The twilight zone between scientific certainty and legal sufficiency: should a jury determine the causation of schizophrenia?
In lawsuits involving complex scientific issues of causation, dispute resolution requires that a final decision be reached in each case, regardless of whether science is able to provide definitive answers to the questions of causation raised at trial. Proving causation before science has is a concept that scientists may find disconcerting and foreign to some of their basic assumptions. This paper explores the foregoing issues, discusses medical versus legal concepts of causation, outlines the legal tests for admissibility of novel scientific evidence (including Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and the Frye test of general acceptance by the relevant scientific community), and presents a toxic tort case in which expert psychiatric testimony addressed the issue of causation of schizophrenia. The paper articulates concerns about the "misleading aura of certainty" posed by scientific evidence and the burden of decision making that is cast upon the legal system in such scientific issue cases.
College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University, New York, NY.
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Goldstein
D000328:Adult; D005104:Expert Testimony / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D006801:Humans; D007306:Insecticides / Q000506:poisoning; D008297:Male; D009943:Organophosphorus Compounds; D011605:Psychoses, Substance-Induced / Q000209:etiology; D012307:Risk Factors; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000209:etiology*
D007306:Insecticides; D009943:Organophosphorus Compounds