Warp wrote:
>   It's scary that eyewitness testimony is the *highest* form of evidence in
> most courts of law, even though eyewitness testimony is more or less the
> same thing as anecdotal evidence.

Uh, not really. The way it works in the USA is that if someone does a test, 
they have to testify what the test was. So the evidence is the policeman 
saying "I measured the skid marks and they were 12 feet long" followed by 
the scientist saying "if you are going 87MPH and slam on the brakes, your 
skid marks will be about 12 feet long."  (Followed by the other side saying 
"if the tire had blown out, the skid marks would be 12 feet long even if he 
was only going the legal speed limit at the time" perhaps.)

One can't just present the facts. Some *person* has to present the facts 
*and* testify that they are true, and then the jury has to decide whether to 
believe it or not.  You can't just show a photograph as evidence. You can 
show a photograph as evidence if you have the photographer come up and say 
"I took this photo and what's in the photo is what I saw when I took it, and 
the photo hasn't been doctored."

In science, the equivalent is peer review and replicated experiments. You 
don't really want to use that technique in a murder investigation. ;-)

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Yes, we're traveling together,
   but to different destinations.

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