Here is an experiment on how much people value eyewitness testimony:
To determine what role eyewitness testimony played in the courtroom, psychologist and memory expert Elizabeth Lofthus conducted an experiment in which subjects served as jurors in a mock trial. First, all jurors heard the same description of the crime, a hypothetical robbery and murder. In one version of the trial, the prosecutor presented only circumstantial evidence. Only 18 percent of the jurors found the defendant guilty. In the second version of the trial the prosecutor presented the same evidence with one addition—an eyewitness. Seventy-two percent of the jurors found the defendant guilty. This led Lofthus to conclude that jurors place enormous value on eyewitness testimony.
Studies have shown that mistaken eyewitness testimony accounts for about half of all wrongful convictions. Researchers at Ohio State University examined hundreds of wrongful convictions and determined that roughly 52 percent of the errors resulted from eyewitness mistakes. Legal scholar Edwin Borchard studied 65 cases of "erroneous criminal convictions of innocent people." Mistaken eyewitness identification was responsible for approximately 45 percent of Borchard's case studies.
52 percent of all the innocent people convicted were the result of eyewitness testimony.
It's really interesting to see Daniel treat the testimony of the 11 witnesses as something akin to the apostles going out across the world to spread the Good News after Christ's death. There's just something about these 19th century men being led into a forest by a convicted treasure digger that doesn't seem to convince your average everyday thinking person. Especially when these people were so credulous as to follow Joseph into those same forests looking for ancient caches of gold... which mysteriously never materialized. Tell a thinking person that Joe used the same stone to look for treasure as to translate this 200lb golden book, and the person should be sufficiently inoculated against Mormon emotional manipulation.
It's really interesting to see Daniel treat the testimony of the 11 witnesses as something akin to the apostles going out across the world to spread the Good News after Christ's death.
11 superstitious witnesses can't possibly be wrong.
"I have the type of (REAL) job where I can choose how to spend my time," says Marcus.
We know that eyewitness evidence is unreliable and that juries think that it’s the most reliable type of evidence. And, the defense lawyers can’t inform the jury of that.
he/him When a Religion is good, I conceive that it will support itself; and when it cannot support itself, and God does not take care to support, so that its Professors are oblig’d to call for the help of the Civil Power, ’tis a Sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.
We know that eyewitness evidence is unreliable and that juries think that it’s the most reliable type of evidence. And, the defense lawyers can’t inform the jury of that.
Do you think there's another country with a better trial-by-jury system?
"I have the type of (REAL) job where I can choose how to spend my time," says Marcus.
We know that eyewitness evidence is unreliable and that juries think that it’s the most reliable type of evidence. And, the defense lawyers can’t inform the jury of that.
Do you think there's another country with a better trial-by-jury system?
No idea.
he/him When a Religion is good, I conceive that it will support itself; and when it cannot support itself, and God does not take care to support, so that its Professors are oblig’d to call for the help of the Civil Power, ’tis a Sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.
We know that eyewitness evidence is unreliable and that juries think that it’s the most reliable type of evidence. And, the defense lawyers can’t inform the jury of that.
Res Ipsa, I would imagine (a question implied here) that a defense lawyer might observe how little familiarity a witness has with the accused and how other people likely have similar appearances.
I think the Book of Mormon witness have different limitation than those a witness identifying a individual in a crime has. For the Book of Mormon witness they simply had no way of knowing if the thing they were shown had the book written on them or if it was from ancient people.
Yet somehow James Strang's witnesses carry zero credibility in the apologetic world.
Strang's letter convinced several eminent Mormons of his claims, including Book of Mormon witnesses John and David Whitmer, Martin Harris and Hiram Page.[c] In addition Apostles John E. Page, William E. M'Lellin, and William Smith,[d] together with Nauvoo Stake President William Marks, and Bishop George Miller,[e] accepted Strang. Joseph Smith's mother, Lucy Mack Smith, and three of his sisters accepted Strang's claims. According to the Voree Herald, Strang's newspaper, Lucy Smith wrote to one Reuben Hedlock: "I am satisfied that Joseph appointed J.J. Strang. It is verily so."[26] According to Joseph Smith's brother William, all of his family (except for Hyrum and Samuel Smith's widows), endorsed Strang.[26]
