Further Remarks on the Lockwood Allegations

Elsewhere, I have categorically and unequivocally denied Heidi Howkins Lockwood's allegation that I groped her in October 2007. Of course, I do not expect people to take my denial at face value. Anyone can deny anything. Well, there is a great deal more I could say here. For now, however, I offer just the following. My intention is to offer evidence that Lockwood is not a credible accuser. She has made many other "interesting" claims about her own experience of sexual misconduct.

After Lockwood "confronted" me with her allegations in February 2014, she continued talking to me (on the phone) for well over half an hour. The subject, which she seemed eager to discuss, was her "affair" (her word) with George Boolos (something of which she publicly accused him just six weeks later). She had first told me about this affair in October 2007, on the same night she alleges I groped her.

Among other things, Lockwood asked me why I had mentioned George's paper "On 'Seeing' the Truth of the Gödel Sentence" to her that night at Yale. I had no memory of mentioning that paper to her at all—it's a brief reply to Penrose, and I am not sure I would even have remembered it—but I just said that I didn't remember why I'd mentioned it. Lockwood then told me that she was happy that I had told her about the paper, because it turned out to contain a coded message from George, written shortly before he died, apologizing for how he had treated her.

The message was supposed to be:

But earthlier happy is the rose distilled
Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn,
Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness.
(A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I, Scene 3)

These lines do not occur in the paper (unsurprisingly, if you are familiar with Boolos's work). They were supposed to be "encoded" in it, though it was not explained to me how. In the context of the play, they are usually taken to be an homage to the earthly pleasures (for women) of sex, as opposed to the heavenly rewards of the convent. But that was not how Lockwood was reading them. I will not say exactly what they were supposed to mean. Suffice it to say that it concerned an alleged detail of the "affair" that it would be cruel for me to reveal.

There were many other such details Lockwood shared with me. And I should emphasize further that I am far from the only person with whom Lockwood has shared these sorts of stories. Many, many people have heard such stories from her. I personally know of at least nine such people.

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NOTE: This account is based upon notes I wrote the day after this conversation. (I shared the details of the conversation with many people at that time, as well.)