Sure it's a fraud, but like something from a comedy movie. Most of the time frauds are incredibly boring and time-consuming to explain. Especially financial frauds are often hidden behind layers upon layers of obfuscation. Now THAT'S what I call planning ahead!
EDIT: ...and I'll gladly pay the karma cost for that reply!
Your idea of genius seems to be simplicity. I consider genius the ability to understand things others cannot. I think the question is, how long did the researchers get away with this fraudulent act compared to bankers who created the last recession? The ability to hide something for longer from more eyes is a greater sign of genius than coming up with a trick nobody bothered to verify.
And of course, the really fucked up part is what the bankers did was legal.
I feel like you're ascribing genius to the equivalent of a parlor trick.
I don't remember the exact quote, but simple people can understand when taught, smarter can learn on their own, smarter still can teach, and a genius can simplify. Simple things are often hard to make and come from deep understanding of the system. See also: "If you can't explain something to a 6-year old, you don't really understand it."
You have a point with more eyes, but we still paint a camouflage on a tank, right?
I think what bankers do is equivalent to piling layers of duct tape/javascript. It takes a lot of time to go through it and see what it actually means.
Here, Internal Revenue Service openly admits auditing rich taxpayers is too hard.
https://www.propublica.org/article/irs-sorry-but-its-just-ea...
To audit them, you have to spend more time and use more senior people, which means more money. The US institution can't muster the same amount of money and specialists as rich people can. And corporations have a monetary incentive to hire people to do 'tax optimization'.
> I think what bankers do is equivalent to piling layers of duct tape/javascript. It takes a lot of time to go through it and see what it actually means.
So basically it's not smart because it's work, and anyone that can find a lazy shortcut is a genius?
Ultimately what matters is whether or not it worked. The bankers got rich and faced no jail time, despite being under scrutiny by investors, regulators, and occasionally the public. The academics committed fraud and hopefully have their careers and reputations permanently blemished as a result, not to mention undoing all of the publications they need redacted directly as a result of the act you are calling "genius."
I really think what you call genius I call laziness, and your celebration of it represents a lot of what I think is wrong with the world today.
And I think I'm amused by the trick. I admire its simplicity and far-sightedness, that's all. I mean, people have been adding their cats as co-authors just because a paper couldn't have a single author.
