Evidence Matters: Science, Proof, And Truth In The Law (Law in Context) - Softcover

Haack, Susan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1107698340 ISBN 13: 9781107698345

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2014

Synopsis

Is truth in the law just plain truth - or something sui generis? Is a trial a search for truth? Do adversarial procedures and exclusionary rules of evidence enable, or impede, the accurate determination of factual issues? Can degrees of proof be identified with mathematical probabilities? What role can statistical evidence properly play? How can courts best handle the scientific testimony on which cases sometimes turn? How are they to distinguish reliable scientific testimony from unreliable hokum? The dozen interdisciplinary essays collected here explore a whole nexus of such questions about science, proof, and truth in the law. With her characteristic clarity and verve, in these essays Haack brings her original and distinctive work in theory of knowledge and philosophy of science to bear on real-life legal issues. She includes detailed analyses of a wide variety of cases and lucid summaries of relevant scientific work, of the many roles of the scientific peer-review system, and of relevant legal developments.

About this title

Book Description

With her characteristic clarity and verve, in these essays Susan Haack brings her original and distinctive work in theory of knowledge and philosophy of science to bear on real-life legal issues. She includes detailed analyses of a wide variety of cases and lucid summaries of relevant scientific work, of the many roles of the scientific peer-review system, and of relevant legal developments.

About the Author

Susan Haack is Distinguished Professor in the Humanities, Cooper Senior Scholar in Arts and Sciences, Professor of Philosophy, and Professor of Law at the University of Miami. She is the author of numerous highly acclaimed books, among them Evidence and Inquiry and Defending Science, Within Reason, and of many articles in legal, philosophical, and scientific journals. Haack is one of a tiny number of living philosophers included in Peter J. King, 100 Philosophers: The Life and Work of the World's Greatest Thinkers (2004); and she appeared on The Independent on Sunday's list of the ten most important women philosophers of all time (2005).

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1107698340
• ISBN 13: 9781107698345
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 444