Italian seismologists jailed...

[Mich the Tester]

...for failing to predict the unpredictable.

Jailing scientists for not giving sufficient warning of the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake is a spectacularly stupid idea – Telegraph Blogs

Utterly stupid, I hope this is overturned at appeal, perhaps by a judge with a half decent education. Earthquakes simply can't be predicted; there are sometimes signs that sometimes precede an earthquake, and there are really three countries in the world where the science of seismology is so advanced that they can sometimes give useful warnings of an earthquake and they are the US, Japan and Italy; these are some of the world's best seismologists. Unfortunately some of the world's worst judges seem to be Italian. If this isn't turned over at appeal I can imagine a brain drain getting started as seismologists go somewhere that they won't be imprisoned for getting the unpredictable wrong.

But what really concerns me is that some judges in Italy, and I suspect in other countries in Europe, obviously have so little understanding of science that you may as well present scientific evidence to a donkey and then see which way the tail waggles to come to a verdict. We see more and more science involved in criminal proceedings; forensic science, DNA evidence and so on, so surely judges need to be educated in the basics of science.

[BrilloPad]

Are the judges posters on cuk? I wish I had a post for every time 2 posters had looked at the same data and drawn opposing conclusions. Actually I probably do.

Or maybe we should just ban scientists? Half the time they say things like "in 50 years time London is going to be underwater unless we blah blah blah". Like anyone is going to be able to check if they are right or wrong in 50 years. I hear more sense spoken by my priest than alot of scientists.

[Paddy]

They jail scientists for not predicting earthquakes but they don't prosecute bankers for mass fraud.

[Mich the Tester]

Are the judges posters on cuk? I wish I had a post for every time 2 posters had looked at the same data and drawn opposing conclusions. Actually I probably do.

Or maybe we should just ban scientists? Half the time they say things like "in 50 years time London is going to be underwater unless we blah blah blah". Like anyone is going to be able to check if they are right or wrong in 50 years. I hear more sense spoken by my priest than alot of scientists.

The trouble with geology and seismology is that you get lots of contradictory evidence that makes it basically impossible to predict with accuracy; at the moment, that is. The research is generally directed at studying more and more things that happen, and then reviewing the data after an event to try and find patterns that could help predict earthquakes. A lot of that work is going on in Italy, for two reasons; firstly, they have earthquakes, and secondly they have some outstanding geologists, volcanologists and seismologists, largely thanks to the first fact. The judge in this case is truly a cretin who's putting more at risk than he can ever understand.

[EternalOptimist]

The way I understand it, the scientists gave the usual data with the usual caveats but the bureaucrat gave assurances to concerned people that everything was going to be ok, and he cited the scientists as his authority.

[EternalOptimist]

The trouble with geology and seismology is that you get lots of contradictory evidence that makes it basically impossible to predict with accuracy; at the moment, that is. The research is generally directed at studying more and more things that happen, and then reviewing the data after an event to try and find patterns that could help predict earthquakes. A lot of that work is going on in Italy, for two reasons; firstly, they have earthquakes, and secondly they have some outstanding geologists, volcanologists and seismologists, largely thanks to the first fact. The judge in this case is truly a cretin who's putting more at risk than he can ever understand.

nonsense.
The judges job is to make sure the law is applied properly. It has never been the role of a judge to make decisions on matters of science

[Mich the Tester]

The way I understand it, the scientists gave the usual data with the usual caveats but the bureaucrat gave assurances to concerned people that everything was going to be ok, and he cited the scientists as his authority.

The bureaucrat didn't understand enough about the science and so he saidd something silly. The scientists simply gave the evidence they had, which as usual was full of conflicting signals and complexity; it's not a science where things are easily predictable or where it's easy to find cause and effect.

[Mich the Tester]

nonsense.
The judges job is to make sure the law is applied properly. It has never been the role of a judge to make decisions on matters of science

Yep, I noticed the
If a judge understands nothing of science then you can have no faith whatsoever in allowing the use of DNA or forensic science in criminal trials, and certainly not information stored in computer systems.

[EternalOptimist]

I think you should concentrate more on what judges are there for and what they do rather than what you wish they were there for

[Mich the Tester]

I think you should concentrate more on what judges are there for and what they do rather than what you wish they were there for

If the judge had any understanding of critical thinking he'd have thrown the case out.