Surely America's most trusted news source counts as part of the media

https://www.theonion.com/boeing-promotes-mysterious-employee-known-only-as-the-1851333169

Should the title of this market be changed to something like “Will mainstream media agree that the Boeing whistleblower died of foul play?” It seems to me that the question of whether he was killed is very different from whether media will have consensus on that in three months.

To be clear, I’d give a 2% chance of the mainstream media reaching a consensus of it being foul play, but a 25% chance of it actually being foul play.

@Gabrielle

I'm not opposed to changing the title, but how else could I resolve this?

@Gabrielle if you have a proposal for different resolution criteria for a new market I'd be curious to hear them.

@Joshua I don't have a good alternate proposal; it's a hard thing to make a market against! A MSM consensus like this is probably the best proxy we can get, but it's just still not a good proxy.

The JFK assassination is the most obvious comparison for this, and we still don't have an objective answer to that sixty years later.

Oh my god how is this market so high. Let's be serious here.

@traders I have limit orders for NO, fill them if you think this actually happened.

Not sure how to bet on this. I'd estimate 75% chance of murder, but much lower chance that mainstream media widely recognizes it as murder. My argument for it being murder is basically on priors:

- if he was gonna commit suicide, he could do it at any point in his life
- if Boeing wants to murder him as a cover-up, they will do it shortly after he comes out with accusations against them

The fact that he died shortly after whistleblowing is a big odds update toward murder

What is the right reference class to be thinking of here for my priors? The base rate of American whistleblowers committing suicide, seems too small of a class, and seems already dubious because of foul play. But the suicide rate of middle-aged Americans seems too broad. Maybe the suicide rate of middle-aged Americans whose careers are being ruined due to legal reasons?

Would be curious to hear thoughts from someone who can think methodically (I don't know how to).

@singer suicide rate of people who say "im not finna suicide" (very high)

@jim What is your evidence for this? Surely it's likely that:

1. people who know they are likely to get murdered say things like "if I die, it wasn't suicide"
2. those people are then murdered in ways that look like suicide
3. you then look at the apparent-suicides and conclude that people who are likely to get murdered often commit suicide

@singer I've tried to find other cases of notable corporate whistleblowers in the US confirmed to have been murdered to cover up what they were saying.

I found exactly one suspected case, which also hasn't been confirmed.

Anyone want to link to a confirmed precedent of this kind of thing?

"If anything happens to me, it's not suicide." -- John Barnett via 'close family friend' "Jennifer" via ABC News 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sA44FFi95PA

"Boeing, $BA, whistleblower John Barnett was planning to drive home to Louisiana after his deposition on Friday 3/8 before Boeing lawyers asked him to stay one more day to finish his testimony. His body was found on the morning of 3/9" -- https://unusualwhales.com/news/boeing-ba-whistleblower-john-barnett-was-planning-to-drive-home-to-louisiana-after-his-deposition-on-friday-3-8-before-boeing-lawyers-asked-him-to-stay-one-more-day-to-finish-his-testim

More at https://fortune.com/2024/03/16/boeing-whistleblower-found-dead-john-barnett-737-max/

It would have to be very blatantly the case for there to be an MSM consensus he died of foul play in just 3 months.

Early reports suggest suicide. Does that count as natural causes or foul play, per resolution criteria?

@Hyperstition

Good question. I think I want to make it not count so I'm going to reverse the question. Only one trader has traded and I'll refund you @Qoiuoiuoiu if you want.

Question and description reversed and resolves as stated. I sent the one trader their mana back

@GCS Google annoyingly still has this cached as natural causes so I accidently just bet the wrong thing!