6 ms·

> That's not very good, and that's horrifying as that could literally happen to any of us by nothing more than some bad luck. Try reading my comment again, you

> That's not very good, and that's horrifying as that could literally happen to any of us by nothing more than some bad luck. Try reading my comment again, you fucking dumbass. EVERY DETECTION METHOD HAS A FALSE POSITIVE RATE, AND THE FBI'S FOR COUNTERTERRORISM APPEARS TO BE ABOUT 0.5 PER YEAR. It could not "literally happen to any of us with a little bad luck". You are several orders of magnitude more likely to be struck by lightning. More people have won $100,000,000 in a lottery than have been held in non-criminal custody by the FBI due to investigation mistakes. That's an error rate so low it would make jetliner engineers faint with envy. (You are orders of magnitude more likely to be killed by such an engineer than inconvenienced for a few days by the FBI.)

girvo 13y ago
Classy, mate.
cnvogel 13y ago
I certainly agree with your conclusion that there's a pretty low probability to be "inconvenienced by the FBI", especially compared with other, pretty real, dangers of our everyday life. Nevertheless, taking this case as an example, it must be concluded that the FBI would have "inconvenienced" one less citizen if they had applied Occam's razor on some of the evidence, or had not ignored some proof that had ruled out that particular suspect. Would they constantly do this, their false-positive rate might even be lower(!), they might not have wasted resources on a pointless investigation against this person... But, yes, a further "Uber-Terrorist" which indeed is able to plant false evidence to cast doubt on his guilt might elude them. What I don't agree with you at all is calling HN user girvo a "fucking dubass", so please leave this community, we'll not miss you.
- Daniel_Newby 13y ago
  Investigations are about gathering evidence quickly. The trail grows cold very, very fast. Hours, and even minutes, count a lot. By being fast you get inside the other side's decision loop, which is the surest road to victory. The actions were not a pointless waste of resources. If you see a smoking building, you cann the fire department and they haul ass. If it turns out to be dust from renovations, the call out is not a waste. False alarms are the necessary cost of true alarms. I will continue to call a spade a spade. If a worthless political shill posts their insane, childish conspiracy theory, they need to be told to take that shit elsewhere in clear terms. Saying that one mistake means everyone everywhere is in grave danger ranks up there with chemtrails and grassy knolls.

girvo 13y ago

Classy, mate.

cnvogel 13y ago

I certainly agree with your conclusion that there's a pretty low probability to be "inconvenienced by the FBI", especially compared with other, pretty real, dangers of our everyday life. Nevertheless, taking this case as an example, it must be concluded that the FBI would have "inconvenienced" one less citizen if they had applied Occam's razor on some of the evidence, or had not ignored some proof that had ruled out that particular suspect. Would they constantly do this, their false-positive rate might even be lower(!), they might not have wasted resources on a pointless investigation against this person... But, yes, a further "Uber-Terrorist" which indeed is able to plant false evidence to cast doubt on his guilt might elude them. What I don't agree with you at all is calling HN user girvo a "fucking dubass", so please leave this community, we'll not miss you.

Daniel_Newby 13y ago
Investigations are about gathering evidence quickly. The trail grows cold very, very fast. Hours, and even minutes, count a lot. By being fast you get inside the other side's decision loop, which is the surest road to victory. The actions were not a pointless waste of resources. If you see a smoking building, you cann the fire department and they haul ass. If it turns out to be dust from renovations, the call out is not a waste. False alarms are the necessary cost of true alarms. I will continue to call a spade a spade. If a worthless political shill posts their insane, childish conspiracy theory, they need to be told to take that shit elsewhere in clear terms. Saying that one mistake means everyone everywhere is in grave danger ranks up there with chemtrails and grassy knolls.