scholarly journals Em defesa do Direito Probatório fundado em regras- e da Epistemologia também

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 319
Author(s):  
Frederick Schauer

<p><strong>RESUMO:</strong></p><p>Desde que Jeremy Bentham escreveu a sua severa crítca ao Direito Probatório, filósofos e juristas têm critcado as regras probatórias excludentes argumentando que as regras formais que excluem classes inteiras de provas em razão da sua alegada infabilidade violam máximas epistemológicas fundamentais que exigem que toda prova pertinente seja levada em consideração. Embora algumas partes da prova possam ser excluídas por falta de fabilidade – argumentam eles – seria um erro fazer tais juízos em relação a categorias inteiras, em oposição a fazê-los somente em relação à provas específcas apresentadas para propósitos específicos. Este artgo põe em causa essas alegações, argumentando que exclusões fundadas em regras servem a propósitos similares àqueles desempenhados pelas regras nas teorias morais consequencialistas de regras, e que, de maneira ainda mais importante, elas são totalmente consistentes com a natureza excludente das regras jurídicas em geral. Na verdade, uma vez visto o papel que as regras excludentes podem desempenhar na Epistemologia Jurídica, se torna possível ver que elas poderiam ter um papel a desempenhar na avaliação epistêmica em geral.</p><p><strong>ABSTRACT:</strong> </p><p>Ever since Jeremy Bentham wrote his scathing critque of the law of evidence, both philosophers and legal scholars have criticized the exclusionary rules of evidence, arguing that formal rules excluding entre classes of evidence for alleged unreliability violate basic epistemological maxims mandating that all relevant evidence be considered. Although particular pieces of evidence might be excluded as unreliable, they argue, it is a mistake to make such judgments for entire categories, as opposed to making only in the context of partcular pieces of evidence ofered for specifc purposes. This paper challenges these claims, arguing that rule-based exclusions serve similar purposes to those served by rules in rule-consequentalist moral theories, and that, even more importantly, they are entrely consistent with the exclusionary nature of legal rules in general. Indeed, once we see the role that exclusionary rules might serve in legal epistemology, we can see that they might have a role to play in epistemic appraisal more generally.</p>

Episteme ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 295-305 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederick Schauer

ABSTRACTEver since Jeremy Bentham wrote his scathing critique of the law of evidence, both philosophers and legal scholars have criticized the exclusionary rules of evidence, arguing that formal rules excluding entire classes of evidence for alleged unreliability violate basic epistemological maxims mandating that all relevant evidence be considered. Although particular pieces of evidence might be excluded as unreliable, they argue, it is a mistake to make such judgments for entire categories, as opposed to making them only in the context of particular pieces of evidence offered for specific purposes. This paper challenges these claims, arguing that rule-based exclusions serve similar purposes to those served by rules in rule-consequentialist moral theories, and that, even more importantly, they are entirely consistent with the exclusionary nature of legal rules in general. Indeed, once we see the role that exclusionary rules might serve in legal epistemology, we can see that they might have a role to play in epistemic appraisal more generally.


Author(s):  
Adrian Keane ◽  
Paul McKeown

Evidence is information by which facts tend to be proved, and the law of evidence is that body of law and discretion regulating the means by which facts may be proved in both courts of law and tribunals and arbitrations in which the strict rules of evidence apply. This introductory chapter discusses truth and the fact-finding process and explains how getting to the truth in court is hampered by practical constraints, the adversarial system, the rules of evidence themselves, and the fact that litigation is a human endeavour that necessarily provides scope for differences of opinion, error, deceit, and lies. The chapter also contains a brief history of the development of the law to date.


2021 ◽  
pp. 69-82
Author(s):  
Frederick Schauer

This chapter starts out with Bentham’s antinomian thesis that rejected the very idea of setting up rules for selecting and evaluating evidence. Bentham believed that factfinding should be governed by epistemically good reasons as a process unconstrained by artificial legal rules. The author observes that most legal systems took up this approach by softening the hard edges of rules (as in common law jurisdictions) and by following the basically free-proof model of factfinding (as in countries that adopted the continental European approach). Yet, he claims that the law of evidence still remains substantially an affair of rules. Why this is the case and whether it should be the case, is the subject of this chapter.


2018 ◽  
pp. 176-226
Author(s):  
Roderick Munday

This chapter discusses the basic functions of judge and jury. It begins with the general rule of separation of functions of judge and jury, before turning to some of the more direct methods of judicial control. The chapter also considers the extent to which the average jury understands the directions that the law requires the judge to give, and whether jurors are as imperceptive, ignorant, or prejudiced as some of the rules of evidence suppose. Secret monitoring of jury deliberations is one way of resolving these issues, but such monitoring would amount to contempt of court. Moreover, any discussion with a third party before verdict is liable to result in a conviction being quashed. Recourse must, at present, be had to simulations and generally less reliable methods of obtaining the information needed to provide a basis for understanding and improving the law of evidence.


2005 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-109 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert J. Currie

This article surveys the manner in which the courts of Canada have treated the concept of ‘culture’ as a justiciable matter in litigation. It starts from the premise that a constitutionally ‘multicultural’ society has manifest impetus to factor cultural realities into court-based decision-making, and acknowledges that judicial use of ‘contextualism’ appears to have provided the framework for reception of cultural evidence. Using the rules of evidence as a lens, the article: surveys how courts have found culture to be relevant, material and admissible in various kinds of legal disputes; analyses the trends; and offers some preliminary thoughts as to how the law of evidence should continue to adapt in order to accommodate culture in a principled manner.


1997 ◽  
Vol 31 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 645-689 ◽  
Author(s):  
John D. Jackson ◽  
Sean Doran

It is a curious quirk of legal scholarship that so much attention has been devoted to the rules and procedures that operate injury trials and so little to the way in which these rules and procedures operate in the vast majority of trials which are conducted without a jury. This “jury-centredness” as it has been called was noted almost thirty years ago by the American scholar Kenneth Culp Davis when he urged scholars and the legal profession to escape from the deep-seated habit of allowing all thinking about evidence law to be dominated by the needs of the 3% of trials that involve juries and to think instead about the needs of the remaining 97% of trials that are tried without a jury. It is certainly true that the withdrawal of the jury from many categories of cases throughout this century in many jurisdictions has not been accompanied by any instant changes in the law of evidence. Certain commentators have noted that in spite of Thayer's claim that the rules are the “child of the jury”, the rules of evidence have proved remarkably resilient in outlasting the demise of the jury. The parent may have ceased to exist in many legal proceedings but the child has lived on.


Author(s):  
Adrian Keane ◽  
Paul McKeown

Evidence is information by which facts tend to be proved, and the law of evidence is that body of law and discretion regulating the means by which facts may be proved in both courts of law and tribunals and arbitrations in which the strict rules of evidence apply. This introductory chapter discusses truth and the fact-finding process and explains how getting to the truth in court is hampered by practical constraints, the adversarial system, the rules of evidence themselves, and the fact that litigation is a human endeavour that necessarily provides scope for differences of opinion, error, deceit, and lies. The chapter also contains a brief history of the development of the law to date.


Legal Studies ◽  
1993 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Hirst

‘In my view, the criminal law of evidence should be developed along common-sense lines readily comprehensible to the men and women who comprise the jury and bear the responsibility for the major decisions in criminal cases. I believe that most laymen, if told that the criminal law of evidence forbade them even to consider such evidence as we are debating in this appeal, would reply, “Then the law is an ass.”…The hearsay rule was created by our judicial predecessors, and if we find that it no longer serves to do justice in certain conditions then the judges of today should accept the responsibility of reviewing and adapting the rules of evidence to serve present society.’


Author(s):  
Richard Glover

This chapter provides an overview of the law of evidence. It discusses the definition of evidence and how the law of evidence differs from the science or philosophy of evidence; the characteristics of the judicial trial that demand a particular legal approach to the presentation and use of evidence including, on occasion, its exclusion; the development of the rules of evidence in the common law system and the factors that influenced this; the classification of the rules of evidence; and the impact of the European Convention on Human Rights, in particular the provisions relating to the right to a fair trial.


1998 ◽  
Vol 24 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 293-343
Author(s):  
Jesse A. Goldner

There are a remarkable number of similarities between science and the law. Each discipline sets as a gold standard a search for precision. For example, scientists utilize the scientific method—a specific set of principles and procedures designed to aid them in a systematic pursuit of knowledge. Following the scientific method involves the recognition and formulation of a problem, the collection of data through observation and possibly experimentation, the formulation of a hypothesis and the testing and confirmation of the hypothesis formulated. The law, in turn, seeks its form of precision through the careful use of words, as in finely crafted statutes or regulations and contractual language that seek to eliminate the possibility of vagueness or confusion. Each discipline utilizes an approach or methodology that strives to minimize or eliminate the possibility of error and to arrive at a form of “truth” that it recognizes as being maximal within the confines of the rules it has established, be they rules of scientific method or legal rules of evidence.


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