Irritations

[c.d.]

Sorry to add to your confusion here, Doctored but I would strongly disagree with what you were told by your American friend. My understanding (and the way I have always used it) is that "making out" is limited to just hugging and kissing. "Getting it on" means uh...doing the deed if you get my drift.

I think you were mislead.

Maybe some other Yanks can weigh in.

c.d.

[Pcdunn]

Sorry to add to your confusion here, Doctored but I would strongly disagree with what you were told by your American friend. My understanding (and the way I have always used it) is that "making out" is limited to just hugging and kissing. "Getting it on" means uh...doing the deed if you get my drift.

I think you were mislead.

Maybe some other Yanks can weigh in.

c.d.

Yes, c.d. I think that "making out" meant (at least in the past) what my parents' generation might have called "necking": just hugging and kissing. (My parents were born in 1917 and '20, so came of age around 1938 or 41.)

It might depend on the age of the American as to whether his information that "making out' equates to "getting it on" is accurate. Language changes over time, and expressions and alter meaning. (Since the line in the movie is "only making out", I think the kissing meaning is more likely.)

[Doctored Whatsit]

Yes, c.d. I think that "making out" meant (at least in the past) what my parents' generation might have called "necking": just hugging and kissing. (My parents were born in 1917 and '20, so came of age around 1938 or 41.)

It might depend on the age of the American as to whether his information that "making out' equates to "getting it on" is accurate. Language changes over time, and expressions and alter meaning. (Since the line in the movie is "only making out", I think the kissing meaning is more likely.)

Hi, yes, I understand, but I should explain that the word "only" was used as an expression of surprise or disbelief, and not one of restriction. In other words, he more or less said, "You'll never guess what he was doing - he was making out in the library". He wasn't saying he was in the library but "just making out".

Having said that, thanks for making the apparent difference clear. Not that it matters, as I won't be using the words anyway!

[Kunochan]

Those proclaiming that the Jack the Ripper is finally solved when they are referring to a crap suspect that has very little going for them. And that everyone should just believe the b.s. there peddling. It's happened with Lechmere, Kosminski, Sickert and now Thompson. These people of course disregard more plausible suspects that are atleast violent murderers.

My problem is with anyone who says "Jack the Ripper is finally solved" period. And it's twice as problematic when someone says they reached their conclusion "scientifically."

It may be possible to solve the identity of someone involved in certain of the Whitechapel Murders—it's not contravened by the Laws of Physics—but the chances are infinitesimal considering the evidence available, most of which is incomplete and anecdotal.

And claiming you've reached a scientific conclusion based on statistical analysis of anecdotal data? Historians and anthropologists analyze anecdotal data, but no responsible researcher would claim scientific certainty.

To me personally, "proving" the identity of Jack the Ripper would involve convincing a majority of academic historians that a suspect was reasonably more likely guilty than not. Science doesn't really enter into it, unless hard evidence with provenance was discovered. The chances of that are infinitesimal, to the point that the possibility can readily be dismissed.

There is nothing wrong with enthusiastically endorsing a suspect. But the moment one uses words like "proven" or "solved," I suspect one is just making a cash grab. There's nothing inherently wrong with making money in Ripperology—I'd like to, but I won't lie or mislead in order to do it.

I don't know enough yet about the Thompson theory to have a firm opinion on his viability as a suspect. But proponents are just harming their case by claiming facts not in evidence. The case is not solved. Barring a miracle, the case will never be solved. To me, solving the case is not the point of Ripperology. Because if that's the goal, then Ripperology has no point.

[The Rookie Detective]

My problem is with anyone who says "Jack the Ripper is finally solved" period. And it's twice as problematic when someone says they reached their conclusion "scientifically."

It may be possible to solve the identity of someone involved in certain of the Whitechapel Murders—it's not contravened by the Laws of Physics—but the chances are infinitesimal considering the evidence available, most of which is incomplete and anecdotal.

And claiming you've reached a scientific conclusion based on statistical analysis of anecdotal data? Historians and anthropologists analyze anecdotal data, but no responsible researcher would claim scientific certainty.

To me personally, "proving" the identity of Jack the Ripper would involve convincing a majority of academic historians that a suspect was reasonably more likely guilty than not. Science doesn't really enter into it, unless hard evidence with provenance was discovered. The chances of that are infinitesimal, to the point that the possibility can readily be dismissed.

There is nothing wrong with enthusiastically endorsing a suspect. But the moment one uses words like "proven" or "solved," I suspect one is just making a cash grab. There's nothing inherently wrong with making money in Ripperology—I'd like to, but I won't lie or mislead in order to do it.

I don't know enough yet about the Thompson theory to have a firm opinion on his viability as a suspect. But proponents are just harming their case by claiming facts not in evidence. The case is not solved. Barring a miracle, the case will never be solved. To me, solving the case is not the point of Ripperology. Because if that's the goal, then Ripperology has no point.

Completey agree, brilliant post!


The reality is that after 137 years, the case will never be scientifically proven.

The only way to ever be able to achieve this, would be to exhume the victim's bones and use some advanced technique that can trace some kind of forensic data that is currently impossible to science, (but may in the future.)

2 of the victims are buried under the roadway that goes through the memorial Gardens at the COL cemetery, but it would be close to impossible to find them precisely.

There's no authority in the world that would grant a mass exhumation at a cemetery. It just wouldn't happen.

Frustratingly, it's likely DNA evidence that could identify the Ripper, would have been deposited on at least some of the victims, but after all this time, nothing would remain or be viable for scientific purposes of identification.

Essentially, the case can never be scientifically proven, on the basis it's now impossible.

And no amount of BS can change that.

[Kunochan]

As to the main discussion, I am at a point in my life where I'm trying to not be irritated by anything. But there are a few things I can list:

People who use "media" as a singular or collective noun. "Media" is the plural of "medium." Making it a collective noun is just ignorance—it does not improve the language or make the word more useful. This also goes for the atrocity that is "mediums," as in "psychic mediums." They're "psychic media," and they're not psychic, because psychic powers don't exist.

People who use artificial intelligence to make art, replacing humans. It might be possible for AI to assist a human in making art (maybe), but art is a uniquely human activity. And by the way, those of us who make art do it because we love and enjoy it. It's not drudgery to be done by a machine.

The "Beverly Hills Stop." The California Stop is when you roll through an intersection with a stop sign, slowing down but never stopping. This is annoying enough. In Beverly Hills, people roll through intersections, but so slowly that actually stopping and then going would have been faster. It's annoying and pointless.

Microsoft Word. This bloated piece of trash has negatively affected our world's productivity for decades. Yet it's still considered the standard. There are far better options, several of which are free. I use Pages on my Mac for professional business writing (even though I have to export to Word in order to share documents with colleagues), and Scrivener to write fiction. Word is a dumpster fire and no one should use it.

Charging money for parking. I live in Los Angeles, where public transportation is rarely a realistic option. So I have to pay every time I leave the house, and it's ethically wrong. It's bad enough having to pay for gas, mileage on the car, the car itself, and insurance. Having to pay for parking (or toll roads) adds insult to injury. And having to pay for parking at a hospital or at a school one is attending is vile.

And finally, the mobile internet. Many pages have dozens of ads, and are constantly loading, so content shifts around and the page often crashes and has to reload multiple times. It's impossible to read anything. I recently found a great plugin called uBlock Origin Lite that makes these pages readable.

And finally finally, people who spell "light" as "lite." STOP IT.

[Doctored Whatsit]

Yes, agreed Kunochan. I have similar problems with the misuse of English. As with "media", criteria is often used as a singular, whereas it is the plural of criterion - we cannot have "this criteria".

I get a bit irritated too, when people say "different to" or "different than". It is "different from".

[Richard Patterson]

My problem is with anyone who says "Jack the Ripper is finally solved" period. And it's twice as problematic when someone says they reached their conclusion "scientifically."

It may be possible to solve the identity of someone involved in certain of the Whitechapel Murders—it's not contravened by the Laws of Physics—but the chances are infinitesimal considering the evidence available, most of which is incomplete and anecdotal.

And claiming you've reached a scientific conclusion based on statistical analysis of anecdotal data? Historians and anthropologists analyze anecdotal data, but no responsible researcher would claim scientific certainty.

To me personally, "proving" the identity of Jack the Ripper would involve convincing a majority of academic historians that a suspect was reasonably more likely guilty than not. Science doesn't really enter into it, unless hard evidence with provenance was discovered. The chances of that are infinitesimal, to the point that the possibility can readily be dismissed.

There is nothing wrong with enthusiastically endorsing a suspect. But the moment one uses words like "proven" or "solved," I suspect one is just making a cash grab. There's nothing inherently wrong with making money in Ripperology—I'd like to, but I won't lie or mislead in order to do it.

I don't know enough yet about the Thompson theory to have a firm opinion on his viability as a suspect. But proponents are just harming their case by claiming facts not in evidence. The case is not solved. Barring a miracle, the case will never be solved. To me, solving the case is not the point of Ripperology. Because if that's the goal, then Ripperology has no point.

Kunochan, the problem isn’t that you’re cautious—it’s that your “caution” is really a way of never having to think for yourself. You’ve written an elegant manifesto about why the case cannot be solved, and in doing so you’ve insulated yourself from ever engaging with the actual evidence. That isn’t the position of a thinking self. It’s the position of someone thinking about how others should think, so he never has to do the hard work of deciding.

You say “the chances are infinitesimal” and “barring a miracle the case will never be solved.” But reality isn’t built on your comfort zone. We actually have hard facts about Francis Thompson that line up exactly with the traits recorded by Major Henry Smith: six years of surgical training, a breakdown that landed him in institutional care, a prostitute lover who ran from him just before the killings, his residence in the Haymarket/Rupert Street orbit, and even the coin-trick anecdote. Add to that the timing—murders beginning when she fled, ending when Thompson was hospitalized—and you don’t need miracles. You need only probability.

The mistake you make is calling this “anecdote.” It isn’t. It’s convergent, independently-sourced data points. When multiplied, they reduce the odds of coincidence to vanishing levels. That’s what science looks like in historical cases: probability, not DNA swabs. When you dismiss this as “cash grab” or “solved is a dirty word,” what you’re really saying is that you’d rather keep the case unsolved so you never have to adjust your worldview. That is the lazy way of thinking.

Ripperology does have a point: it’s to weigh evidence until one suspect clearly outweighs the others. Thompson does. If you prefer to keep the mystery as a comfort blanket, that’s your choice. But don’t mistake refusal to think through the evidence for intellectual rigor.

[Kunochan]

The mistake you make is calling this “anecdote.” It isn’t. It’s convergent, independently-sourced data points. When multiplied, they reduce the odds of coincidence to vanishing levels. That’s what science looks like in historical cases: probability, not DNA swabs.

I think you, and even Herlock, have a different idea of what constitutes a "fact" than I do. Take the example of whether Thompson was in a regular hospital or a mental asylum. This would be a fact—in objective reality, either he was hospitalized for mental health issues, or he was hospitalized but not for mental issues, or he was not hospitalized at all. One of these things was definitely factual. But we don't know which one. All we have is an imprecisely-worded quote from a third party that muddies the issue and clarifies little.

Even if we had a hospital record with clear provenance that definitively identifies the man we're discussing, that would count as a "fact" to a historian, and would be good enough for our purposes as Ripperologists. But it's not scientific data, because we can't absolutely confirm its authenticity or correctness, the way we can test and retest to confirm a scientific measurement.

But if I understand the issue here, and if I'm wrong please correct me, we don't have even that.

And importantly—we don't know for a fact that the actual Ripper was ever hospitalized or was mentally ill! This is an assumption. Lots of serial killers never had mental health treatment and were later found sane enough to stand trial.

What I'm single-mindedly focusing on here is not whether Thompson is a good suspect or not. It's the idea that it's been proven scientifically, that we can be certain he was a murderer (your position) or certain he was not (Herlock's position). We can be certain of neither, as far as I can tell.

Ripperology does have a point: it’s to weigh evidence until one suspect clearly outweighs the others.

Which is what I said—the identification of one suspect more likely to be a killer than not. It would be fantastic if we identified such a person. Maybe it's Thompson, although I am very confused on one point—aren't you saying Thompson was a suspect known by the police to have a solid alibi? Am I confused?

I've tried to be clear that I'm not criticizing the Thompson theory itself at this point, nor that you are a fierce proponent for it. Somebody said you were "handwaving" your statistical probabilities, and I agree. You keep quoting probabilities, but need to back them up. Is this done in your writings? Because your level of certainty seems extremely unrealistic to me.

I don't want the case to remain unsolved—solving it would be tremendously exciting. But I am painfully aware of the limits of the information we have available to us. I have college-level training in both the hard and soft sciences, and intend to go to grad school to study history. I am very interested in how academics know what they know, and the limitations involved. Historians can borrow from the sciences, but history is not a science. It's not even a social science, not in the sense anthropology or sociology is. If I had to categorize academic or professional Ripperology, I'd place it in the humanities, not social science (or even criminology, although of course we can borrow from criminology).

But categorizations are fluid. The OED defines "anecdote" as "a short account of an amusing, interesting, or telling incident or experience; sometimes with implications of superficiality or unreliability." To me the key words are "superficiality" and "unreliability." Victorian press reports, police memoirs, and Ripper letters without a verified source are, unfortunately, superficial and unreliable. We don't have the police files, the actual coroners' reports, or modern forensics; and the photos we have are of poor quality and lack strict chain of custody.

Flawed data in, flawed data out.

[Richard Patterson]

I think you, and even Herlock, have a different idea of what constitutes a "fact" than I do. Take the example of whether Thompson was in a regular hospital or a mental asylum. This would be a fact—in objective reality, either he was hospitalized for mental health issues, or he was hospitalized but not for mental issues, or he was not hospitalized at all. One of these things was definitely factual. But we don't know which one. All we have is an imprecisely-worded quote from a third party that muddies the issue and clarifies little.

Even if we had a hospital record with clear provenance that definitively identifies the man we're discussing, that would count as a "fact" to a historian, and would be good enough for our purposes as Ripperologists. But it's not scientific data, because we can't absolutely confirm its authenticity or correctness, the way we can test and retest to confirm a scientific measurement.

But if I understand the issue here, and if I'm wrong please correct me, we don't have even that.

And importantly—we don't know for a fact that the actual Ripper was ever hospitalized or was mentally ill! This is an assumption. Lots of serial killers never had mental health treatment and were later found sane enough to stand trial.

What I'm single-mindedly focusing on here is not whether Thompson is a good suspect or not. It's the idea that it's been proven scientifically, that we can be certain he was a murderer (your position) or certain he was not (Herlock's position). We can be certain of neither, as far as I can tell.



Which is what I said—the identification of one suspect more likely to be a killer than not. It would be fantastic if we identified such a person. Maybe it's Thompson, although I am very confused on one point—aren't you saying Thompson was a suspect known by the police to have a solid alibi? Am I confused?

I've tried to be clear that I'm not criticizing the Thompson theory itself at this point, nor that you are a fierce proponent for it. Somebody said you were "handwaving" your statistical probabilities, and I agree. You keep quoting probabilities, but need to back them up. Is this done in your writings? Because your level of certainty seems extremely unrealistic to me.

I don't want the case to remain unsolved—solving it would be tremendously exciting. But I am painfully aware of the limits of the information we have available to us. I have college-level training in both the hard and soft sciences, and intend to go to grad school to study history. I am very interested in how academics know what they know, and the limitations involved. Historians can borrow from the sciences, but history is not a science. It's not even a social science, not in the sense anthropology or sociology is. If I had to categorize academic or professional Ripperology, I'd place it in the humanities, not social science (or even criminology, although of course we can borrow from criminology).

But categorizations are fluid. The OED defines "anecdote" as "a short account of an amusing, interesting, or telling incident or experience; sometimes with implications of superficiality or unreliability." To me the key words are "superficiality" and "unreliability." Victorian press reports, police memoirs, and Ripper letters without a verified source are, unfortunately, superficial and unreliable. We don't have the police files, the actual coroners' reports, or modern forensics; and the photos we have are of poor quality and lack strict chain of custody.

Flawed data in, flawed data out.

Kunochan, I actually like the way you think things through—it shows you’re genuinely wrestling with the limits of history and the problem of evidence. And I have to say, I also like your taste: David Warner in Time After Time (1979) is my favorite Ripper film too. He captured something chillingly plausible about the killer, precisely because the film leaned on logic rather than melodrama.

Now, to your point. You say history cannot give us “scientific” certainty. Fair enough—we aren’t running repeatable lab tests on 1888 blood samples. But what we can do—and what courts and historians alike do every day—is weigh multiple independent facts, and calculate the probability that they converge on one person. That’s not “handwaving.” That’s statistics applied to documented data.

Let’s take Thompson: six years dissecting cadavers, documented institutionalization after breakdown, residence in the Haymarket/Rupert Street orbit, association with prostitutes, disappearance of his prostitute lover right before the killings, and murders ceasing when he entered care. These are not vague anecdotes—they are independently documented traits. Major Henry Smith recorded this rare bundle of traits as belonging to the suspect police feared most. Thompson alone fits all of them. The odds of coincidence? Vanishingly small.

This is where logic locks the case. We don’t need DNA to know that when five or six rare traits converge on a single man, while no other candidate matches them all, the only rational conclusion is that we have found the culprit. It’s not speculation, it’s elimination. That’s why I say I can only be right—because the logic doesn’t leave me an exit door.

You’re right to be cautious, but sometimes caution drifts into over-caution: treating evidence as too fragile to handle at all. Reality isn’t fragile. It’s there to be reasoned with. Thompson is the only man standing when reason does its work. That’s the difference between thinking about how to think, and actually thinking through to the end.

[Enigma]

Irritated that debate about Francis Thompson has not only dominated all current threads but has insinuated itself into the irritations thread.

[The Rookie Detective]

I think you, and even Herlock, have a different idea of what constitutes a "fact" than I do. Take the example of whether Thompson was in a regular hospital or a mental asylum. This would be a fact—in objective reality, either he was hospitalized for mental health issues, or he was hospitalized but not for mental issues, or he was not hospitalized at all. One of these things was definitely factual. But we don't know which one. All we have is an imprecisely-worded quote from a third party that muddies the issue and clarifies little.

Even if we had a hospital record with clear provenance that definitively identifies the man we're discussing, that would count as a "fact" to a historian, and would be good enough for our purposes as Ripperologists. But it's not scientific data, because we can't absolutely confirm its authenticity or correctness, the way we can test and retest to confirm a scientific measurement.

But if I understand the issue here, and if I'm wrong please correct me, we don't have even that.

And importantly—we don't know for a fact that the actual Ripper was ever hospitalized or was mentally ill! This is an assumption. Lots of serial killers never had mental health treatment and were later found sane enough to stand trial.

What I'm single-mindedly focusing on here is not whether Thompson is a good suspect or not. It's the idea that it's been proven scientifically, that we can be certain he was a murderer (your position) or certain he was not (Herlock's position). We can be certain of neither, as far as I can tell.



Which is what I said—the identification of one suspect more likely to be a killer than not. It would be fantastic if we identified such a person. Maybe it's Thompson, although I am very confused on one point—aren't you saying Thompson was a suspect known by the police to have a solid alibi? Am I confused?

I've tried to be clear that I'm not criticizing the Thompson theory itself at this point, nor that you are a fierce proponent for it. Somebody said you were "handwaving" your statistical probabilities, and I agree. You keep quoting probabilities, but need to back them up. Is this done in your writings? Because your level of certainty seems extremely unrealistic to me.

I don't want the case to remain unsolved—solving it would be tremendously exciting. But I am painfully aware of the limits of the information we have available to us. I have college-level training in both the hard and soft sciences, and intend to go to grad school to study history. I am very interested in how academics know what they know, and the limitations involved. Historians can borrow from the sciences, but history is not a science. It's not even a social science, not in the sense anthropology or sociology is. If I had to categorize academic or professional Ripperology, I'd place it in the humanities, not social science (or even criminology, although of course we can borrow from criminology).

But categorizations are fluid. The OED defines "anecdote" as "a short account of an amusing, interesting, or telling incident or experience; sometimes with implications of superficiality or unreliability." To me the key words are "superficiality" and "unreliability." Victorian press reports, police memoirs, and Ripper letters without a verified source are, unfortunately, superficial and unreliable. We don't have the police files, the actual coroners' reports, or modern forensics; and the photos we have are of poor quality and lack strict chain of custody.

Flawed data in, flawed data out.

Another excellent post, well said.


I want the case solved, but only if it's the truth.

Not knowing the truth is always a better option, than believing in falsehoods and lies, and thus being led down a path whereby the case is "solved" incorrectly and unfactually.

Believing and knowing, aren't the same thing.