Is the “conspiracy theory” label stopping you from reaching your desired audience?
Has the thought-stopping pejorative phrase “conspiracy theory” ever caused serious problems discussing certain ideas or even objective facts with your audience, friends, family, or colleagues? Today even the simple word “conspiracy” is increasingly used this way. How can you overcome the thought stopping effect of “conspiracy theory” and expand your audience?
“Conspiracy theory” labelers frequently use superficially plausible arguments backed up by no data or a single or few examples. For example: “conspiracies will always or almost always fail because someone would have talked,” citing for example the exposure of the Watergate burglary failure and the downfall of Richard Nixon. This would for example suggest unsolved murders by conspiracies, such as “gang,” “Mafia” or “organized crime” killings are exceptionally rare or nonexistent.
What does the data actually tell us about the frequency and success rate of conspiracies?
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
“Conspiracy theory” is now a shorthand for crazy, irrational conspiracy theory from a nut or nuts used to quickly dismiss all sorts of ideas including even objective facts, generally applied when the “conspiracy theory” suggests misconduct or error by authority figures in a group the “conspiracy theory” labeler identifies strongly with.
“Conspiracy theory” has broadened to included related phrases: “conspiracy theorist,” “conspiracist”, “conspiracy thinking,” and even just “conspiracy.” In recent decades it is increasingly bundled with other thought stopping pejorative phrases such as “witch hunt,” “pseudoscience,” “denialist”, or “denier”.
Expanding Use of “Conspiracy Theory” and Related Pejorative Phrases
The shorthand pejorative meaning of “conspiracy theory” has expanded to include error theories that do not propose an actual conspiracy such as a laboratory leak of SARS-COV-2 at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and been used by high government officials such as Anthony Fauci and associates to stigmatize suggestions they may have made significant errors. “Conspiracy theory” has been frequently applied to the Mandela Effect and Graham Hancock’s lost civilization theories, recently expounded in the Netflix Ancient Apocalypse docuseries even though neither proposes a conspiracy.
This pejorative meaning of “conspiracy theory” represents a change in common usage of English that makes it difficult to either discuss or think about possible misconduct or error by groups of people, especially groups of powerful people. In this it resembles George Orwell’s fictional Newspeak in his novel 1984, a simplified English in which it is impossible to express or imagine error or misconduct by the ruling political party.
How, in fact, should we react when someone, especially authorities and experts shout “conspiracy theory” or “conspiracy theorist,” to dismiss something out of hand? Clearly one should not rely on pejorative labels such as “witch hunt,” “conspiracy theory,” “denialism,” or “pseudoscience” to dismiss alleged facts or actual conspiracy theories in the non-pejorative legal sense out of hand.
This does not depend on whether these labels were generated or centrally directed by the CIA, the Lyndon Johnson White House, the CPUSA, or any other group or real conspiracy. One needs to look at the actual facts and logic so labeled.
“Conspiracy theory,” “conspiracy theorist,” and other related pejorative labels are frequently used as if to say: criminal conspiracies are essentially impossible or so rare as to be easily and quickly dismissed by any sane rational person. One in a thousand. One in a million. Even physically impossible.
The pejorative “conspiracy theory” or related labels are generally applied to theories about significant events. These events are most often assassinations, murders, or suspected murders such as the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, his brother Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, the alleged suicide of late “financier” Jeffrey Epstein and others, where the alleged or suspected conspirators are usually authority figures in the group or groups the “conspiracy theory” labeler identifies strongly with.
Event
Date(s)
Killed
Official Cause
Assassination of Senator Huey Long
Sep. 10, 1935
Huey Long, Carl Weiss
Carl Weiss acting alone, Weiss killed by Long’s bodyguards
JFK Assassination
Nov 22, 1963
John F. Kennedy, J.D. Tippit, Lee Harvey Oswald
Lee Harvey Oswald acting alone. Oswald killed by Jack Ruby acting alone.
Malcolm X Assassination
February 21, 1965
Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little)
Originally convicted: Muhammad A. Aziz (exonerated) Khalil Islam (exonerated) Thomas Hagan
Conspiracy by enemies in the Nation of Islam.
MLK Assassination
April 4, 1968
Martin Luther King
James Early Ray acting alone
RFK Assassination
June 5, 1968
Robert Francis Kennedy
Sirhan Sirhan acting alone
Oklahoma City Bombing
April 19, 1995
at least 168 people
Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols (Michael Fortier convicted of related offenses, but not the conspiracy, plea deal)
TWA Flight 800
July 17, 1996
230, all on board
accidentally blew up
September 11 Attacks
September 11, 2001
2,996
attributed to 19 hijackers acting on orders from Osama bin Laden
Anthrax attacks
September 18 – October 12, 2001
5 killed
Eventually blamed on researcher Bruce Ivins
Jeffrey Epstein “suicide”
August 10, 2019
1 dead
Ruled a suicide
COVID-19 Pandemic
Fall 2019 – Present
Several million worldwide
Unknown
Most Prominent “Conspiracy Theories” Involve Homicide or Possible Homicide Cases
“Conspiracy theory” labelers frequently use superficially plausible arguments backed up by no data or a single or few examples. For example, conspiracies will always or almost always fail because someone would have talked, citing for example the exposure of the Watergate burglary failure and the downfall of Richard Nixon. This would for example suggest unsolved murders by conspiracies, such as “gang” murders, “Mafia” or “organized crime” murders, or Provisional IRA murders in Northern Ireland are exceptionally rare or nonexistent (see data below).
Conspiracy Data
There are laws against criminal conspiracy and people are convicted under these laws all the time. The FBI statistics on homicides for 2019 shows that about 14.7% of “cleared” (ostensibly solved) murders in 2019 involved at least one accomplice, a conspiracy in common usage.
FBI Attributes 14.7% of
Murders with Known Offenders to Multiple Offenders in
2019
A review of Wikipedia’s list of US serial killers showed that 56 of 553 identified serial killers active from 1950 to 2020 had accomplices, a conspiracy in common usage. This is 10.13% of the names listed. The error is roughly 1.4% giving a ninety-five percent confidence interval of about 7.9% to 13.2% of identified serial killer cases involve conspiracies — have accomplices. This provides a check on the FBI official numbers where the names of the killers and victims or at least forensic evidence of victims who could not be identified in some cases are available for independent review.
A review of US Presidential assassinations and plots showed that at least one of the four Presidential Assassinations (Lincoln) was clearly a conspiracy and 9-10 of 37 failed Presidential assassination attempts were conspiracies of some sort.
Unsolved Murders in United States
The FBI listed 27.8% of homicides in 2019 with an unknown offender or offenders. The rate of unsolved murders in the United States has increased substantially since the early 1960s. Police and other law enforcement officials in the United States often attribute unsolved murders to gang violence. Gangs are conspiracies in common English usage.
There is significant controversy over the fraction of unsolved murders due to gang violence. The FBI’s Supplemental Homicide Reports (SHR) generally list about 7.4 percent of unsolved homicides as gang related (categories “Gangland killing” and “Juvenile gang killings”). This usually appears to be based on the victim or victims being known to law enforcement as gang members. A survey of Wikipedia’s lists of unsolved murders both in the United States and around the world, found sixty-eight (68) out of 820 unsolved murder cases (8.29%) with notes indicating a suspected “gang,” “mafia,” or “organized crime” murder.
US CIA Murders
The US CIA declassified evidence in the 1970s strongly suggesting their involvement in the assassinations/deaths of Patrice Lumumba in the Belgian Congo (later Zaire), Dominican Republic dictator Rafael Trujillo and his son, President of South Vietnam Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother, Salvador Allende in Chile, and unsuccessful plots to kill Cuban President Fidel Castro in league with the US Mafia.
The CIA also declassified some records in the 1970s of a series of mind control research programs, usually referred to popularly as MK-ULTRA, involving many prominent scientists (Martin Orne, Louis Jolyon West, Ewan Cameron, many others) and illegal experiments on uninformed test subjects and even children. The mind control programs were kept secret for about twenty years and much remains unknown about these programs. At least one participant, CIA officer Frank Olson fell, jumped, or was thrown to his death nine days after being surreptitiously dosed with LSD.
Of the 1,186 killings that the PSNI’s Legacy Investigation Branch is assessing:
45.5% are attributed to republican paramilitaries. (loosely Irish Catholics, Communist groups)
23% are attributed to loyalist paramilitaries. (loosely English and Ulster Scots Protestants)
28.5% are attributed to the security forces. (loosely the UK British troops and intelligence groups)
For the remaining 3% of deaths, the background of those primarily responsible is unknown.
These represent still unsolved murders mostly attributed to large scale conspiratorial organizations. As with alleged unsolved gang related killings in the United States, proof is elusive. The politically charged 1972 disappearance/murder of Jean McConville, alleged to have been ordered by the Sinn Fein political party leader Gerry Adams in transcripts of “oral histories” collected by Boston College (USA) from former IRA members who claimed to have abducted and shot Jean McConville, has never been officially solved, although her body was discovered in 2004. Adams denies ever having been in the IRA, let alone being one of its leaders, or ordering the murder. (See, for example, Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe)
Unsolved Murders in Other Civil Conflicts
The conspiratorial civil conflict in Northern Ireland is unusual in taking place in a “first world,” western European “democracy.” Somewhat similar conflicts have occurred in many other nations with secretive revolutionary, quasi-governmental and governmental groups contending for power. Everything from the total number killed, number of unsolved murders, who killed whom and why, what constituted legitimate warfare versus war crimes is disputed. These include El Salvador’s civil war (1980-1992), Argentina’s “dirty war” in the 1970s and 1980s, civil conflict and war in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, civil conflict in South Africa in the 1980’s and early 1990s.
Arguably entire nations have devolved into criminal conspiracies with no rule of law, extensive secrecy and government lying to the population, and large numbers of executions including Nazi Germany, the Stalinist Soviet Union and China during the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution.
Conclusion
It is clearly rational to suspect conspiracies including high level conspiracies in unsolved or suspicious “solved” murders. The likelihood of a conspiracy involved in an unsolved murder is probably at least 8%, simply using the fraction of unsolved murders where a “gang” or “mafia” is officially suspected by law enforcement.
(C) 2023 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Alex Jones repeating CIA invented “conspiracy theorist” claim from Lance deHaven-Smith’s Conspiracy Theory in America (2013)
“It’s like CIA after they assassinated Kennedy in 63, they admitted in 67 they created the word ‘conspiracy theorist'”
Alex Jones on YOUR WELCOME with Michael Malice #237 (about Dec. 20, 2022)
Do you suspect conspiracies of powerful people are behind some important problems? Do you suspect President Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy? COVID-19 leaked from a gain of function lab?
Have you been dismissed, ridiculed, even angrily insulted by friends, family, or colleagues uncritically chanting the thought-stopping “conspiracy theory” label? How can you get friends, family, or colleagues to seriously consider the actual facts and logic?
A popular method is to claim that the CIA invented the pejorative label “conspiracy theorist” and/or “conspiracy theory” to counter critics of the Warren Commission Report on the assassination of President Kennedy. Several variations of this claim exist. They are derived from the book Conspiracy Theory in America (2013) by Lance deHaven-Smith which does claim this, citing a January 1967 CIA cable to overseas CIA stations declassified in the 1970s.
Conspiracy Theory in America (2013) Book Cover
This claim is unproven despite the affirmative statements in the book. The evidence presented in Conspiracy Theory in America is weak at best, consisting primarily of the 1967 cable.
Historical Growth in Use of “Conspiracy” Related Pejorative LabelsModerate Increase in Usage of “conspiracy theory” after JFK Assassinated (1964-1971) Levels Off
Contrary to claims, the phrase “conspiracy theory” was used in the modern pejorative sense occasionally in the 1940’s and 1950s, in philosopher Karl Popper’s The Open Society and its enemies (first published in 1943) and in Columbia University historian Richard Hofstadter’s Pulitzer Prize winning the Age of Reform in 1955. Popper used “conspiracy theory” as shorthand for “conspiracy theory of society,” which he ridiculed. Hofstadter used “conspiracy theory” as shorthand for his “conspiracy theory of history” which he ridiculed much the same as Popper. This language spread slowly among intellectuals and political junkies in the 40s and 50s, accelerating with the assassination of Kennedy in November 1963 for several years.
The CIA cable uses the phrases “conspiracy theories,” “conspiracy theorists,” and “conspiracy talk” each once in the cable which outlines factual and logical arguments to rebut critics of the Warren Commission.
The cable does not direct CIA stations to use the “conspiracy theory,” “conspiracy theorist”, or “conspiracy talk” phrases in rebuttals, nor outlines a campaign to use the phrases as marketing slogans similar to advertising/PR campaigns such as Wendy’s Restaurant’s highly successful “Where’s the Beef?” campaign in 1984/85.
“Where’s the Beef” usage soars with Wendy’s Ad Campaign — Hijacked by Walter Mondale to shoot down Senator Gary Hart
There is no spike in use of “conspiracy theory” or “conspiracy theorist” in 1967, only a moderate increase in use that started in 1964 and leveled off in 1971. The “conspiracy theory” language was used to attack both critics of the Warren Commission, Senator Barry Goldwater, his followers, and the then highly publicized John Birch Society. The pejorative label “conspiracy theorist” did not start to be used until the late 1970s, even then rarely, and took off in the late 1980s as shown in the plot above.
Claiming the CIA invented “conspiracy theorist” or “conspiracy theory” and/or citing deHaven-Smith’s book is preaching to the converted. Dismissive or hostile family, friends, and colleagues will examine the book and correctly find its claims unproven and weak at best. This will almost certainly add to their skepticism and willingness to dismiss facts and logic labeled “conspiracy theory” by authority figures they trust.
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
US President Abraham Lincoln was Murdered by a Criminal Conspiracy
It is common to encounter implicit or explicit claims, especially by intellectuals, that “conspiracy theories” are inherently irrational, impossible or extremely rare. The phrase “conspiracy theory” as well as related phrases “conspiracy theorist,” “conspiracy”, and “conspiracist” are used more and more to dismiss any suggestion of a criminal conspiracy or even error in certain events.
These are generally significant events, often assassinations, murders, or suspected murders such as the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, his brother Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, the alleged suicide of late “financier” Jeffrey Epstein and others, where the alleged or suspected conspirators are usually authority figures in the group or groups the “conspiracy theory” labeler identifies strongly with.
Event
Date(s)
Killed
Official Cause
Assassination of Senator Huey Long
Sep. 10, 1935
Huey Long, Carl Weiss
Carl Weiss acting alone, Weiss killed by Long’s bodyguards
JFK Assassination
Nov 22, 1963
John F. Kennedy, J.D. Tippit
Lee Harvey Oswald acting alone
Malcolm X Assassination
February 21, 1965
Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little)
Originally convicted: Muhammad A. Aziz (exonerated) Khalil Islam (exonerated) Thomas Hagan
Conspiracy by enemies in the Nation of Islam.
MLK Assassination
April 4, 1968
Martin Luther King
James Early Ray acting alone
RFK Assassination
June 5, 1968
Robert Francis Kennedy
Sirhan Sirhan acting alone
Oklahoma City Bombing
April 19, 1995
at least 168 people
Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols (Michael Fortier convicted of related offenses, but not the conspiracy, plea deal)
TWA Flight 800
July 17, 1996
230, all on board
accidentally blew up
September 11 Attacks
September 11, 2001
2,996
attributed to 19 hijackers acting on orders from Osama bin Laden
Anthrax attacks
September 18 – October 12, 2001
5 killed
Eventually blamed on researcher Bruce Ivins
Jeffrey Epstein “suicide”
August 10, 2019
1 dead
Ruled a suicide
COVID-19 Pandemic
Fall 2019 – Present
Several million worldwide
Unknown
Most Prominent “Conspiracy Theories” Involve Homicide or Possible Homicide Cases
This common and increasing usage of “conspiracy theory” makes it difficult even to discuss suspicions of criminal conspiracies or even incompetence by powerful persons or groups, not unlike George Orwell’s fictional newspeak in the novel 1984. Newspeak is a controlled language of simplified grammar and restricted vocabulary designed to limit the individual’s ability to think and articulate “subversive” concepts such as personal identity, self-expression, and free will.
Frequency of “Conspiracy Theory” and Related Phrases in Google Books (Dec 3, 2022)
What Does the Data Show Us?
There are laws against conspiracy and groups of people are convicted of conspiracy all the time.
US FBI Attributes 14.7% of Homicides in 2019 to “Multiple Offenders,” a conspiracy in common usage. Twenty-seven point eight (27.8) percent attributed to an unknown offender or offenders, a possible conspiracy.
CBS Report in 2008 Attributing Many Unsolved Murders to Gangs and Drugs
FBI figures reviewed by The Associated Press show that the homicide clearance rate, as detectives call it, dropped from 91 percent in 1963 – the first year records were kept in the manner they are now – to 61 percent in 2007.
Law enforcement officials say the chief reason is a rise in drug- and gang-related killings, which are often impersonal and anonymous, and thus harder to solve than slayings among family members or friends. As a result, police departments are carrying an ever-growing number of “cold-case” murders on their books.
Gangs, Drugs Blamed For Unsolved Murders, December 9, 2008 (CBS/AP)
Official statistics can be incorrect due to political pressure, bias, or simple error. Official agencies often never admit such errors even if they quietly revise or discontinue reporting the faulty statistic. Thus it is prudent to find independent checks on such official claims.
A review of Wikipedia’s list of US serial killers showed that 56 of 553 identified serial killers active from 1950 to 2020 had accomplices, a conspiracy in common usage. This is 10.13% of the names listed. The error is roughly 1.4% giving a ninety-five percent confidence interval of about 7.9% to 13.2% of identified serial killer cases involve conspiracies — have accomplices. This provides a check on the FBI official numbers where the names of the killers and victims or at least forensic evidence of victims who could not be identified in some cases are available for independent review.
Another check on the FBI numbers especially relevant to the use of the phrase “conspiracy theory” to dismiss suspicions of a criminal conspiracy are assassinations or attempted assassinations of US Presidents.
Here Wikipedia’sList of United States presidential assassination attempts and plots which lists only officially alleged conspiracies is reviewed (on December 3, 2022). There are unproven conspiracy theories involving all four assassinations and many, possibly all, attempts to assassinate US presidents.
Wikipedia’s List of United States presidential assassination attempts and plots (December 3, 2022)
The Wikipedia list discusses thirty-seven (37) alleged attempts to kill a US President, including when out of office. Of these 9-10 were arguably alleged conspiracies, mostly involving foreign political groups often labeled “terrorists.” This gives 24.3 to 27% of US Presidential assassination attempts were conspiracies. This matches the one (1) in four (4) actual presidential assassinations.
The statistics are quite low however. With 95% confidence anywhere from 0 to 75% of actual Presidential assassinations are actual detectable conspiracies, ignoring a significant failure rate for detecting a conspiracy — in practice conspiracies are clearly difficult to prove. With larger numbers of failed assassination attempts, with 95% confidence anywhere from 3/37 to 16/37, 8% to 43% of failed assassination attempts are actual conspiracies. These ranges are consistent with the 14.7% of homicides in 2019 involve multiple offenders reported by the US FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation).
Herbert Hoover[edit]
On November 19, 1928,[58] President-elect Hoover embarked on a ten-nation "goodwill tour" of Central and South America.[59] While crossing the Andes Mountains from Chile, an assassination plot by Argentine anarchists was thwarted. The group was led by Severino Di Giovanni, who planned to blow up his train as it crossed the Argentinian central plain. The plotters had an itinerary but the bomber was arrested before he could place the explosives on the rails. Hoover professed unconcern, tearing off the front page of a newspaper that revealed the plot and explaining, "It's just as well that Lou shouldn't see it,"[60] referring to his wife. His complimentary remarks on Argentina were well received in both the host country and in the press.[61]
Harry S. Truman[edit]
Main article: Attempted assassination of Harry S. Truman
Mid-1947: During the Jewish insurgency in Palestine before the formation of the State of Israel, the Zionist Stern Gang was believed to have sent a number of letter bombs addressed to the president and high-ranking staff at the White House. The Secret Service had been alerted by British intelligence after similar letters had been sent to high-ranking British officials and the Gang claimed credit. The mail room of the White House intercepted the letters and the Secret Service defused them. At the time, the incident was not publicized. Truman's daughter Margaret Truman confirmed the incident in her biography of Truman published in 1972. It had earlier been told in a memoir by Ira R. T. Smith, who worked in the mail room.[65]
November 1, 1950: Two Puerto Ricanpro-independence activists, Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola, attempted to kill President Truman at the Blair House, where Truman was living while the White House was undergoing major renovations. In the attack, Torresola injured White House Policeman Joseph Downs and mortally wounded White House PolicemanLeslie Coffelt. Coffelt returned fire, killing Torresola with a shot to the head. Collazo wounded an officer before being shot in the stomach. Collazo survived with serious injuries. Truman was not harmed, but he was placed at a huge risk. Collazo was convicted in a federal trial and received the death sentence. Truman commuted Collazo's death sentence to life in prison. In 1979, President Jimmy Carter further commuted Collazo's sentence to time served.[66]
Richard Nixon
Late May 1972: During Nixon's official visit to Tehran, Iran, a "Marxist terrorist group" named People's Mujahedin of Iran blew up a bomb at Reza Shah's mausoleum, where Nixon was scheduled to attend a ceremony just 45 minutes after the explosion.[73] This may have been the earliest known attempt on the president's life by an Islamic extremist.
Jimmy Carter[edit]
Raymond Lee Harvey was an Ohio-born unemployed American drifter. He was arrested by the Secret Service after being found carrying a starter pistol with blank rounds, ten minutes before Carter was to give a speech at the Civic Center Mall in Los Angeles on May 5, 1979. Harvey had a history of mental illness,[78] but police had to investigate his claim that he was part of a four-man operation to assassinate the president.[79] According to Harvey, he fired seven blank rounds from the starter pistol on the hotel roof on the night of May 4 to test how much noise it would make. He claimed to have been with one of the plotters that night, whom he knew as "Julio". (This man was later identified as a 21-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico, who gave the name Osvaldo Espinoza Ortiz.)[78] At the time of his arrest, Harvey had eight spent rounds in his pocket, as well as 70 unspent blank rounds for the gun.[80] Harvey was jailed on a $50,000 bond, given his transient status, and Ortiz was alternately reported as being held on a $100,000 bond as a material witness[78] or held on a $50,000 bond being charged with burglary from a car.[80] Charges against the pair were ultimately dismissed for a lack of evidence.[81]
NOTE: The Raymond Lee Harvey/Osvaldo Espinoza Ortiz case is obviously ambiguous since although arrests were apparently made, the charges were reportedly dismissed. Hence 9 or 10 conspiracy cases.
George H. W. Bush[edit]
See also: 1993 cruise missile strikes on Iraq
April 13, 1993: According to Kuwaiti authorities, and an FBI investigation [84] fourteen Kuwaiti and Iraqi men believed to be working for Saddam Hussein smuggled bombs into Kuwait, planning to assassinate former President Bush by a car bomb during his visit to Kuwait University three months after he had left office in January 1993.[85] The former president was on a visit to Kuwait in 1993 to commemorate the coalition's victory over Iraq in the Persian Gulf War when Kuwaiti officials claimed to have foiled an alleged assassination plot and arrested the suspects. At the time the former president was accompanied by his wife, two of his sons, former Secretary of State James A. Baker III, former Chief of Staff John Sununu, and former Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady. Of the 17 people Kuwaiti authorities arrested, two suspects, Wali Abdelhadi Ghazali and Raad Abdel-Amir al-Assadi, retracted their confessions at the trial, claiming that they were coerced.[86] A Kuwaiti court convicted all but one of the defendants. Then-president Bill Clinton responded by launching a cruise missile attack on an Iraqi intelligence building in the Mansour district of Baghdad. The plot was used as one of the justifications for the Iraq Resolution authorizing the 2003 U.S. invasion of the country. An analysis by the CIA's Counter-Terrorism Center concludes the assassination plot was likely fabricated by Kuwaiti authorities,[87] however at the time the FBI established that the plot had been directed by the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS), and The CIA had received information suggesting that Saddam Hussein had authorized the assassination attempt to get revenge against the U.S, to punish Kuwait for working with the U.S, and to keep other Arab states for intervening in Iraq any further.[88] The day before the attack, on April 12th, 1993, the then U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. and future 64th U.S. secretary of state, Madeleine K. Albright, went before the U.N. Security Council to present evidence of the Iraqi plot with the hope of gaining international support.
Bill Clinton
November 1994: Osama bin Laden recruited Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, to attempt to assassinate Clinton. However, Yousef decided that security would be too effective and decided to target Pope John Paul II instead.[92]
1996: During his visit to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum in Manila, Clinton's motorcade was rerouted before it was to drive over a bridge. Service officers had intercepted a message suggesting that an attack was imminent, and Lewis Merletti, the director of the Secret Service, ordered the motorcade to be re-routed. An intelligence team later discovered a bomb under the bridge. Subsequent U.S. investigation "revealed that [the plot] was masterminded by a Saudi terrorist living in Afghanistan named Osama bin Laden".[93]
Barack Obama
2011–2012: The far-right terrorist group FEAR plotted to carry out a series of terror attacks which included assassinating Obama.[107] The plot was foiled when four members of the group were arrested on murder charges and one, Michael Burnett, agreed to co-operate with authorities in return for a lighter sentence.[108]
Conclusion
Contrary to the popular belief among many intellectuals, clearly detected conspiracies are not exceptionally rare or non-existent, in Presidential assassinations and assassination attempts. Given that many actual conspiracies go unproven in more mundane murders, it is not unreasonable to suspect actual but unproven conspiracies in Presidential assassinations or other high profile murders or possible murders.
(C) 2022 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me (References follow this About Me section)
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Note that the details of these crimes are quite unpleasant and are discussed in these references. The analysis in this article is only concerned with the proportion of cases that were conspiracies as defined in common usage — multiple offenders working together.
Programmed to Kill: The Politics of Serial Murder, Dave McGowan, August 2004 https://www.amazon.com/Programmed-Kill-Politics-Serial-Murder/dp/0595326404/
Another brief followup to my article on the rationality of conspiracy theories. It is a common belief among intellectuals that “conspiracy theories” are inherently irrational or so unlikely as to be essentially inherently irrational.
The dictionary — as opposed to popular pejorative propaganda meaning — of “conspiracy theory” is simply a theory or hypothesis that some illegal or harmful event was caused by two or more malefactors working together. When surviving family, friends and neighbors, police investigators, news reporters or others suspect two or more perpetrators in a murder, they must consider a conspiracy theory.
The popular propaganda redefinition of “conspiracy theory,” the most straightforward dictionary phrase for a conspiracy theory, as “an irrational theory contradicted by evidence and reason” makes it difficult even to discuss and consider actual conspiracies in the modern world — not unlike the fictional newspeak in George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984.
United States FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) Homicide Statistics for 2019
A high fraction of events where the phrase “conspiracy theory” is used to stigmatize suspicions of a criminal conspiracy are murders such as the assassination of President Kennedy or possible murders such as the suspicious “suicide” of financier Jeffrey Epstein where the suspected criminal conspiracy involves powerful persons such as high government officials, politicians, business leaders, or others. According to official FBI statistics about 14.7 percent of murders in 2019 were committed by multiple offenders, a conspiracy in common usage.
Almost twenty-seven percent (27%) of murders in 2019 were unsolved. Unsolved murders tend to be gang violence/organized crime murders, that is conspiracies that could not be proven. The larger, the more powerful, and the more secret a gang or organized crime group is perceived to be, the less willing witnesses are to come forward with testimony and evidence.
Official government numbers may be inaccurate due to political pressure, bias, or error. For example, serious questions have been raised about the FBI’s estimates of the number of serial killers and serial homicides in the early 1980s.
Wikipedia List of serial killers in the United States screenshot (November 27, 2022)
Methods
The data was extracted from the Wikipedia page identified serial killers table to a CSV (comma separated values) file on August 18, 2022 for another analysis to understand the properties and possible causes of serial murders, notably the seeming 1970s-1980s serial killer wave. The analysis is done using the Python programming language, NumPy, SciPy, and Matplotlib.
The table includes a Notes column which enables identification of cases where there was one or more accomplice. The language “accomplice,” “accomplices,” “with partner”, “with husband,” “with wife,” and similar phrases is generally used to identify accomplices. Some accomplices are listed separately in the Name column of the table; some are not. Serial killers reportedly active in the United States from 1950 to 2020 were analyzed.
The accomplices refer to persons convicted in a court of law. They do not include unsubstantiated claims by the serial killer, suspects never convicted including named or unnamed suspects suggested in books such as Maury Terry’s The Ultimate Evil or Dave McGowan (no relation)’s Programmed to Kill. As discussed in my previous article, there is evidence of additional accomplices, never convicted, in a number of cases listed by Wikipedia with no accomplices in the Notes section. These include John Wayne Gacy, Patrick Kearney, Randy Kraft, and several others. These “maybe” serial killer conspiracies are not included in the results below which count only convicted accomplices.
The Wikipedia list of serial killers in the United States is extensive, appears correct, but there may be some errors.
The plot below gives a rough overview of the serial killer conspiracy cases — fifty-six (56) named serial killers out of 553 reportedly active from 1950 to 2020. This is 10.13% of the names listed in the table. The error is roughly 1.4% giving a ninety-five percent confidence interval of about 7.9% to 13.2% of identified serial killer cases involve conspiracies — have accomplices. Both the number of proven victims and the number of serial killers active peaks during the 1970s and 1980s, declining substantially in the 1990s up to 2020.
The green bars show the dates the serial killer and accomplices were active. The red circle shows the middle of this date range. The horizontal axis is the date in year. The vertical axis is the number of proven victims from the table. The red circles are labeled with the names of all identified serial killers from the table with the same middle of the date range. This shows some of the accomplices/conspirators. The data in the table, especially the notes column, is inconsistently presented, resulting in some serial killers not being grouped together. For example, Elmer Wayne Henley and Dean Corll, both shown in the plot, were accomplices. The table appears to credit Henley with only six (6) of the proven twenty-eight (28) murders organized by Corll, the ringleader.
Conclusion
Thus, proven in a court of law conspiracies are a small but significant fraction, about 10 percent (8-13% ninety-five percent confidence interval), of prominent serial killer cases — smaller than the 14.7 percent of murders with multiple offenders according to the FBI (in 2019). This is not surprising given the generally solitary nature of the crimes. Nonetheless, conspiracies are not exceptionally rare or unusual even in this type of murder.
Appendix: Deep Dive into Analysis
ACCOMPLICE CASES (56)
CASE NOTES MATCH AT LEAST ONE OF: accomplice, with wife, with husband, cult , accompliace, with his wife, with her husband, killers, partnership, with the aid of local teenagers
Bianchi, Kenneth Along with accomplice Angelo Buono Jr., known as "The Hillside Stranglers". Murdered young women in Los Angeles and Washington
Bittaker, Lawrence With accomplice Roy Norris known as "The Tool Box Killers"
Bonin, William Known as "The Freeway Killer"; preyed on young men and boys in southern California with several accomplices
Briley Brothers Three brothers and an accomplice responsible for 11 murders
Brown, Debra Denise Accomplice of Alton Coleman
Brummett, Lyle Raped and strangled three women in Texas with an accomplice
Bundy, Carol M. With accomplice Doug Clark, known as "The Sunset Strip Killers"; preyed on young women in West Hollywood and Los Angeles, California
Buono Jr., Angelo Along with accomplice Kenneth Bianchi, known as "The Hillside Stranglers". Murdered young women in Los Angeles
Carson, Michael Bear Along with his wife, Suzan Carson, dubbed "The San Francisco Witch Killers"; considered suspects in nearly a dozen other deaths in the U.S. and Europe[103]
Carson, Suzan Along with her husband, Michael Bear Carson, dubbed "The San Francisco Witch Killers"; considered suspects in nearly a dozen other deaths in the U.S. and Europe[103]
Chavez, Juan Rodriguez Known as "The Thrill Killer"; killed a neighbor during a burglary; paroled and went on a killing spree with a teenage accomplice
Clark, Doug With accomplice Carol M. Bundy, known as "The Sunset Strip Killers"; preyed on young women in West Hollywood and Los Angeles, California
Coffman, Cynthia Kidnapped four women by ATMs before accomplice strangled them
Coleman, Alton Multi-state killer who, along with his accomplice, murdered a man and injured another, murdered four women and three young girls, and raped a young girl
Cooks, Jessie Lee Part of "The Death Angels" cult responsible for the Zebra murders
Copeland, Faye Along with her husband, Ray Copeland, the oldest couple ever sentenced to death in the United States
Copeland, Ray Along with his wife, Faye Copeland, the oldest couple ever sentenced to death in the United States
Corll, Dean Known as "The Candy Man" and "The Pied Piper". Crimes referred to as "The Houston Mass Murders"; raped and murdered boys and young men in Texas with the aid of teenaged accomplices David Owen Brooks and Elmer Wayne Henley
Davis, Girvies Accomplice of Richard Holman; killed robbery witnesses, saying it was "easier" than wearing a mask
Dieteman, Samuel Accomplice Dale Hausner Committed suicide in prison
Gallego, Gerald Accomplice Charlene Gallego released in 1997
Gecht, Robin Member of the satanic cult and organized crime group known as "The Ripper Crew" or "The Chicago Rippers"
Gordon, Steven Dean Sex offender who raped and strangled prostitutes in Santa Ana and Anaheim, California, aided by accomplice Franc Cano
Graham, Gwendolyn Accomplice of Cathy Wood; nurse's aide that preyed on elderly women in a Walker, Michigan nursing home
Green, Larry Part of "The Death Angels" cult responsible for the Zebra murders
Gretzler, Douglas With accomplice Willie Steelman, killed witnesses to their robberies spree across California and Arizona
Henley, Elmer Wayne Crimes referred to as "The Houston Mass Murders"; accomplice of Dean Corll, who he later killed in self-defense
Herzog, Loren Along with accompliace Wesley Shermantine known as "The Speed Freak Killers"
Holman, Richard Accomplice of Girvies Davis; killed robbery witnesses
Kadamovas, Jurijus Accomplice of Iouri Mikhel; Lithuanian immigrant who kidnapped five people for ransom money in California and killed them
Knorr, Theresa Her sons, William and Robert Jr., were accomplices
Knotek, Michelle Tortured and abused boarders in her home with her husband
Kokoraleis, Andrew Member of the satanic cult and organized crime group known as "The Ripper Crew" or "The Chicago Rippers"
Kokoraleis, Thomas Member of the satanic cult and organized crime group known as "The Ripper Crew" or "The Chicago Rippers"
Koster, Brent Teenage accomplice of Danny Ranes, who actively participated in three of his four murders
Lake, Leonard Along with accomplice Charles Ng, they are also known as "The Operation Miranda Killers"
Lewingdon, Gary Together with brother Thaddeus Lewingdon, known as "The .22 Caliber Killers"
Lewingdon, Thaddeus Together with brother Gary Lewingdon, known as "The .22 Caliber Killers"
Malvo, Lee Boyd With accomplice John Allen Muhammad, perpetrated the D.C. sniper attacks
McCoy, Stephen Along with his accomplice, James Paster, the pair murdered three people in the Houston Area
Mikhel, Iouri Accomplice of Jurijus Kadamovas; Russian immigrant who kidnapped five people in California for ransom money and killed them
Moore, Manuel Part of "The Death Angels" cult responsible for the Zebra murders
Muhammad, John Allen With accomplice Lee Boyd Malvo, perpetrated the D.C. sniper attacks
Neelley, Alvin Committed murders with wife Judith Neelley
Neelley, Judith Committed murders with husband Alvin Neelley
Ng, Charles Along with accomplice Leonard Lake, they are also known as "The Operation Miranda Killers"
Norris, Roy With accomplice Lawrence Bittaker known as "Tool Box Killers"
Pardo, Manuel South Florida former police officer who acted in partnership with Rolando Garcia; the two claimed to be ridding the world of drug dealers
Paster, James Along with his accomplice, Stephen McCoy, the pair murdered three people in the Houston Area. Paster confessed to two other murders for which he was never tried.
Ranes, Danny Kidnapped, raped and murdered women around Kalamazoo, Michigan with teenage accomplice Brent Koster
Schmid, Charles Known as "The Pied Piper of Tucson"; murdered three teenage girls in Arizona with the aid of local teenagers
Shermantine, Wesley Along with accompliace Loren Herzog, known as "The Speed Freak Killers"
Simon, J.C.X. Part of "The Death Angels" cult responsible for the Zebra murders
Spreitzer, Edward Member of the satanic cult and organized crime group known as "The Ripper Crew" or "The Chicago Rippers"
Toole, Ottis Accomplice of Henry Lee Lucas; claimed to have murdered Adam Walsh
Wood, Cathy Accomplice of Gwendolyn Graham; nurse's aide that preyed on elderly women in a Walker, Michigan nursing home. Released on January 16, 2020
ACCOMPLICE CASES (56)
Note that the details of these crimes are quite unpleasant and are discussed in these references. The analysis in this article is only concerned with the proportion of cases that were conspiracies as defined in common usage — multiple offenders working together.
Programmed to Kill: The Politics of Serial Murder, Dave McGowan, August 2004 https://www.amazon.com/Programmed-Kill-Politics-Serial-Murder/dp/0595326404/
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics
"""
Short demo How to Display Grid Lines in MatPlotLib
(C) 2022 by Mathematical Software Inc.
http://www.mathematical-software.com/
"""
# Python Standard Library
import os
import sys
import time
# NumPy and MatPlotLib add on Python packages/modules
import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
XRANGE = 5.0
CUBE_CONST = 1.5
ACCELERATION = 9.8
VELOCITY = -20.0
x = np.linspace(-XRANGE, XRANGE, 200)
y = CUBE_CONST*x**3 + 0.5*ACCELERATION*x**2 + VELOCITY*x
# simple MatPlotLib plot
f1 = plt.figure()
ax = plt.axes() # get plot axes
ax.set_facecolor('lightgray') # background color of plot
plt.plot(x, y, 'g-')
plt.title('Grid Lines in MatPlotLib DEMO')
plt.xlabel('X')
plt.ylabel(f'Y = {CUBE_CONST:.2f}*X3 + {0.5*ACCELERATION:.2f}*x**2' f' + {VELOCITY:.2f}*x)')
plt.grid(which='major', color='black')
plt.grid(which='minor', color='gray')
plt.minorticks_on() # need this to see the minor grid lines
plt.show(block=True)
f1.savefig('how_to_display_grid_lines_in_matplotlib.jpg',
dpi=300)
(C) 2022 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Short video on how to get the standard Normal/Gaussian/Bell Curve function in Python without writing your own implementation which is complex and error prone.
# Example of Standard Bell Curve Function in Python
from matplotlib import pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
import math # no Gaussian function
# Get scipy add on module from scipy.org
from scipy.stats import norm # Gaussian function in scipy.stats
# Custom Gaussian/Normal/Bell Curve custom function
def gaussian(x, mean, sigma):
return 1./(math.sqrt(2.0*math.pi)*sigma)\
* np.exp(-0.5*np.power((x - mean)/sigma, 2.))
x = np.linspace(-3, 3, 100)
# plt.plot(gaussian(x, 0.0, 1.0))
plt.plot(norm.pdf(x, loc=0.0, scale=1.0))
plt.grid(True)
plt.show()
(C) 2022 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Subscribe to our free Weekly Newsletter for articles and videos on practical mathematics, Internet Censorship, ways to fight back against censorship, and other topics by sending an email to: subscribe [at] mathematical-software.com
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
Subscribe to our free Weekly Newsletter for articles and videos on practical mathematics, Internet Censorship, ways to fight back against censorship, and other topics by sending an email to: subscribe [at] mathematical-software.com
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
I recently ran across a claim citing the United States Census that non-white US population has increased from about 10 percent in 1921 to about 30 percent today that is almost certainly based on comparing apples and oranges:
Census records from 1921 indicate that non-whites comprised 10.2% of the American population that year while the 2010 census reports that non-whites now constitute more than 30% of the population. 38,39 Be that as it may, it can be argued that, while the numbers of non-whites in the United States have increased over the past century, so has the number of Planned Parenthood facilities.
McCrea, Sarah (2015) “Eugenics No Matter What?: An Investigation of the Eugenic Origin of Planned Parenthood and its Effect on Contemporary Society,” Black & Gold: Vol. 1. Available at: https://openworks.wooster.edu/blackandgold/vol1/iss1/5 (pages 8-9)
The US Census did not start regularly counting Hispanics, which is a cultural category that includes persons with entirely European ancestry, some or all American Indian ancestry, Blacks, essentially anyone who traces their background to a Spanish speaking region or country, until 1970.
California for example classified most Hispanics as white in 1921 and American Indians were explicitly exempted from the infamous California law banning interracial marriage — otherwise a huge fraction of the state population would have faced a bureaucratic nightmare when trying to marry. Today, I would estimate about 80% of Hispanics, defined as a Spanish surname, in California have visible American Indian ancestry. Hard to be sure, but probably very similar numbers in 1921. The US acquired a substantial non-white — as sometimes defined today — population in the Mexican-American war and the annexation of Texas. The US census avoided counting these people as separate from the “white” population. Note that many Hispanics self-identify as “white” when asked their race even if they have visible American Indian ancestry.
References on the Racial Classification of Hispanics in California
These are some references to back up my discussion of the curious laws and social customs of California in the past. This is the text of the California State Supreme Court decision in the Perez vs Sharp case that invalidated bans on interracial marriages in 1948:
Note that the issue was the marriage of Andrea Perez, a Mexican-American woman who identified as “white” and Sylvester Davis who identified as “Negro”.
The interracial marriage law in California did not ban marriages between whites and either Mexican-Americans or American Indians. Mexican-Americans were usually classified as “white” legally in California.
Curiously, one could drive down to Mexico, get married in Mexico where interracial marriages were legal, and return to California which would recognize the marriage in another jurisdiction despite the law. Andrea Perez wanted to get married in her Catholic Church in LA, hence the challenge.
Not One Drop of Blood
There is a myth that one encounters on the Internet and in some political debates, that the United States historically had a one drop of blood rule where any non-white ancestry immediately resulted in being classified as non-white. There is even a Wikipedia page on the One-drop of blood rule which used to be grossly inaccurate and promote this myth. California with its large mixed-race population long deviated from this supposed rule.
(C) 2022 by John F. McGowan, Ph.D.
About Me
John F. McGowan, Ph.D. solves problems using mathematics and mathematical software, including developing gesture recognition for touch devices, video compression and speech recognition technologies. He has extensive experience developing software in C, C++, MATLAB, Python, Visual Basic and many other programming languages. He has been a Visiting Scholar at HP Labs developing computer vision algorithms and software for mobile devices. He has worked as a contractor at NASA Ames Research Center involved in the research and development of image and video processing algorithms and technology. He has published articles on the origin and evolution of life, the exploration of Mars (anticipating the discovery of methane on Mars), and cheap access to space. He has a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a B.S. in physics from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech).
