It’s more than a dictionary definition. Bias is covered in multiple disciplines. From statistics, science, psychology it’s a massive topic. Just look at the psychology of bias alone -> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases or read some theory behind it https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_bias

You will have to run a gauntlet of psychologists to claim you have no bias. It’s a human condition. It’s okay to have bias. Bias isn’t even fatal sometimes to the original hypothesis. I have a bias.

If humans could remove themselves from bias totally, we wouldn’t have to do double-blind testing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blinded_experiment

This thread is an example. There is not clarity over this issue of the date literally because of poor photocopies. You have given reasons why you have rejected one and accepted the other. In your view, the older document is correct and the later documents in error. We know they can’t both be right. You have decided the error is not in the older document and therefore the later documents got it wrong. Is there any possibility it is the other way around? That the mistake of the original was noticed and corrected in subsequent documentation? Is it a possibility? if it’s a possibility then it’s a possible outcome. You don’t even have to know the outcome to see that some form of bias must take place to select either side because neutral would be truly neutral. It would be "I don’t know". That’s the neutral position, not one side or the other, where there is reason to doubt.

I don’t know what the correct date is because the photocopy isn’t clear. The FBI files give conflicting accounts.

BTW, I still don’t use the full hypothesis I outlined above today due to this controversy. I am just outlining what it is. The card connection wasn’t fatal to it. It still stands without it. Unlike a hypothesis where something is baked in and can’t be reversed, it is modular. I can put it in or take it out. Still ends up saying the same thing.

I have shown how the later individuals arrived at February 14th. They mistook received as postmarked. Which is more likely, the original documentation or the second hand documentation compiled by distant individuals. In essence, what we have to believe, is the individual or individuals looked at the postmark on the envelope and couldn’t see properly, somehow mistook 14 as 3, or just lied because they had nothing better to do. Why do we suppose people couldn’t read in 1974. The date of your last post was Fri Aug 21. When somebody recounts the conversation between you and I three weeks later, 2 months later, 6 months later and cites your post as Fri Aug 27, who do you believe is most likely correct. Me, who actually saw the post, with first hand information, or the person who is citing the date at a later time. I don’t really care anymore, because I have decided that the Exorcist letter wasn’t mailed on January 29th 1974, the Melvin Belli letter wasn’t mailed on December 20th 1969, the Los Angeles letter wasn’t mailed on March 13th 1971 and the Dripping Pen card wasn’t mailed on November 8th 1969. I think these earlier documents were wrong. And by the way, the Badlands letter was mailed on May 6th 1974. Do you know why – because this later compiled list said so. If this list had stated the Halloween card was mailed from England on December 10th 1975, I would believe that as well.

RG I am not arguing against your well reasoned hypothesis. I think it’s a good one. Hence why I retracted what I did. However I didn’t realize there were several documents with the 14th. I thought it was just the one. So that made me re-think a bit again.

What I am talking about is human bias. No one is outside some sort of bias bubble and immune to bias. For example do you know the way I brought up the neutral position of "I don’t know". Even that position is still subject to bias problems. Being agnostic about something doesn’t eliminate bias either. Only accepting the facts can do that and we are missing some.

We are dealing with second hand information. The source material isn’t clear. Yes you made some good deductions, but the possibility still remains. Both might even be wrong as another possible outcome. Sometimes low probability events happen. In fact low probability events are explanations for many things. Low probability doesn’t mean impossible. Insurance actuaries calculate them all the time and real world management systems in place for when they happen. Actually let me sum this up in two words – shit happens.

If I am reading you correctly on this you seem to have actually put all your eggs into the one basket despite even the low possibility you may be wrong. Sometimes the roulette ball lands on green. If it didn’t, the house wouldn’t make a profit. Red/Black isn’t 50:50. It’s more like 49.5/49.5 but that’s all the house needs to profit as long as there is a lot of playing so that there are more random samples which eventually emerge into a bigger picture where those green hits add up to "the house always wins". In the end it does.

Accepting a high probability position is still a bias. It is not unreasonable to suggest low probability events happen because we have a history of showing they do.

Hi Richard,

Why did you only compare the SLA envelope with the Count Marco envelope? You wanted to show that they were both written by the "SLA." Had you gone back in time and looked at the 11/8 and 7/26 envelopes, you would have asked the question, which "prankster" or SLA sycophant from LA would have known to write a letter that not only confirms the many Norse references in the Z case that I cited before but also copies the style of two of the Z envelopes, including not including a Zip code, so much so that Morrill undoubtedly confirmed it as a Z letter because of the envelope, even though the letter was sent from Los Angeles and could have used a Zip code?

So what was the reason I can find the similarities between the SLA envelope and the other two confirmed Z envelopes, one of which contained a swatch of Stine’s shirt proving its pedigree, but you cannot? Did you not think of it, or did you want to promote the narrative that Z did not write the SLA letter? You apparently give my SLA source little credence but he says that Z was NOT part of the SLA, which did not even exist in 1969-70 when the 11/9 and 7/26 letters were sent. And there were likely no members of the SLA in the LA area on February 3, 1969. He also said that Kathy Soliah, whom he knew well, would not have written such a letter. So that leaves us with a "prankster," who not only knew that the Old Norse language existed, regardless of the meaning of the word "sla," but who also copied the appearance of a Z letter so well that even Morrill apparently thought the letter was from Z based probably more on the envelope than the letter?

You do not want to hear the other possibility: That Z traveled a lot and found himself in LA on Feb 3rd, saw that piece in the LA Times and wanted to show the people at the Chronicle that he knew something about the word "sla" that nobody else knew. Sla is part of the phrase "sla i hjel," (sp?) that actually does mean to kill. Oh, and KQ told me that he traveled something like 75 or whatever % of the year in those days. So why could he not have been in LA at that time? Too much of a coincidence? What about the existence of a prankster who throws out a Norse reference and copies Z envelopes? How much of a coincidence is that?

But regardless of what people think of KQ, this is a one-issue argument: Who can tell us why and how the alleged SLA member or prankster copied the format and handwriting of actual Z envelopes, one of which was from over four years prior (11/9/69) and one of which was three years and six months old (7/26/70)?

Mike’s take on this is just as compelling. Why are the SLA copycatting a Zodiac envelope and letter if they are capable of these type written letters?

More importantly, why would they even want to do that if it’s possible it would be mistaken for the Zodiac?

What’s the psychology behind that?

Also there is this…

Norse Medieval Crytography in Runic Carvings by by Alf Mongé, O. G. Landsverk, 1967.

Here is a newspaper article for it ->

I wanted to look for such an article myself earlier this week but I signed up with a newspaper archive service that conveniently does not have the Times or the Chronicle in it! What kind of "service" is that?

I use Newspapers.com, but there’s a cheap tier and a not-so-cheap tier, and the not-so-cheap has most of the papers we’re interested in. The last time I used the 7-day free trial, it included everything, however, they only carry the 1865-1923 run of The Chronicle and the 1974 run of the Vallejo Times.

They have the Examiner, L.A.T., Sac Bee, Napa Valley Register, etc.

Not sure what the deal with the Chronicle is. The subscriber-only archive on their website only goes back to 1985. Somebody over there thinks they’re sitting on a mountain of cash, I guess?

I haven’t said the Symbionese Liberation Army were copycatting Zodiac letters BD. They (or some other person) just wrote a letter to the Chronicle and it was mistook as Zodiac. Anybody attempting to pass off the SLA letter as Zodiac would likely have used his introduction, drawn crosshairs or placed a victim total – none of which were used. The author also used "San Francisco Chronicle" on the envelope, which had NEVER been used before by Zodiac. Zodiac also used Calif.

The reason I showed the SLA envelope and Red Phantom envelope together, is the address style is identical, not withstanding the handwriting. Unfortunately Mike, I don’t see the Norse connection like you prior to 1974. Your interpretation of earlier communications is different to mine. When you look at the SLA and Red Phantom envelopes and compare them, then look at the 11/8 envelope, there is a noticeable difference. In terms of Kathy Soliah (it may not have been her), however she is capable of travelling to Los Angeles. But I did in my very first post on this thread, implicitly state "In terms of placing the SLA in Los Angeles in February, they had many members, affiliates and sympathizers". I doubt your source knew them all.

So again, without the question I asked being answered – after 25+ communications, apparently the Zodiac Killer designed a letter primarily and ONLY for the purpose of mentioning the SLA, absent of any other Zodiac identifying features, never misspelled a word (just like Badlands and Red Phantom) and used address styles never before used by Zodiac, fortunately the day before the SLA’s biggest crime. Is your contention it was just lucky timing by Zodiac?

The argument for Zodiac being the SLA author – subjective handwriting.

Actually, some of the Zodiac envelopes were published (not a definitive list, just what I’ve seen):

– Belli in the Chronicle
– Dripping Pen and one of the "Bates had to die" envelopes in Avery’s Riverside piece
– The L.A.T. in the San Bernardino County Sun (but, strangely enough, not in the L.A.T.)

I’ll chime in if I find the Exorcist envelope, as that would be a much more probable candidate for a 1974 copycat, for obvious reasons (i.e. no internet).

Update: None of the 30 or 40 papers I checked out featured a repro of the Exorcist letter or the envelope.

On January 31st, in the article entitled Zodiac Mystery Letter – the First Since 1971, the San Francisco Chronicle presented the Exorcist letter with the strange characters at the foot of the letter whitewashed.

Yup, it was split from the article and I didn’t scroll down further.

While I’m here, I’ll link the L.A. Times write-up with the envelope picture:
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/2042674 … ounty-sun/

This is what I find interesting about whoever who responsible for the ‘Zodiac’ SLA communication.

The early coverage in Nov 1973 papers weren’t using the abbreviation SLA.

The San Francisco Examiner
San Francisco, California
Thursday, November 08, 1973 – Page 22

I can’t find any papers using the abbreviation SLA until two members had already been arrested on Jan 10th and were in San Quentin and under guard. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Remiro#Arrest

The abbreviation SLA appears on 12th Jan 1974 newspaper articles.

So something happened following that to give the abbreviation. Items found in the search? One of those arrested calling it the SLA? I’d like to know what that is.

However the Feb 4th, 1974 SLA communication appears to have the abbreviation with periods – S.L.A and not just SLA.

Any other examples of them using the abbreviation?

Also look closely at the word ‘SLA’ in the Zodiac SLA communication.

It doesn’t just say SLA. It appears to have what looks like a Y at the end. Look at how they write y elsewhere. That looks more to me like a ‘T’ on it’s side. SLAT.

I just don’t get the profile behind the SLA card being linked to that organization. Why this way at all?

The SLA letter you posted BD, is a further nth grade reproduction. It actually never read SLAY.

How does degrading through photocopying add letters which happen to look like SLAY? Out of 26 letters and all sorts of possibilities? That’s some photocopier. I swear that thing probably needs an Exorcist to work properly again.

You’ve seen the extremely dotted reproductions, caused by repeated copying. Contamination, creases, dirt and a multitude of other things can cause errant copies. All I have done is show you an earlier copy without the mark. If you still want to believe it says SLAY, then that is your perogative.

You mean low probability events forming the letter Y?

BTW – photocopying has the ability to increase things like saturation and contrast. My guess is the compressed image (squashed) you showed looks like it has gone through a contrast adjustment also. That can blend a lot of things and also cause things to vanish.