Will Scotland Yards HOLMES 2 and AI solve Jack the Ripper?

[Lewis C]

But who knows if he was or not? Kosminski, Kaminski, Cohen, Levy, Hyams, Chapman...all Jewish suspects.

I believe that Chapman was a Gentile.

[Fiver]

I would suggest Lawende is giving an honest statement of what he remembers seeing and that all three saw a couple, who was probably Kate and her killer given the location and timings. Could this description stand up in court, of course not.

Paul

It is probable that Lawende gave a description that he believed to be correct. But we don't have his direct statement, we have newspaper accounts and police reports and they contradict each other on the suspect's height, hair color, mustache size, and how well they were dressed. We can try to sort these contradictions out, but we lack a signed statement from Lawende and cannot interview him to obtain clarification.

Both at the time and today, people tend to favor Lawende over Levy and Harris, because of the level of detail. (Ironically, many discard Hutchinson because of his level of detail, even though Hutchinson had a lot more time to observe his suspect.) Lawende's description can be used for and against suspects or at least types of suspects. Levy and Harris are of little or no use for identifying a suspect.

There are two possibilities - either Lawende had significantly better night vision and memory than his companions or he had an overactive imagination. Harris clearly supports the latter as if the man's back was turned, Lawende could not have seen a kerchief or mustache. Levy clearly believed Lawende was very wrong about the suspect's height, leaving open the possibility Lawende was wrong about other elements of his description.

There's also the issue of Lawende identifying Eddowes. She was a stranger seen for only a few moments in very poor lighting. If Lawende was right, the man he was was the Ripper. If Lawende was wrong, and the woman was not Eddowes, then the man was not the Ripper and the accuracy of his description is irrelevant.

Church Lane was not the only way to get to Mitre Square. If Lawende misidentified the woman, then Eddowes and her killer entered through one of the other two routes and may have already been in Mitre Square at 1:35am.

[Fiver]

Lechmere would. Lives outside the boundary, but for real-world reasons connected with home, family and work is actually confined within it at certain times, and with very limited degrees of freedom.

Applying a silly binary model to this real-world life generates the wrong answer of a Marauder based near Tabram's murder site. Why even bother with it?

M.

There are reasons to question the Commuter-Marauder model. I have not seen enough information to tell if its a useful model or a waste of time like the organized-disorganized dichotomy. We also have no information as to how they came to the Marauder conclusion.

But you aren't discarding the answer based on criticism of the model or the reasoning used to reach that answer. You are discarding the answer because it rules out your suspect.

[John Wheat]

There are reasons to question the Commuter-Marauder model. I have not seen enough information to tell if its a useful model or a waste of time like the organized-disorganized dichotomy. We also have no information as to how they came to the Marauder conclusion.

But you aren't discarding the answer based on criticism of the model or the reasoning used to reach that answer. You are discarding the answer because it rules out your suspect.

Nothing at all rules Lechmere in though. He's a witness not a suspect.

[bonestrewn]

The use of AI in this case brings up two things for me:

1. It has been demonstrated that AI systems repeat and magnify the prejudices embedded in the data on which they are trained. For example, giving an image generating AI the prompt "doctor" and receiving images of only men back. Or facial recognition software which, due to embedded and unrecognized racial biases, is trained primarily on images of white people, then struggles to recognize people of color.

When we talk about the evidence and reporting in this case, we are talking about information deeply affected by xenophobia and antisemitism. This isn't to say the information has zero value, but that an AI given this information will not have the human discernment to determine relative value. I am not convinced that if we gave an AI all the Ripper documentation, it wouldn't spit out a caricature inflected by these biases.

2. This is more of a personal theory of mine, but I do not feel confident that any serious model of "serial killing" developed post-Ripper has almost anything of value to give. I feel that the Ripper has completely poisoned the well by "teaching" other serial killers how to act, and so to draw any conclusions about serial killers and their behavior post-1888, you are necessarily working with a tainted pool of information that, again, requires human discernment to sieve for meaningful info. So, to argue that this system or integrated platform has been taught models and structures based on the modern study of serial killers does not convince me that it will have anything useful to say.

[Patrick Differ]

The use of AI in this case brings up two things for me:

1. It has been demonstrated that AI systems repeat and magnify the prejudices embedded in the data on which they are trained. For example, giving an image generating AI the prompt "doctor" and receiving images of only men back. Or facial recognition software which, due to embedded and unrecognized racial biases, is trained primarily on images of white people, then struggles to recognize people of color.

When we talk about the evidence and reporting in this case, we are talking about information deeply affected by xenophobia and antisemitism. This isn't to say the information has zero value, but that an AI given this information will not have the human discernment to determine relative value. I am not convinced that if we gave an AI all the Ripper documentation, it wouldn't spit out a caricature inflected by these biases.

2. This is more of a personal theory of mine, but I do not feel confident that any serious model of "serial killing" developed post-Ripper has almost anything of value to give. I feel that the Ripper has completely poisoned the well by "teaching" other serial killers how to act, and so to draw any conclusions about serial killers and their behavior post-1888, you are necessarily working with a tainted pool of information that, again, requires human discernment to sieve for meaningful info. So, to argue that this system or integrated platform has been taught models and structures based on the modern study of serial killers does not convince me that it will have anything useful to say.

Artificial Intelligence is only one component of Big Data Analytics. Query based analysis saves time and creates other avenues based on all types of data including perhaps the most important in this case, the medical data , MO and signatures.

The University of Washington did a Ripper study and compared it to over 3000 other murders, including by serial killers. One conclusion they had was that the mutilations by this killer were extremely rare. Even to this day it just rarely, if
ever, happens. They also concluded that the killer was a local.

I haven't seen any profiles of any kind or studies indicating this killer was a CCommuter.if there are I would highly appreciate being pointed in that direction.

If you have more tools to investigate or create new avenues in pursuit of answers or create new questions then I see no reason to not use it. It would be nice to see a Big Data analysis of the medical evidence that is the only constant in the case.

Of course none of us have seen

[Patrick Differ]

Continued ( fat fingers)
None of us have seen the data sets but as someone pointed out is there enough information in the case to gain anything useful?

The Who in this case is the big question. The second in my mind might be who had the ability to commit the rare act of mutilating a human. Would that eliminate those who had no known skills with a knife, for example?

So if Big Data Analytics produces a result based on serial killing or murder information residing in a database, literally thousands of records, and statistically says these mutilations are rare...then how do you use that information?

Ask more questions?
Why was it rare?
Did it require a certain skill to make the cuts?
Did the knife, based on the evidence, have to be a certain sharpness to penetrate human skin?

For me I am interested in the questions that have not been asked or fully explored. If any at this point. That's why I would not discount big data based on large historical samples.

One of these might be- How would someone mutilate ( based on the medical evidence) really perform this act in less than 10 minutes, in 5 minutes? How sharp did the knife have to be each time relative to the previous mutilation? How did human skin differ from animal skin? And so on?

Can Big Data get us closer? I don't think it can hurt is my only point. The JtR mutilations were rare statically. Does that tell us something about the killer? Something in his profile?