Zodiackiller.com Message Board: Possible Zodiac Victim Cheri Jo Bates: Ramona High yearbook illustration

The illustration featuring the crossed-circle symbol comes as quite a surprise. Was there a caption? If not, was the illustration included in a specific section of the yearbook(Science, Mathematics) that might give some indication of what the symbol means?

Oddball

If you look closely at the drawing you will see what appears to be a slide-rule hanging from the ceiling. For you youngsters, slide rules were an ancient tool used in the days before Texas Instruments unleashed personal calculators on math students in the early 70s. I'd say the drawing illustrates a math class and the symbols on the chalkboard could refer to geometry.

They look like unit circles to me, and the triangular symbols within them I believe represent trigonometric expressions.

I defer to those who took trig. My math career ended with 10th grade geometry.

I went as far as calculus III. The first thing I mentioned to Tom is that it looked like a unit circle to me. Hmm, maybe Z drew that picture...

Lordy be, I find myself agreeing with EdN and Douglas on a point. You don't have to look too closely to see the slide rule, but you do have to look a bit closer to see that the Cartesian symbols on the chalk board are accompanied by mathematical expressions, only some of which may be made out in Tom's posting. There are also a variety of Cartesian circles in addition to the Z sign, to me somewhat dampening the "shocking" effect of the z sign itself. In this context, the Z sign itself is almost certainly the unit circle, and the others assorted variations on a theme by des Cartes.

On the other hand I am amazed that Doug has not pointed out that one of them is very close to if not an exact rendition of TK's hybrid Z/peace sign.

Hey, wait a minute, look closely at that desk in the third row. Tom, give us a close up of that, can you? Yep, it's got a late adolescent female suicidal angst poem engraved clearly on the under side . . .

Peter, I did indeed notice that, but over the years I've learned not to get too excited about little coincidences.

However, I wonder if anyone noticed the one particular drawing in which the hypotenuses of the triangles angle upward? The entire effect looks eerily similar to the symbol on the Halloween card.

Sorry, Douglas, but what does the (Z) case against TK consist of other than little coincidences? Isn't that the definition of a circumstantial case?

Oh, wait a minute, Doug, I assumed you were referring to the Cartesian peace sign. Did you mean you noticed the poem, too?

But seriously, folks, or Douglas, do you really consider this a little coincidence? The occurrence of the Z sign and TK's hybrid on the same page? Is this because what I am calling the Hybrid is a fairly conventional or familiar Cartesian function, and TK's use of it is more like a math doodle than a cultural reference?

Peter, TK's use of the "upside-down peace symbol" has nothing to do with mathematics. The Norse symbol Yggdrasil has long been associated with anarchists and other extremist groups. Kaczynski, an anarchist, spray-painted the symbol on the wall at Cal State, Sacramento, prior to mailing a bomb whose return address was the name of a professor at that institution. Along with the symbol he had spray-painted the word "anarchy."

The reason both symbols are on the same page in the yearbook is because in that case the unit circle (a circle drawn on a Cartesian grid having a radius of 1) was being used to illustrate trigonometric functions such as sine and cosine.

Peter wrote: Sorry, Douglas, but what does the (Z) case against TK consist of other than little coincidences?

Peter: Two analogies come to light in this regard: 1) One small twig is easily broken; put several together and try to break them in half. There is strength in numbers... 2) A single page of a phone book can be torn without attempt; try to tear the phone book in half (even a small one). There is strength in numbers...

There are numerous "coincidences" to the Zodiac/Unabomber connection. Some are little; others are, to me, quite strong (i.e. documented writings, use of code). Combined, the coincidences and/or similarities make Ted a VERY STRONG suspect UNTIL such time as there is PROOF (and I know Doug is working on this) that Ted Kaczynski has a viable and confirmed alibi for his whereabouts during any one of the KNOWN Zodiac crimes.

From the final page of Gareth Penn's TIMES 17:

"Not long after 'The Calculus of Evil' appeared in Mensa Bulletin, I received a very thoughtful letter from a reader on the East Coast who said that in any single instance of the patterns which I had documented in the Zodiac letters, coincidence could easily be the cause. But the sheer number of repetitions, he said, reduced the probability of coincidence to insignificance. I suggest that the same observation applies to the phenomena noted above as well ... There are just too many of them."

See, there is a great circumstantial case against Ted K, but there are also great circumstantial cases against Mike O and Arthur A. People will tell you the same thing about Larry K and Robert H, as well.

When nearly every suspect meets this challenge, it's time to raise the bar.

--Jake
http://members.aol.com/Jakewark
"This is the Zodiac Speaking..."

Not quite so fast, Jake.

When applying the probabilities of certain circumstances to Kaczynski and Zodiac there is always the tendency to assume that those probabilities apply to the population at large. They don't. They apply to a very tiny and select group of individuals who (1) possess a common psychological pathology (2) moved in the same locations at approximately the same times and (3) were known murderers possessing a common criminal signature. That is the set of individuals to whom any probabilities regarding circumstantial evidence must apply.

For instance, if we know that statistically 25 percent of individuals drive a brown or tan car, we apply the 25 percent, not to the entire U.S. population, but to the number of persons meeting the three criteria above. The result is a very small number, indeed.

Can someone tell me where to find this yearbook illustration? Is it on this site?

Jud, Yes it is. Go back to the first page, and click on victims,then click on Cheri Jo Bates.