To hear them tell it, it’s big. Some scientists continued their association with Epstein after his sex assault rap in 2008 (under social duress, maybe?):
But others continued to accept funding from Epstein, BuzzFeed reports. Evolutionary biologist Robert Trivers, who retired from Rutgers Universty in 2017, told Reuters in 2015 that he had accepted $40,000, and defended Epstein by saying that girls mature earlier now than they used to—comments he walked back in a tweet published this July.
Still others continued to facilitate meetings between Epstein and members of the research community. Martin Nowak, a mathematician and evolutionary biologist at Harvard University, arranged a get-together in 2012 between Epstein and scientists at MIT and Harvard. Nowak tells BuzzFeed he’d received no funding from Epstein since the latter’s conviction, although he continued to thank him in scientific papers published up until at least 2012.
Catherine Offord, “More Scientists, Institutions with Links to Jeffrey Epstein” at The Scientist
Several science research foundations that received Epstein money have said that they will donate an equivalent amount to an appropriate cause (for example, causes fighting sexual exploitation).
An interesting take on the story is the study of the networks Epstein moved around in:
Harvard, thus far, doesn’t get it. In July, school representatives said the university had no plans to return $6.5 million that helped set up its Program for Evolutionary Dynamics.
Giving away the money would begin to clean up the gross, topologically complex web of influence trading that Epstein helped weave. Before and after his year in prison, in 2008, Epstein lavished money and attention on scientists—biologist Stephen Jay Gould, biochemist George Church, evolutionary scientist Martin Nowak, linguist Steven Pinker, physicist Murray Gell-Mann, physicist Stephen Hawking, and AI researcher Marvin Minsky, among many others.
Epstein was, in the parlance of the sciences, a marker. Like the radioactive tracer you get injected with before an fMRI, his villainy illuminates how the connections among a relatively small clique of American intellectuals allowed them, privately, to define the last three decades of science, technology, and culture. It was a Big-Ideas Industrial Complex of conferences, research institutions, virtual salons, and even magazines, and Jeffrey Epstein bought his way in.
Adam Rogers , “Jeffrey Epstein and the Power of Networks” at Wired
Rogers asks, “How did these geniuses find themselves cozying up to a child rapist?” and provides us with some of the many answers that will filter in.
See also: More Pop Science Fallout Re Jeffrey Epstein: Stu Pivar And PZ Myers
Meanwhile, from the Uncommon Descent News Wayback machine: Stu Pivar’s Book Lifecode: So What’s In It? Why The Fuss? Okay, here at last is Jerry Bergman’s review of Stuart Pivar’s Lifecode. Yes, Stu Pivar was the friend of Steve Gould who was suing and then unsuing PZ Myers.
See also: Darwinists May Be Paying A Price For Pop Science Celebrity: Jeffrey Epstein
UD Newswatch: Epstein suicide
Now Steve Pinker Is Getting #MeToo’d, At Inside Higher Ed Over Jeffrey Epstein
Alleged Sex Trafficker Jeffrey Epstein Pledged $30 Million For Harvard Evolution Program
and
Jeff Epstein’s cultural dumpster fire spreads to ID vs. evo controversies.
Just because people are in the news doesn’t mean they did anything. It rather shows how a bad actor can change the news picture.
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