they may have been the murderer. For example: There are three people in a room. I place a piece of chocolate candy on the table in the front. The lights go off and on and the candy is gone. Who did it and why? I'm sure without further information we could come up with an unlimited number of answers. Suppose I next told you the lights went on and off in five seconds. The time factor might be enough to eliminate person "a" sitting in the back of the room. Suppose I next told you person "b" claimed to be allergic to chocolate. This might also rule them out. At the very least, it should force an investigator to a) measure the time it would take to go from all three seats to the table and back, and b) check whether person "b" really is allergic to chocolate and whether they still have been known to eat it occasionally regardless. Getting what we believe to be reliable answers to these questions would save us all sorts of time and effort in figuring out who most likely did it. In the Jovin murder, the key facts are: 1. The timeline 2. Suzanne's plans for that night, 3. Whether or nor a car were used, 4. Where Suzanne was spotted. My definition of "creative writing" was intended to describe a scenario that ignores "reasonable" application of the above. Perhaps that's a poor choice of words because being creative is certainly a good thing. Perhaps I should have said "chimerical" instead, as in unrealistic. What most worried me about what CJ wrote is that it seemed to me to be based on a series of "givens" that I didn't think merited that distinction. That, of course, is my opinion :). For example, CJ has Jim and Suzanne planning a meeting. Jim says no such meeting was ever planned. So, should we establish it as a given that everything Jim says is a lie? Sure we should always be suspect of what he says, but if we are going to discount it shouldn't we first establish a basis for that? Looking big picture, is there any reason in general to assume Suzanne were setting out to meet anyone at all? The problem is that if we gloss over this point it's literally possible for us to assume any number of people called Suzanne between 8:45 and 9:01 that night setting up an impromptu meeting. Should we go through all her friends one by one and establish whether they might have called? Well, had Suzanne told someone, anyone, she were going to "meet a friend" then yes! She didn't. So unless we are prepared to show how it's reasonable that Suzanne lied or didn't see fit to tell people her true destination then why bother? Please also note, that some scenarios 'that are the most likely based on the evidence' as you call them, may need some development time, and some team work, and therefore, in a nascent or intermediate step will be published in a state tuned with only part of the evidence, e.g. the timeline, or part of it, and some comments that are added to show up for the blanks, that still have to be filled in. Absolutely. One new fact could send us back to the drawing board... but it could also get us one step closer to the killer. - Jeff