On Jun 12, 2007, at 2:07 PM, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
> What I find really baffling is your and (others on this list)
> willingness to discard this fundamental irrationality of the "plain
> folks of
> the land" (to quote HL Mencken) when it comes to jury duty or
> elections.
> What makes you think that the half of the population that earnestly
> believes
> in this kind of irrational superstition suddenly starts thinking in
> the
> matter-of-fact terms when it comes to evaluating facts pertaining to
> criminal behavior or public policy?
My experience of having been on a couple of juries, for one. People took the task very seriously and reviewed the evidence intelligently. I think juries are terrific. It's all about context and role. Ordinary folks are entrusted by the system to make very serious decisions, and they rise to the task. Most of the time, the system - I mean, The System - treats them like idiots, and they often live down to expectations.
Doug