People Get Ready – There’s a Reference Manual a Comin’
Science is the key … Back in February, I wrote about a National Academies’ workshop that featured some outstanding members of the scientific and statistical world, and which gave participants to...
View ArticleReference Manual – Desiderata for 4th Edition – Part VI – Rule 703
One of the most remarkable, and objectionable, aspects of the third edition was its failure to engage with Federal Rule of Evidence of 703, and the need for courts to assess the validity of individual...
View ArticleConsensus Rule – Shadows of Validity
Back in 2011, at a Fourth Circuit Judicial Conference, Chief Justice John Roberts took a cheap shot at law professors and law reviews when he intoned: “Pick up a copy of any law review that you see,...
View ArticleExcluding Epidemiologic Evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 702
We are 30-plus years into the “Daubert” era, in which federal district courts are charged with gatekeeping the relevance and reliability of scientific evidence. Not surprisingly, given the lawsuit...
View ArticleThe Role of Peer Review in Rule 702 and 703 Gatekeeping
“There is no expedient to which man will not resort to avoid the real labor of thinking.” Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723-92) Some courts appear to duck the real labor of thinking, and the duty...
View ArticleThe Proper Study of Mankind
“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of Mankind is Man.”[1] Kristen Ranges recently earned her law degree from the University of Miami School of Law, and her doctorate in...
View ArticleQRPs in Science and in Court
Lay juries usually function well in assessing the relevance of an expert witness’s credentials, experience, command of the facts, likeability, physical demeanor, confidence, and ability to communicate....
View ArticlePeer Review, Protocols, and QRPs
In Daubert, the Supreme Court decided a legal question about the proper interpretation of a statute, Rule 702, and then remanded the case to the Ninth Circuit of the Court of Appeals for further...
View ArticleAccess to a Study Protocol & Underlying Data Reveals a Nuclear...
The limits of peer review ultimately make it a poor proxy for the validity tests posed by Rules 702 and 703. Published peer review articles simply do not permit a very searching evaluation of the facts...
View ArticleZhang’s Glyphosate Meta-Analysis Succumbs to Judicial Scrutiny
Back in March 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) issued its working group’s monograph on glyphosate weed killer. The report classified glyphosate as a “probable carcinogen,”...
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