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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. |
On December 11 2012 02:35 xDaunt wrote:
I actually agree that lawyers tend to be defective people. In fact, female attorneys tend to be the worst.
I tried to date one once. Worst idea ever.
And yes, most lawyers tend to be terrible people in one way or another.
On December 11 2012 01:20 oneofthem wrote:
well at least we know bluepanther's internal polls were pretty bad.
Those were the Romney internal polls I was talking about. I'll be the first to admit they were way off. But at the same time, I'm not sure they are "more prone" to being off. That's the thing with margins of error. It may be off and still not be "wrong". I mean, PPP, WeAsk, Rasumussen... those are the same companies doing internal polling for the most part.
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On December 11 2012 04:23 ticklishmusic wrote:I lol'd so hard, then was aghast that someone could have a stick so far up their ass that it defied the laws of nature. It's great when someone whips out their e-peen then the community castrates them. EDIT: I don't know, but Business is borderline joke for me. I'm doing Bio (on a premed/research-ish track) along with a BBA at my school, and Business is pretty easy for me-- this is supposed to be the 5th ranked BBA program in the US. I do my work for Financial Accounting (which is reputedly the hardest pre-req/ one of the harder courses in the B-school), then do maybe 5/5 hours the two days before the test and pull a 98 (avg = 73). Overall, I'm a mid range A when the class has been curved. I study my ass off for orgo for 3 weeks and I scraped a 67 (avg = 66) on my last test. I was fucking ecstatic when I found I got 18/18 on one page of that exam-- that is how hard the class and how much it means to me. Maybe I'm just bad at orgo, but geez this is a little ridiculous. So yeah, ask a scientist to analyze some financial statements-- he can figure that shit out in a couple hours. Ask a businessman to learn a Gringnard Reaction? Not gonna happen.
Business math is generally easy, its the interpretation and use of the math that's the hard part 
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On December 11 2012 05:06 BluePanther wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 04:10 Rassy wrote:
I have to go with the first answer.
Am not sure how it is in the usa but in the netherlands the law study is the easiest study by far at university level.
That does not mean there are no smart lawyers,its just that a law study alone is not sufficient to qualify someone as a philosopher king.
My expectations for the cliff are no solution and no fall off the cliff.
They will find an intermediate solution, postponing most of the automatic budget cuts and they will come with a solution when they are about to hit the debt ceiling (wich i believe is expected to be in february/march?) In the US, Lawyer is a (professional) doctoral degree. It's three years, post-undergrad. It's also probably one of the hardest graduate schools to get into at more prestigious schools. The only program I'd compare it to in difficulty is medical school. It's not really the same as it is in Europe. Most lawyers also have a degree in something else as well. "Law" really isn't any sort of undergraduate degree in the USA.
The bolded part is where the complication arises; there are many excellent schools in the United States that put out respectable JD's, this is an obvious consequence of the incredibly high graduate program quality ceiling in the United States. On the flipside, however, there are more and more crappy schools just slipping by when they get ABA accreditation, and the labor market for lawyers is rather poor due in part to the inflated number of JD recipients coming out of factory schools. There are a ton of shitty lawyers who are not intelligent people, and there are tons of quality lawyers who really put in the time and know their stuff and when to let others know their stuff. My point is that estimating the political quality of an entire field of professionals based on some vague ideation of what that respective field's strengths and weaknesses are is rather silly and not very productive.
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On December 11 2012 05:23 farvacola wrote:
My point is that estimating the political quality of an entire field of professionals is rather silly and not very productive.
What? I thought we were deciding which profession should rule the world. This seems like a crucial question to me
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On December 11 2012 05:23 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 05:06 BluePanther wrote:On December 11 2012 04:10 Rassy wrote:
I have to go with the first answer.
Am not sure how it is in the usa but in the netherlands the law study is the easiest study by far at university level.
That does not mean there are no smart lawyers,its just that a law study alone is not sufficient to qualify someone as a philosopher king.
My expectations for the cliff are no solution and no fall off the cliff.
They will find an intermediate solution, postponing most of the automatic budget cuts and they will come with a solution when they are about to hit the debt ceiling (wich i believe is expected to be in february/march?) In the US, Lawyer is a (professional) doctoral degree. It's three years, post-undergrad. It's also probably one of the hardest graduate schools to get into at more prestigious schools. The only program I'd compare it to in difficulty is medical school. It's not really the same as it is in Europe. Most lawyers also have a degree in something else as well. "Law" really isn't any sort of undergraduate degree in the USA. The bolded part is where the complication arises; there are many excellent schools in the United States that put out respectable JD's, this is an obvious consequence of the incredibly high graduate program quality ceiling in the United States. On the flipside, however, there are more and more crappy schools just slipping by when they get ABA accreditation, and the labor market for lawyers is rather poor due in part to the inflated number of JD recipients coming out of factory schools. There are a ton of shitty lawyers who are not intelligent people, and there are tons of quality lawyers who really put in the time and know their stuff and when to let others know their stuff. My point is that estimating the political quality of an entire field of professionals based on some vague ideation of what that respective field's strengths and weaknesses are is rather silly and not very productive.
This is all true. There are a lot of really shitty law schools out there that crank out a lot of people with law degrees who have no business being lawyers. These are the same people who actually worry about passing the bar (though in fairness, there are a lot of really neurotic smart people who worry about it anyway) and have to take it multiple times. However, if you're looking at the top 10% or so of the profession, you're going to find a lot of very impressive individuals with very impressive backgrounds and credentials that make them uniquely qualified for political office in a way that you generally won't see with other professions simply because of what the legal profession does. I'm not trying to knock other professions, and I have no shortage of criticisms about the legal profession. Because our job is generally to advise people about what they do, we have to understand what they do to one degree or another. This results in us being exposed to far more fields than your average professional and having a broader base of knowledge to draw upon.
Again, I'm just pointing out some of the reasons why you're more likely to draft strong politicians from the legal profession than any other profession. I have no delusions that exceptional politicians can't (and don't) from other walks of life.
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On December 11 2012 05:23 farvacola wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 05:06 BluePanther wrote:On December 11 2012 04:10 Rassy wrote:
I have to go with the first answer.
Am not sure how it is in the usa but in the netherlands the law study is the easiest study by far at university level.
That does not mean there are no smart lawyers,its just that a law study alone is not sufficient to qualify someone as a philosopher king.
My expectations for the cliff are no solution and no fall off the cliff.
They will find an intermediate solution, postponing most of the automatic budget cuts and they will come with a solution when they are about to hit the debt ceiling (wich i believe is expected to be in february/march?) In the US, Lawyer is a (professional) doctoral degree. It's three years, post-undergrad. It's also probably one of the hardest graduate schools to get into at more prestigious schools. The only program I'd compare it to in difficulty is medical school. It's not really the same as it is in Europe. Most lawyers also have a degree in something else as well. "Law" really isn't any sort of undergraduate degree in the USA. The bolded part is where the complication arises; there are many excellent schools in the United States that put out respectable JD's, this is an obvious consequence of the incredibly high graduate program quality ceiling in the United States. On the flipside, however, there are more and more crappy schools just slipping by when they get ABA accreditation, and the labor market for lawyers is rather poor due in part to the inflated number of JD recipients coming out of factory schools. There are a ton of shitty lawyers who are not intelligent people, and there are tons of quality lawyers who really put in the time and know their stuff and when to let others know their stuff. My point is that estimating the political quality of an entire field of professionals based on some vague ideation of what that respective field's strengths and weaknesses are is rather silly and not very productive.
I want to stress that I was generalizing when I made that comment. It was a refutation that lawyers in government were the problem. It's not lawyers; it's bad politicians that are the problem, regardless of what their profession is.
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On December 11 2012 05:52 BluePanther wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 05:23 farvacola wrote:On December 11 2012 05:06 BluePanther wrote:On December 11 2012 04:10 Rassy wrote:
I have to go with the first answer.
Am not sure how it is in the usa but in the netherlands the law study is the easiest study by far at university level.
That does not mean there are no smart lawyers,its just that a law study alone is not sufficient to qualify someone as a philosopher king.
My expectations for the cliff are no solution and no fall off the cliff.
They will find an intermediate solution, postponing most of the automatic budget cuts and they will come with a solution when they are about to hit the debt ceiling (wich i believe is expected to be in february/march?) In the US, Lawyer is a (professional) doctoral degree. It's three years, post-undergrad. It's also probably one of the hardest graduate schools to get into at more prestigious schools. The only program I'd compare it to in difficulty is medical school. It's not really the same as it is in Europe. Most lawyers also have a degree in something else as well. "Law" really isn't any sort of undergraduate degree in the USA. The bolded part is where the complication arises; there are many excellent schools in the United States that put out respectable JD's, this is an obvious consequence of the incredibly high graduate program quality ceiling in the United States. On the flipside, however, there are more and more crappy schools just slipping by when they get ABA accreditation, and the labor market for lawyers is rather poor due in part to the inflated number of JD recipients coming out of factory schools. There are a ton of shitty lawyers who are not intelligent people, and there are tons of quality lawyers who really put in the time and know their stuff and when to let others know their stuff. My point is that estimating the political quality of an entire field of professionals based on some vague ideation of what that respective field's strengths and weaknesses are is rather silly and not very productive. I want to stress that I was generalizing when I made that comment. It was a refutation that lawyers in government were the problem. It's not lawyers; it's bad politicians that are the problem, regardless of what their profession is.
Yeah, I think you were pretty clear as to your intentions. As to the concentration of lawyers in government, I can't help but feel a tad deterministic about it in lieu of making any value-based judgements; it just so happens that the barrier between law and politics is particularly thin in comparison to other fields of study and consequently, our government is full of lawyers. Now, I do feel that an injection of field-specific expertise into some areas of government would certainly be a good thing, but in what capacity and to what degree I'm not entirely certain. Instead, I'll only suggest that those with the idea in mind that non-lawyers would necessarily make better politicians ought to take a long hard look at the procession of bureaucracy in virtually any field, whether that be physics, education, medicine, or psychology. I think anyone would find that, similar to what BluePanther and xDaunt said, errors in governance are inevitably tied more with human nature than anything else.
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On December 11 2012 05:52 BluePanther wrote:
I want to stress that I was generalizing when I made that comment. It was a refutation that lawyers in government were the problem. It's not lawyers; it's bad politicians that are the problem, regardless of what their profession is.
I'll reiterate by saying you're breaking that second rule again... You're automatically assuming that problems in government arise from poor politicians. Laws, politicians, pretty much everything revolves around how the Government is set up. Like I said in my earlier post, with a limited government, with very little power, lawyers are the ideal representatives because they are practiced in representing people to protect their rights. This is not the case now however as the role of government has changed entirely from being one of simple protections to one that provides and assists for its citizens.
I would argue the way our government is set up is the real reason we have "bad government" and that politicians/companies/etc. are only acting in their own best interest, which is perfectly logical. I'll explain. Corporations and unions spend lots of money on elections each year. A corporation's main purpose is to turn a profit, and a union to protect its workers (if you think differently then please correct me, but I believe this is the bare minimum idea behind both). In order to keep that money flowing for future campaigns, they use their power in government to assist these corporations and unions, such as by earmarks or contracts, for corporations, or drafting and supporting legislation that protects the rights of workers further or strengthens unions, for unions.
Now, we have our general population that forms factions that A. Hate corporations because they have their hands in government B. Hate unions because they have their hands in government and C. Hate politicians because they are basically bribed by unions and corporations. But as I explained, all of them were working in their best interest. The corporation is trying to turn a profit, and by use of cost-benefit analysis has discovered giving money to campaigns yields higher revenues. The union wants to protect its workers and spending money on elections yields the best results. The politician wants to be reelected and so they continue to accept these donations and give out favors.
Isn't acting in your best interest the logical thing to do? If acting in your best interest undermines the rights of others, isn't there a problem with the way things are setup?
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Has anyone mentioned McConnell filibustering his own bill?
http://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/07/mitch-mcconnell-objects-to-himself-so-do-we/
edit :
Also, Silver isn't speaking anecdotally about internal polling, he's been provided with internal polling by more than one campaign and turned down offers from others. The Obama campaign provided him their internal polling 2008, he declined the same offer in 2012 for a number of reasons (The polls were less accurate than the average poll, he didn't want to appear biased being the main two)
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On December 11 2012 06:24 renoB wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 05:52 BluePanther wrote:
I want to stress that I was generalizing when I made that comment. It was a refutation that lawyers in government were the problem. It's not lawyers; it's bad politicians that are the problem, regardless of what their profession is. I'll reiterate by saying you're breaking that second rule again... You're automatically assuming that problems in government arise from poor politicians. Laws, politicians, pretty much everything revolves around how the Government is set up. Like I said in my earlier post, with a limited government, with very little power, lawyers are the ideal representatives because they are practiced in representing people to protect their rights. This is not the case now however as the role of government has changed entirely from being one of simple protections to one that provides and assists for its citizens. I would argue the way our government is set up is the real reason we have "bad government" and that politicians/companies/etc. are only acting in their own best interest, which is perfectly logical. I'll explain. Corporations and unions spend lots of money on elections each year. A corporation's main purpose is to turn a profit, and a union to protect its workers (if you think differently then please correct me, but I believe this is the bare minimum idea behind both). In order to keep that money flowing for future campaigns, they use their power in government to assist these corporations and unions, such as by earmarks or contracts, for corporations, or drafting and supporting legislation that protects the rights of workers further or strengthens unions, for unions. Now, we have our general population that forms factions that A. Hate corporations because they have their hands in government B. Hate unions because they have their hands in government and C. Hate politicians because they are basically bribed by unions and corporations. But as I explained, all of them were working in their best interest. The corporation is trying to turn a profit, and by use of cost-benefit analysis has discovered giving money to campaigns yields higher revenues. The union wants to protect its workers and spending money on elections yields the best results. The politician wants to be reelected and so they continue to accept these donations and give out favors. Isn't acting in your best interest the logical thing to do? If acting in your best interest undermines the rights of others, isn't there a problem with the way things are setup?
I think you're agreeing with me, not disagreeing with me.
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On December 11 2012 05:04 renoB wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 04:10 Rassy wrote:
I have to go with the first answer.
Am not sure how it is in the usa but in the netherlands the law study is the easiest study by far at university level.
That does not mean there are no smart lawyers,its just that a law study alone is not sufficient to qualify someone as a philosopher king.
I've been seeing a lot of posts similar to this one that really break the second rule of this forum (I don't mean to pick on you, it was the closest to the end). Many are breaking this second rule by automatically coming to an understanding that politicians are "philosopher kings", "leaders", "rulers" or whatever word you can use to describe someone placed above yourself in government. It would seem most of you aren't arguing that lawyers are good/bad for American government, but rather good/bad for the type of government you envision. If you believe in very powerful politicians whose decisions have staggering effects on personal lives/economy/etc., then yeah, I could see how you wouldn't want a lawyer being in that position. If you believe that government should have very little power, and/or be spread out and competing, then your choice for politicians should be lawyers because they are specialized in representing people, and their job would be to keep government, foreign countries, or any other influence from effecting their citizens rights. Its clear that the American Government was setup for the latter (if you don't think so just read the constitution), so in theory lawyers should be the preference for politicians, but de facto American Government has grown exponentially to a point where its original purpose has changed entirely. Whether thats a good or a bad thing is your opinion, but it did happen nonetheless. I think its very interesting to see the differences as some people in european countries have posted in here as well. I find it very interesting to see different societies/cultures/social upbringings that contribute to our political identities. So please keep contributing!
Uuh, now that i see my post is beeing taken seriously i feel the need to clarify.
My post was a short more or less jokingly and cynical response to the slightly sarcastical post right above it.
I do think that law study (at least in the netherlands) is one of the more easy studies (to say it nicely), but i have no opinnion about lawyers as politicians in general, and definatly not in the way you described it.
It was more a side remark,thats why i ended my post with an opinnion about the latest point of discussion in this thread, wich was the fiscal cliff.
In general i think that lawyers are quiet qualified as politician.
Politicians make law, so it will definatly help if a politician has a deeper understanding of the current law.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
On December 11 2012 02:58 xDaunt wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 02:51 oneofthem wrote:
the standards of justification and reasoning in law are inchoate, still pretty infantile in all honesty. all the reasonable person etc appeals and the tendency to look for persuasive instead of truth searching discourse So I take it from these comments that you are 1) in favor of the state enacting an infinite number of laws, rules, and regulations to govern behavior (this is the alternative to the reasonable person standard), and 2) against the right to an appeal? I don't really understand what you're getting at with the last comment. Legal advocacy is a combination of truth finding and persuasion. There are mechanisms in advocacy whose express purpose is to facilitate finding the truth.
you should understand my comment with my previous post. i'm not dismissing law just a particular way of doing law. a particular formalistic approach to law assumes that any conclusion produced by the system's own deliberative equilibrium is justified, but legal realists can see instances where that is not necessarily the case.
we could go in depth on this in a later time.
On December 11 2012 05:15 BluePanther wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 01:20 oneofthem wrote:
well at least we know bluepanther's internal polls were pretty bad. Those were the Romney internal polls I was talking about. I'll be the first to admit they were way off. But at the same time, I'm not sure they are "more prone" to being off. That's the thing with margins of error. It may be off and still not be "wrong". I mean, PPP, WeAsk, Rasumussen... those are the same companies doing internal polling for the most part.
not blaming you for them. remember back when you posted them i said there was no magical way for internal polls to be rightly sampled. that was proven right.
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On December 11 2012 06:46 BluePanther wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 06:24 renoB wrote:On December 11 2012 05:52 BluePanther wrote:
I want to stress that I was generalizing when I made that comment. It was a refutation that lawyers in government were the problem. It's not lawyers; it's bad politicians that are the problem, regardless of what their profession is. I'll reiterate by saying you're breaking that second rule again... You're automatically assuming that problems in government arise from poor politicians. Laws, politicians, pretty much everything revolves around how the Government is set up. Like I said in my earlier post, with a limited government, with very little power, lawyers are the ideal representatives because they are practiced in representing people to protect their rights. This is not the case now however as the role of government has changed entirely from being one of simple protections to one that provides and assists for its citizens. I would argue the way our government is set up is the real reason we have "bad government" and that politicians/companies/etc. are only acting in their own best interest, which is perfectly logical. I'll explain. Corporations and unions spend lots of money on elections each year. A corporation's main purpose is to turn a profit, and a union to protect its workers (if you think differently then please correct me, but I believe this is the bare minimum idea behind both). In order to keep that money flowing for future campaigns, they use their power in government to assist these corporations and unions, such as by earmarks or contracts, for corporations, or drafting and supporting legislation that protects the rights of workers further or strengthens unions, for unions. Now, we have our general population that forms factions that A. Hate corporations because they have their hands in government B. Hate unions because they have their hands in government and C. Hate politicians because they are basically bribed by unions and corporations. But as I explained, all of them were working in their best interest. The corporation is trying to turn a profit, and by use of cost-benefit analysis has discovered giving money to campaigns yields higher revenues. The union wants to protect its workers and spending money on elections yields the best results. The politician wants to be reelected and so they continue to accept these donations and give out favors. Isn't acting in your best interest the logical thing to do? If acting in your best interest undermines the rights of others, isn't there a problem with the way things are setup? I think you're agreeing with me, not disagreeing with me.
I'm disagreeing with your statement that politicians are the problem with government. Politicians are not bad, they are acting in their own interest. It is the system that they use to exploit for their own interest that is bad.
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On December 11 2012 07:04 oneofthem wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 02:58 xDaunt wrote:On December 11 2012 02:51 oneofthem wrote:
the standards of justification and reasoning in law are inchoate, still pretty infantile in all honesty. all the reasonable person etc appeals and the tendency to look for persuasive instead of truth searching discourse So I take it from these comments that you are 1) in favor of the state enacting an infinite number of laws, rules, and regulations to govern behavior (this is the alternative to the reasonable person standard), and 2) against the right to an appeal? I don't really understand what you're getting at with the last comment. Legal advocacy is a combination of truth finding and persuasion. There are mechanisms in advocacy whose express purpose is to facilitate finding the truth. you should understand my comment with my previous post. i'm not dismissing law just a particular way of doing law. a particular formalistic approach to law assumes that any conclusion produced by the system's own deliberative equilibrium is justified, but legal realists can see instances where that is not necessarily the case.
Ah, how coincidental, I was just reading about this very problem in Habermas yesterday! I wish I knew more about the philosophy of law.
edit: would a "legal positivist" be the opponent of a "legal realist" here?
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On December 11 2012 08:54 sam!zdat wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 07:04 oneofthem wrote:On December 11 2012 02:58 xDaunt wrote:On December 11 2012 02:51 oneofthem wrote:
the standards of justification and reasoning in law are inchoate, still pretty infantile in all honesty. all the reasonable person etc appeals and the tendency to look for persuasive instead of truth searching discourse So I take it from these comments that you are 1) in favor of the state enacting an infinite number of laws, rules, and regulations to govern behavior (this is the alternative to the reasonable person standard), and 2) against the right to an appeal? I don't really understand what you're getting at with the last comment. Legal advocacy is a combination of truth finding and persuasion. There are mechanisms in advocacy whose express purpose is to facilitate finding the truth. you should understand my comment with my previous post. i'm not dismissing law just a particular way of doing law. a particular formalistic approach to law assumes that any conclusion produced by the system's own deliberative equilibrium is justified, but legal realists can see instances where that is not necessarily the case. Ah, how coincidental, I was just reading about this very problem in Habermas yesterday! I wish I knew more about the philosophy of law. edit: would a "legal positivist" be the opponent of a "legal realist" here?
One of the many annoying things about phil terminology. A legal realist is actually the opposite of what realists are in most other areas (e.g., like the case with moral realist). Based on usage elsewhere, you'd expect the legal realist to believe that laws and their interpretation are beholden to an objective standard of correctness, but they instead deny this.
They think that legal reasons for a given decision do not determine a unique correct outcome and they try to explain what types of factors (e.g., psychological, sociological) end up filling the gap between the legal reasons and the legal decisions.
edit: Well, it is an exaggeration to say it is the "opposite". Presumably that still is legal positivism. But legal realism still differs from what one would expect when hearing the word "realism", which I imagine would be more like Dworkin's view.
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so the opposite position would be that any legal decision x is uniquely determined by the formal legal system? So a realist would deny the formal completeness/consistency of the legal system, while an anti-realist (?) would affirm it?
that's a little different question than what I was thinking about from Habermas
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On December 11 2012 09:38 sam!zdat wrote:
so the opposite position would be that any legal decision x is uniquely determined by the formal legal system? So a realist would deny the formal completeness/consistency of the legal system, while an anti-realist (?) would affirm it?
that's a little different question than what I was thinking about from Habermas
I've never heard the opponents referred to as "anti-realists" before (though I don't have much exposure to the literature). There are different ways you could disagree with the realists. You can think there are unique answers like Dworkin (though note that the legal reasons that factor into his unique answers don't have to all stem from literal interpretations of explicit legal rules).
You can also be a formalist, which is a type of positivist, in which case you might think there are always uniquely right answers if you think that what the written down law says always uniquely determines an answer.
A formalist could deny uniqueness, but that wouldn't make them realists (though again, the terminology has almost always been vague where I've encountered it). A realist would often be cool with a creative, to put it mildly, interpretation of law designed to attain some positive goal. But for the formalist, the laws are the only factors in reasoning.
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See Sam, I told you Dworkin was worth reading if only to familiarize ones' self with unusual approaches to liberal philosophy.
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hmm ok, thanks froggy. guess I'll add that to the list of things to understand before I die
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On December 11 2012 09:20 frogrubdown wrote:Show nested quote +On December 11 2012 08:54 sam!zdat wrote:On December 11 2012 07:04 oneofthem wrote:On December 11 2012 02:58 xDaunt wrote:On December 11 2012 02:51 oneofthem wrote:
the standards of justification and reasoning in law are inchoate, still pretty infantile in all honesty. all the reasonable person etc appeals and the tendency to look for persuasive instead of truth searching discourse So I take it from these comments that you are 1) in favor of the state enacting an infinite number of laws, rules, and regulations to govern behavior (this is the alternative to the reasonable person standard), and 2) against the right to an appeal? I don't really understand what you're getting at with the last comment. Legal advocacy is a combination of truth finding and persuasion. There are mechanisms in advocacy whose express purpose is to facilitate finding the truth. you should understand my comment with my previous post. i'm not dismissing law just a particular way of doing law. a particular formalistic approach to law assumes that any conclusion produced by the system's own deliberative equilibrium is justified, but legal realists can see instances where that is not necessarily the case. Ah, how coincidental, I was just reading about this very problem in Habermas yesterday! I wish I knew more about the philosophy of law. edit: would a "legal positivist" be the opponent of a "legal realist" here? One of the many annoying things about phil terminology. A legal realist is actually the opposite of what realists are in most other areas (e.g., like the case with moral realist). Based on usage elsewhere, you'd expect the legal realist to believe that laws and their interpretation are beholden to an objective standard of correctness, but they instead deny this. They think that legal reasons for a given decision do not determine a unique correct outcome and they try to explain what types of factors (e.g., psychological, sociological) end up filling the gap between the legal reasons and the legal decisions. edit: Well, it is an exaggeration to say it is the "opposite". Presumably that still is legal positivism. But legal realism still differs from what one would expect when hearing the word "realism", which I imagine would be more like Dworkin's view.
A good example of this is how a huge influence on sentencing is whether or not the judge has eaten lunch
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2011/04/11/justice-is-served-but-more-so-after-lunch-how-food-breaks-sway-the-decisions-of-judges/
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EPT
