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Full-Text Articles in Law
Book Review: Carl Cranor, Toxic Torts: Science, Law, And The Possibility Of Justice, David S. Caudill
Book Review: Carl Cranor, Toxic Torts: Science, Law, And The Possibility Of Justice, David S. Caudill
Working Paper Series
Carl F. Cranor’s Toxic Torts: Science, Law, and the Possibility of Justice is a sustained, comprehensive argument that the Daubert gatekeeping regime has tilted the playing field against injured plaintiffs in toxic tort litigation. More generally, Cranor joins those who argue that the Daubert regime has not fared well in practice. Complex scientific evidence is not handled well in trials because scientific methods, data, and inferential reasoning are not well understood by gatekeeping judges. Cranor’s goal is to help solve this problem by offering a detailed description of the patterns of reasoning, evidence collection, and inference in nonlegal scientific settings. …
Arsenic And Old Chemistry: Images Of Mad Alchemists, Experts Attacking Experts, And The Crisis In Forensic Science, David S. Caudill
Arsenic And Old Chemistry: Images Of Mad Alchemists, Experts Attacking Experts, And The Crisis In Forensic Science, David S. Caudill
Working Paper Series
Drawing on research into the use of experts in early 19th-century criminal trials, the image of mad alchemists in popular culture representations of science, and the distinction between empirical and contingent “interpretive repertoires” in the discourse of scientific controversies, this article explores the controversy over arsenic-detection technologies prior to the Marsh test. In addition to noting the predictable criticism of incompetent expertise in the service of law, this article highlights implied accusations of hubris and amorality on the part of over-confident experts, both in the early 19th-century and in today's crisis of forensic science.