Posted on 07/13/2007 9:39:10 AM PDT by Enchante
Ex-University of Chicago 'genius' turned ecoterrorist
But prominent physicists take up Billy Cottrell's cause
LOS ANGELES -- William "Billy" Cottrell was such an exceptional student at the University of Chicago that he was described by his professors as something of an eccentric genius. He even won the award for best senior thesis in physics, addressing string theory, which seeks a single unifying way to explain all forces and all forms of matter.
Today the 27-year-old is in jail.
Two years after his 2002 graduation with honors as a double major in physics and math, Cottrell was charged and convicted as one of the nation's first ecoterrorists of the post-Sept. 11 era. He was found guilty of conspiracy and arson in the 2003 firebombings of Hummer and other sport-utility vehicle dealerships in the Los Angeles area to advocate a radical environmentalism. Two conspirators remain at large.
Cottrell is appealing his conviction. One mitigating factor, his supporters argue, is that he is diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, which can make his behavior at times inappropriate.
His case is now a cause celebre for some of the nation's most prominent physicists, including four from the University of Chicago and even Stephen Hawking, who have urged better treatment for Cottrell in prison so he could continue his study and research.
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
It's a diagnosis. It doesn't mean the kid doesn't know right from wrong.
I’d say he got off pretty lightly for what he did and should stop whining about it. Plenty of criminals serve (deservedly) much longer sentences without having prominent physicists to plead for amenities.........
>Cottrell is appealing his conviction.
If you can’t do the time don’t do the crime genius.
String theory is BS. He’s probably on crack.
The tone of the article seems to be this is ‘unusual’.
In fact, excluding the religious based terrorists, this is the ‘norm’.
Almost all the domestic terrorists from the 1960’s and 70’s were well educated, from middle to upper class families, with a good home.
What a waste. Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time. As far as the Asperger’s goes, either he’s fit for society or he isn’t. In suburban Mass., there was a recent high school murder by a student (admittedly not in the intellectual class of Billy Cottrell) with Asperger’s. Its not a good enough excuse.
Bet the other guys in Cell Block C are impressed with his thesis.
Not looking so smart now, are ya, buddy?
I thought you might find this interesting.....
Cottrell is appealing his conviction. One mitigating factor, his supporters argue, is that he is diagnosed with Asperger syndrome, which can make his behavior at times inappropriate.
The thesis, they kinda understand, but they don't really know what to make of this ass-burgers thing.
Makes me wonder if this clown may know about the Chicagoland eco-terrorism acts committed while he was attending UC.
I wonder if the bleeding hearts would be as sympathetic had he vandalized and torched an abortion clinic instead of a car dealership.
Not to mention that, by definition, all criminal behavior is "inappropriate."
REVOKE HIS mensa MEMBERSHIP. He’s an IDIOT!.......
So, now they are trying to make Asperger’s syndrome a defense?
The problem with Asperger’s people is that they have to be taught moral conscience. There is no internal moral compass. They are totally rational thinkers. That’s the trait that makes them so smart and sometimes dangerous. It is not an excuse to commit a crime. Aspergers people don’t realize that they are exceptional, they just think that everyone else is exceptionally stupid.
My sympathy is with asperger sufferers, but some people are just criminals or downright mean, regardless of whether they have disabilities or not.
I’ll be there are a lot of brilliant people behind bars. Brilliance doesn’t matter if you don’t know right from wrong, or you’re so selfish that you believe rules/laws don’t apply to you.
Knowledge will grow, but wisdom will be diminshed.
Watch, when he is released, he will be the poster boy for the eco terrorism, “See, this genus knows that the Earth should be put First!”
Screw him, he had more opportunities and vistas before him then 99% of the populace, and he chose to torch Humvees in the dead of night, perhaps he should wirte a thesis about
“How a coddled boy genus became and idiot in a few short steps”
And “yes” genius was misspelled intentionally...
I always wondered what my Dad meant when he told me that some people are “so smart they’re stupid.” Now, I finally know!
Mama always said, “Stupid is as stupid does.”
Misnomer...
How can this guy have Aspberger’s if he won an award for the best senior thesis? Aspberger’s folks have difficulties with language. Even in physics, they have to use language to write a thesis. If his was award winning, I would assume he has a fairly good use of language. Now in prison he is *writing*! “Cottrell wrote of “good productive” inmates desperately trying to live “an honest life, but the government has actively deprived them of the resources to do so.””
His interests are also supposed to be extremely narrow. Mathematics, physics, ecology . . .
There isn’t anything wrong with the guy’s head. Well, except he’s a liberal.
Calling Ted Kazinsky.........
As they say, there’s a fine line between genius and insanity.
He should have plenty of time to receive his Phd. while serving his sentence. Go genius.
I have heard people talk about defining Asperger’s-like syndromes as just having a large difference in verbal and mathematical abilities-say a difference of 200 in the SAT-V and SAT-M. From my experience, the Mathematical “geniuses” are more well adjusted. The Verbal “geniuses” were usually the ones that got into adjustment problems.
At least until recently, hard Science, Engineering, and Mathematics professors were a lot more Conservative, or at least a lot more tolerant of Conservative viewpoints, than the Social Sciences and Humanities professors.
Sorry, please do some research; maybe you’re confusing greater Autism and Asperger’s. Asperger’s is on the Autism spectrum. It manifests itself as social awkwardness, shyness, clumsiness, etc. They may have trouble *speaking* conversationally, but writing is usually not a problem. In fact the writing of someone with Asperger’s can be quite good, where one has time to carefully choose what to say, versus extemporaneous conversations with people.
FWIW I am in no way trying to defend this jerk and I also believe that Asperger’s in absolutely no way is a defense for this act.
‘Watch, when he is released, he will be the poster boy for the eco terrorism, “See, this genus knows that the Earth should be put First!”’
He’ll get tenure at a University in Michigan just like the losers from Weather Underground did.
Well, I’ve looked at the CDC’s website as well as ASPEN and other sites discussing Asperger’s and I haven’t seen anything other than language disorders. I haven’t seen that they can write like the dickens but can’t communicate in spoken form. I could be wrong about that.
BUT . . . Cottrell says, “It is a fact that may only be appreciated by coming to prison—or perhaps by a long-term media campaign—that the government incarcerates hundreds of thousands of ordinary, harmless citizens, administers prisons so as to maximize violence and minimize rehabilitation, and then actively sets people up for failure in the real world after release,”
Now if folks with asperger’s have “difficulty understanding others’ feelings,” then how does this guy have asperger’s? He doesn’t. He and his lawyers are full of crap.
One problem with Autism spectrum disorders is that they manifest themselves in different ways, and to different extents, in each affected person.
Nothing I’ve read about Asperger’s would preclude someone with the disorder from being an excellent writer.
However, the “fuzziness” of the diagnosis gives slimy lawyers yet another crutch or excuse for their clients since it’s inherently hard to prove or disprove the condition. In the end I doubt it will help him much in court, and hope it won’t.
Sure, let him continue his research at Alcatraz. Physics, ornithology, whatever.
Give him access to the prison library and a computer with no internet.......and for good behavior maybe Paris Hilton's phone #
I really don’t give a damn that he was good at science or that other scientists are pleading for him to pursue his studies or whatever. He can do what he wants when he gets out. For now, he’s not supposed to do what he wants. He’s supposed to sit in a cage and think about what he did.
I say Jack Bauer him to get any and all information he has on other eco-terrorists.
Q: What do eco-terrorists and Muslim terrorists have in common?
A: They’re terrorists that hate America and Western civilization.
Hunt them all down and bring them all to justice and do whatever you have to to get as much info out of them as possible.
Mine always said "don't be so stupid, smartass!"
So all 14 year olds have Aspergers?
Well, not quite. I have a brother, who think probably has Aspergers. When we were kids, the school district sent representatives to our home to tell my parents that my brother’s IQ was the highest that they had ever seen and that they had no idea that they had been boring him to death. They thought that he was just a disinterested student. I guess both assumptions were right.
The one saving grace for my brother was the fact that my mother was a fundamentalist Christian, who taught him a strong sense of right and wrong. Even though he rejected the religion, he never completely rejected the moral training. Aspergers people don’t have the ability to feel empathy. They only see the world as it relates to them.
Like someone else said, a Ph.D. Physicist would have to have better language skills to write a thesis. Some have said that the way some people are defining down Asperger’s these days, if it weren’t for them we’d have no engineers (God Bless Them). Good language skills add to an engineer’s ability, but for some at least, aren’t as necessary. We need people that don’t talk much but can fix and invent anything.
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