[extropy-chat] Professor Being Sued Over Anti-Aging Comments

[Brent Neal]

 (6/22/05 10:42) Brett Paatsch <bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au> wrote:


>
>Ultimately I think all intelligent people to be successful in a competitive
>world do need to know the law reasonably well. Even scientists 
>and technologists are well advised to go slum it in the humanities 
>occassionally because the humanities or inhumanities will cause them
>untold or told amounts of grief if they do not. 


This is absolutely true. But you assume that I'm completely ignorant of the law (i.e. you've taken Lorrey at his word).  I'm actually reasonably cognizant of the laws in this country covering tort.  I'm also reasonably cognizant of how they play out in "real life" as opposed to on paper, which I suspect Lorrey is a bit shaky on.  If he were better informed, he'd realize that class action, as it exists today, provides very little benefit to the plaintiffs. Some have argued that the plaintiffs in class action only serve to benefit the lawyers who are bringing the suits.  One of the key problems therein is that the lawyers have an incentive to settle, due to the burden on most civil court dockets, for substantial sums, but sums that are not sufficient to adequately recompense their clients.  The defendant company typically admits no wrongdoing in the settlement, the lawyers receive a sizable fee, and the plaintiffs receive pennies on the dollars of loss.  While certainly, -some- class action suits are prosecuted effectively, an overwhelming plurality of them end in a settlement that's worthless in the sense that we've been discussing.

Now, lets imagine a system where we've doubled or tripled the number of cases of product liability. The courts would struggle to handle that kind of workload, thus providing even more incentive to settle and quickly.  The stated goal of the suit - to punish the wrongdoer in order to provide a disincentive for further wrongdoing - is not met and further, the person who suffered the loss would not receive recompense. 

Sometimes, it pays to take a small dose of reality with your idealism. In a perfect world, I'd absolutely agree with the notion of axing the FDA. I'd certainly agree strongly that it needs systemic reforms right now.  But just blithely cutting out and hoping that the courts will solve the issues that arise is just a spank-fantasy. I think most of us recognize that reality is a bit more complicated than that.

Brent
-- 
Brent Neal
Geek of all Trades
http://brentn.freeshell.org

"Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein