By Sheeva Azma
Jeffrey Epstein flew under the radar with his crimes for decades until he went to jail for them in 2008, and released on good behavior (knowing what we all know now, it’s like: um, okay?!) in 2009. He ended up going back to jail a few years later after dragging a whole bunch of gleeful scientists into it all, as we know post-Epstein files.
In 2010, not too long after Epstein’s early release from prison, three researchers thanked Epstein in their Nature paper. The acknowledgement is no real surprise, in a way, given that Epstein was heavily involved in this work, because he provided the startup funding for the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, where two of the authors worked. The third author is the famous E.O. Wilson who studied ants and won two Pulitzer Prizes.
E.O. Wilson was one of my science role models growing up, so this discovery devastated me. I posted about what I had learned on Instagram and mentioned that this finding “absolutely broke me.” One guy took it upon himself to message me and say something like, “oh, there are no emails between Wilson and Epstein, nor is there evidence that Wilson visited the Epstein properties in the files, so it’s not that bad.”
I guess the guy reaching out to gaslight me did not realize what it means to be thanked in a Nature paper — that is, a paper published in the leading academic journal Nature. I asked Google to explain for you, and it told me: “Publishing in Nature is considered one of the highest achievements in scientific research due to its extreme selectivity, high citation impact, and unmatched prestige. It signifies that research is a major, groundbreaking advancement, often leading to increased career opportunities, funding, and global media attention.”
Global media attention (of the positive kind) is exactly what Epstein wanted…and it is what he got from associating with researchers.
Epstein, newly out of jail, sought to revamp his image…and science was a great avenue for that
After Epstein got out of jail, there were a slew of news headlines about Epstein’s disgraceful activities that outranked his philanthropic endeavors on Google. So, he got some help from his friends to position him as someone who cared about humanity and helping people so much that he funded the work of brilliant researchers.
I previously wrote about the lengths to which Al Seckel, Epstein’s late friend and ex-boyfriend of Ghislaine Maxwell’s sister, went to try to boost Epstein’s digital presence and make it a more positive one after he got out of jail.
The Nature paper is another example. The acknowledgements section of the paper, which is reported as a fully collaborative effort by all three authors, reads, “We gratefully acknowledge support from the John Templeton Foundation, the NSF/NIH joint program in mathematical biology (NIH grant R01GM078986), the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (Grand Challenges grant 37874), and J. Epstein.”
Epstein is publicly listed as funding several influential science papers
The fact that Epstein is involved in this paper that literally reshapes prevailing theories in social cooperation just feels so suspect to me. It’s evidence to me that Epstein’s contributions redefined elite science, instead of just passively funding a bunch of “good ideas” to “help humanity” (which is how we often think of science working).
I have many questions about this study, but it would take me time I do not have right now to learn about why Epstein was able to throw enough money at science to take down a theory E.O. Wilson espoused for decades. I wish I could travel back in time and ask E.O. Wilson why he co-authored a paper disproving his own favored theory after decades with … you guessed it … Jeffrey Epstein’s friends.
Besides directly thanking Epstein, the paper also thanks friends of Epstein’s — the John Templeton Foundation, where Barnaby Marsh, a close Epstein colleague, worked, and, of course, Bill Gates (who Eppy often referred to as “bill” — no caps, first name only — in the emails).
Templeton Foundation’s Marsh and Epstein were emailing about “metrics of success of the [Templeton Foundation] grants” in early July 2009, at which point, by my estimation, Epstein was in jail — since he was released on July 22, 2009.
It’s hard for me to believe that you can write a casual email in jail, even if it’s just to say “sorry I missed your call” to someone, but I guess weirder things have happened in the Epstein files.
Throwing a ton of money at science and working in its broken system, Epstein’s PED friends (one of whom, Martin Nowak, is the corresponding (aka: main) author of the Nature paper and is on paid leave at Harvard, and the other is a younger female who all but idolized Epstein, is a professor at Princeton now).
Scientists play a huge role in legitimizing Epstein in the Epstein files
The way the Epstein files have been covered, it feels like there’s one timeline for non-scientist “important” people, and then all these scientists that Epstein befriended. It’s not really that way, as I’ve learned. I’ve been covering science in the Epstein files for nearly three months on Instagram and his science activities are a central part of the story.
The bizarre part, for me, is that “J. Epstein” is thanked for his “support” (usually, this means financial support, but it’s clear that Epstein “supported” the scholars he partnered with in many ways) in other research papers as well. It’s just odd for a convicted criminal of this caliber to be mentioned in so many high-profile papers, like this one about “dynamic remodeling of in-group bias during the 2008 presidential election” or this one in Nature Communications about “the evolution of antisocial punishment in optional public goods games.” I wonder how many times these papers have been cited, collectively? Did J. Epstein email these researchers with his own crackpot theories? In retrospect, Epstein’s involvement and the dissonance between his values and society’s poses a conflict of interest in a way that these researchers did not really take the time to examine on any level. Maddening!
Taken together, we start to see a storyline take shape that involves a dual life of failing at being a good person (to say it mildly — the details are outside of the scope of this hopefully, informative but relatively lighthearted article) while also contributing to some of the world’s most prominent scientific and technological achievements while also trying to reshape science itself to — possibly — normalize him.
Let’s add science into the main timeline of Epstein events for the full picture
How does all of this happen, one might wonder?
It starts with Jeffrey Epstein being a lover of science, teaching physics and calculus while being noticeably creepy at an elite Manhattan prep school, then getting rich after working at Bear Stearns thanks to a connection from a student’s parent. After he left Bear Stearns, he continued to work his connections and get more and more rich and influential. This article from DW does not explain any of this kindly.
Epstein, somewhere along the way, linked up with scientists he could fund and learn science from (and bounce off his own largely unremarkable ideas), while also living more and more of a double life of scientific achievement and crime.
It’s an unusual path, but perhaps not so for someone with a little science background and a lot of money who found camaraderie among some of elite science’s most toxic men.
We know that Epstein was donating to Harvard as early as 1998. Harvard’s student newspaper, the Harvard Crimson, called him a “mogul” in 2003 and had this to say: “Networking with the University’s greatest and most well-known minds, he has spurred research through both discussion and dollars he has contributed to various faculty—most often in the sciences.
In March 2006, per NPR, Epstein financed a conference of elite physicists on his private island. Sometime either before or after that, he also gifted $60,000 to an MIT professor named Seth Lloyd — which went straight to Lloyd’s personal bank account, according to the MIT report on their Epstein interactions.
In 2006, per the Harvard report on their Epstein interactions, Epstein had spent the 2005-2006 academic year as visiting fellow at Harvard, which was renewed for another school year — though they rescinded that in September 2006, after he got arrested.
So, no, he was not just a funder of science — he was actively involved in shaping it, whatever that ended up meaning for the science ecosystem (it’s a huge and open question, to be honest).
Science vibes are a privilege, not a right
My fellow scientists, remember the positive vibes you would get when telling people about your science project growing up? Well, it seems like Jeffrey Epstein sought to clear mentions of his predatory behavior by affiliating with scientists to get those same vibes. It’s a classic example of the halo effect and it was not right, but it’s what happened.
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