On my return from Sri Lanka last week, I read the back issues of the Cleveland newspapers and found that a big story was the vicious beating of a middle-aged white man by a group of six black teenagers who had accosted him while he was on a walk in his neighborhood. The man was …
Monthly Archive: January 2008
Jan 16 2008
Jury service and jury nullification-2
The fourth time I was empanelled was for a criminal case involving charges of felonious assault where the defense said that it would argue self-defense. Once again, there was an oral voir dire, which included questions about whether we had ever been involved in any physical altercation. It was during the voir dire that I …
Jan 15 2008
Jury service and jury nullification-1
By a coincidence, while writing and posting my series on the law and religion in public schools, I was also called for jury service and spent the better part of the week of November 5, 2007 in the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court in downtown Cleveland. I feel strongly that the jury system is one …
Jan 14 2008
Why rush election results?
Ever since election day on November 6, 2007 news reports in Cleveland have been obsessing over the fact that the results were delayed by a couple of hours due to a systems crash that required the backup to kick in. I am puzzled by this obsession with speed in elections. Why is there such a …
Jan 11 2008
What is science?
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) Because of my interest in the …
Jan 10 2008
Necessary and sufficient conditions
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) The problem of finding definitions for …
Jan 09 2008
Improving the quality of our snap judgments
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) In a previous post, I mentioned …
Jan 08 2008
Snap judgments and prejudices
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) In an earlier post, I described …
Jan 07 2008
Snap judgments
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell’s …
Jan 04 2008
Atheism and Agnosticism
(I am taking a break from original posts due to the holidays and because of travel after that. Until I return, here are some old posts, updated and edited, for those who might have missed them the first time around. New posts should appear starting Monday, January 14, 2008.) In an interview, Douglas Adams, author …
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