|
|
|
| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 18 2012 @ 07:05 PM EDT |
| Dueling experts are aparently largely a US phenomenon:
NY
Times article. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: bugstomper on Friday, May 18 2012 @ 07:38 PM EDT |
What if there is genuine disagreement amongst experts. For example there was a
time when the Big Bang Theory and Steady State Theory were both in contention as
models of Cosmology. If in some far-fetched case the verdict in a trial hinged
on which theory of the origin of the Universe was true, who would have been the
one expert for the court to choose? There was a time when some well respected
physicists were strongly convinced of Big Bang, others were strongly convinced
of Steady State, both had evidence to back them up in their theory being correct
and evidence that the other one was wrong. I'm sure there were some who
maintained an open mind until more evidence came in to help decide. Any choice a
court would make, even the choice of an expert who is still sitting on the
fence, is choosing a foregone conclusion of one side or the other or a hung jury
or throw of the dice.
It may be that the correct outcome in such a circumstance would be a hung jury
or a jury that concludes that they cannot decide based on the evidence. If that
is the correct conclusion then the court appointing a single expert might not be
a good way to get there.
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: reiisi on Friday, May 18 2012 @ 08:37 PM EDT |
If a court could expect to successfully appoint an expert _and_ a special
interrogator to direct the expert's testimony (you do understand that's what
your "special master" ends up being), then the court would not expect
to ever need a jury to hear the testimony.
We need to allow duelling witnesses precisely because life is ambiguous.
What you are wishing for is a world in which all questions have a right and
wrong answer. Not only that, but you are wishing for a society of people who can
always (eventually) pierce the fog to the answer of every question. Very much
wishful thinking
More often than not, when you have duelling witnesses, both witnesses are right
-- within their own context. Neither is completely right, but both are (mostly)
right within the context of their understanding.
We misstate the jury's duty. The jury should not be deciding who or what is
right or wrong relatively to testimony, but should be deciding which witness's
context applies best to the case in question. Sometimes there is an underlying
question of right and wrong in the priority question, but the difficult
decisions are almost never black and white.
The plaintiff and the defendent may not actually sit on the witness stand in a
particular case, but if they aren't witnesses to their own stand, there would be
no case to try. So the trial starts with duelling witnesses.
We give judicial precedent too much authority, and waste too much time trying to
reach unanimity. We would do well to view a hung jury as indication that,
morally speaking, a compromise would be a better result than a verdict for one
side or the other.
In this case, Oracle is clearly in the wrong. On the other hand, and this is
important, Google should not have been letting Sun hang out to dry when Sun was
finding its way to the auction block.
No, they didn't want to mess Android licensing up with cross-licensing
agreements, but they (we) needed to find a way to keep Sun out of the hands of
any buyer. Any company that could have floated the price would have had to
justify the price, with the result we see now, the buyer having to go out and
try to convert the intellectual capital to cash in the terms that work in the
current market: that evil IP.
Companies that are not interested in trolling for the jackpot should look at
ways to lend out and borrow engineers instead of licensing clauses.
[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 19 2012 @ 01:02 AM EDT |
Like the Judge said, what weight to give evidence is entirely for the jury to
decide. That's the system.
A better idea is to invest heavily in public education. Not only for math and
science subjects, but also for the arts, and humanities. This is how we get
better juries.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 19 2012 @ 01:03 AM EDT |
Like the Judge said, what weight to give evidence is entirely for the jury to
decide. That's the system.
A better idea is to invest heavily in public education. Not only for math and
science subjects, but also for the arts, and humanities. This is how we get
better juries.[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: amster69 on Saturday, May 19 2012 @ 06:19 AM EDT |
I like your thinking. However, as it removes the tap dancers from the equation
it has little chance of being adopted.
Bob
---
Bob[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
|
|
|
|
|
