Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
Or nearly infallible either. No such thing.
Is it me or is this site in its death throes?
- Thread starter Bowser
- Start date
Or nearly infallible either. No such thing.
Merriam Webster disagrees...
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/infallible
Definition of infallible
- 1: incapable of error : unerring aninfallible memory
- 2: not liable to mislead, deceive, or disappoint : certain an infallibleremedy
- 3: incapable of error in defining doctrines touching faith or morals
What about the definition of the word infallible precludes the use of the qualifier "nearly"?
It seems you are now trying to dictate the terms if the English Language... Thankfully, you have no power to do so
Kittamaru,
You gave an impression that you were supporting perception based mouth to mouth transfer of experience, but seems you are in double mind..
Basically you are taking a contrary view on eye witness testimony, eye witness testimony is taken as a sound evidence of event/matter in hand till the same is rebutted or till a crack is developed on the integrity of witness. It is foolish and naive on your part to push your argument with a claim that due to eye witness testimony innocents are convicted. Do you understand what you are arguing? You are arguing that just because memory of a witness is not helping him, so his testimony however honest is not the true reflection of happenings and judge would convict the innocent based on this! Phew!!!! Have you been to courts?? I have not seen and I have substantial legal experience too, anyone getting convicted due to memory failed eye witness account. You are giving no credit to judges and defense counsels, they are bloody ostrich fools??
You gave an impression that you were supporting perception based mouth to mouth transfer of experience, but seems you are in double mind..
Kittamaru said:
Basically you are taking a contrary view on eye witness testimony, eye witness testimony is taken as a sound evidence of event/matter in hand till the same is rebutted or till a crack is developed on the integrity of witness. It is foolish and naive on your part to push your argument with a claim that due to eye witness testimony innocents are convicted. Do you understand what you are arguing? You are arguing that just because memory of a witness is not helping him, so his testimony however honest is not the true reflection of happenings and judge would convict the innocent based on this! Phew!!!! Have you been to courts?? I have not seen and I have substantial legal experience too, anyone getting convicted due to memory failed eye witness account. You are giving no credit to judges and defense counsels, they are bloody ostrich fools??
Bells
Staff member
That is entirely up to you.
Having said that and especially in response to this from you, can you please stop PM'ing me with your complaints about staff... Your complaints about staff should go to Admin, not me. Especially in light of this complaint from you about me. After all, if you think my "self righteous outrage" a) is self righteous outrage and b) you think it is contrived and propped up and you think that by responding to you, I am flaming you and preaching (which is ironic given that you have been at this for multiple pages and I have only just entered the discussion 8 pages into it), it makes absolutely no sense for you to keep sending me PM's to complain about staff and asking me to do something about said complaints.
Because it sets up an interesting little dilemma for you, doesn't it? To the one, you present this public persona, insulting me, and then via PM, you keep asking me for help. I would rather you did not, thanks.
Reading and comprehension is hard for you.
Did you not read the links provided? They show with proof of studies, some of which go back decades, that eyewitness testimony is unreliable. It says a lot that 73% of cases that are overturned due to DNA evidence, all involved convictions that were based on eyewitness testimony. That is exceptionally high. Had you bothered to educate yourself, you would have realised that a 75,000+ conviction rate based on something that is absolutely unreliable, sets a terrifying reality for unlawful convictions.
Eyewitness testimony is by far, the most prominent reason for unlawful or wrongful conviction. And the US convicts more than 75,000 people based on eyewitness testimony. Now, I want you to consider this:
More than four out of five police agencies in the U.S. have no written policies for handling eyewitness identifications despite long-standing federal guidelines, according to a report obtained by USA TODAY.
The findings in the National Institute of Justice report, come as flaws in eyewitness identification represent the single greatest cause of wrongful conviction, contributing to 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing, according to the Innocence Project, which uses DNA testing to challenge criminal convictions. More than 300 people have been exonerated since 1989 through post-conviction DNA testing.
The report, which was produced for the Justice Department's research arm by the Police Executive Research Forum, is the first national assessment of eyewitness identification standards. In it, 84% of police agencies reported that they had no written policy for conducting live suspect lineups, and slightly more than 64% said they had no formal standard for administering photo displays of potential suspects.
[...]
Police agencies reported the lack of standardization despite 1999 National Institute of Justice guidelines that urged law enforcement to improve policies for how witnesses are used to identify suspects.
The guidelines emphasized the benefit of "blind" testing in lineups — that is, lineups conducted by administrators who do not know the identities of the suspects, avoiding improper influence. But the report found that nearly 70% of police agencies still use officers with knowledge of the suspects in photo lineups, and 90% of agencies use "non-blind" administrators in live lineups.
The problems, according to the report, are especially persistent in small agencies. But even in large agencies — with 500 or more officers — 25% reported no policies for conducting photo lineup presentations, and fully half of the responding agencies had no policies for live lineups.
The findings in the National Institute of Justice report, come as flaws in eyewitness identification represent the single greatest cause of wrongful conviction, contributing to 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing, according to the Innocence Project, which uses DNA testing to challenge criminal convictions. More than 300 people have been exonerated since 1989 through post-conviction DNA testing.
The report, which was produced for the Justice Department's research arm by the Police Executive Research Forum, is the first national assessment of eyewitness identification standards. In it, 84% of police agencies reported that they had no written policy for conducting live suspect lineups, and slightly more than 64% said they had no formal standard for administering photo displays of potential suspects.
[...]
Police agencies reported the lack of standardization despite 1999 National Institute of Justice guidelines that urged law enforcement to improve policies for how witnesses are used to identify suspects.
The guidelines emphasized the benefit of "blind" testing in lineups — that is, lineups conducted by administrators who do not know the identities of the suspects, avoiding improper influence. But the report found that nearly 70% of police agencies still use officers with knowledge of the suspects in photo lineups, and 90% of agencies use "non-blind" administrators in live lineups.
The problems, according to the report, are especially persistent in small agencies. But even in large agencies — with 500 or more officers — 25% reported no policies for conducting photo lineup presentations, and fully half of the responding agencies had no policies for live lineups.
A normal person who was honest, would recognise that boasting about conviction rates based on eyewitness testimony is not something one would boast about. Nor would one be proud of making such arguments. But you are neither honest nor are you someone who has any sense.
Studies have shown just how unreliable eyewitness testimony is. We have studies that show how law enforcement agencies are not even bothering to follow the most basic guidelines that were developed to attempt to combat the unreliable nature of eyewitness testimony and we have studies that show how police are often influencing the eyewitness, in a bid to get a conviction. And you are boasting about how successful it is?
As for my outrage.. I want you to consider this:
Again, the authors concluded that racial bias may contribute to the disparity. Previous research has found that white Americans are more likely to misidentify black people for one another than white people, a phenomenon they said may play a role in eyewitness misidentification.
The registry found eyewitness errors in 79 percent of sexual assault cases involving wrongfully convicted black defendants, compared with 51 percent in cases with exonerated white defendants.
The registry found eyewitness errors in 79 percent of sexual assault cases involving wrongfully convicted black defendants, compared with 51 percent in cases with exonerated white defendants.
Your position is one of malice. Frankly, it is the personification of evil. You are boasting about something that is unreliable and results in wrongful convictions and at times, even wrongful executions and is full of racial bias. I want you to be honest and consider just how many of those 75,000+ convictions a year, are wrongful based on the knowledge and understanding that eyewitness testimony is so unreliable.
A 1977 study conducted at the University of Nebraska shows the effect of photo bias on the memory of witnesses. Student "witnesses" watched some "criminals" committing a crime. An hour later they looked through mug shots that included some of the criminals they had seen. A week later lineups were staged, and the subject witnesses were asked to indicate those who had taken part in the original crime. Eight percent of the people in the lineups were identified as criminals, yet they had neither taken part in the "crime" nor were their pictures included in the mug shots. Twenty percent of the innocent people whose photographs were included among the mug shots were also falsely identified. None of these people had committed a crime, not had they ever before been seen in person--and yet they were recognized from photographs and identified as criminals.
That is just one study. Countless of others show similar results.
You aren't stupid, MR. But you are malicious. Boasting about the high conviction rates based on eyewitness testimony in the face of countless of studies, some of which go back decades, all of which so how unreliable it is and how it is often wrong, just because you want to badly argue that eyewitness testimony when it comes to UFO's and fringe subjects is valid, is frankly reprehensible.
Bells
Staff member
I have always argued that eyewitness testimony is unreliable Yazata. And the science backs me up on it. What's your excuse?
Ah, the twisting of my words.
The words are interchangeable Yazata. Do you think eyewitness testimony is reliable like MR does? Prove it.
Oh look, you are as malicious as MR is.
Do you want to know why?
Because scientists have been pointing out the unreliable nature of eyewitness testimony for decades. In 1999, the DOJ set out guidelines about the use of eyewitness testimony, and also set out guidelines about how eyewitnesses are to be questioned in a bid to combat the unreliable nature of it. Don't you find it strange that police departments around the US have failed to implement those guidelines? And you are arguing that "every criminal investigator and court trial says otherwise", despite the knowledge that those departments and criminal investigators are failing to adhere to those recommendations to ensure that eyewitnesses can be more reliable? Why do you think criminal investigators and prosecutors fail to adhere to those guidelines and instead, by your words, are saying that it is reliable? What do they stand to gain from it, Yazata?
And I was a prosecutor. I know how the system works. Tell me, what guidelines did you follow when you questioned or interviewed witnesses?
Did you ask them leading questions in your interviews with them? Were you suggestive in how you questioned them?
Did you allow your bias to shine through?
Did you allude to the witnesses helping your case when you questioned them? How long after the crime, did you question the witnesses? Did you go back and notice or take note of how often their statements changed from their initial statements to the police, until they go to you for their "interview"? Were you questioning them to ensure that their testimony could stand up in court and did you let them know of this before or during their questioning?
Eyewitnesses are often called to testify in court. It makes for a grand gesture, grand theater really. But any prosecutor who fails to account for the differences in testimony from the very first interview, who allows these eyewitnesses to testify knowing that the investigators, who initially questioned them or had them pull the perpetrator out of a line up, knew the identity of the perpetrator, is not going for justice, just a notch on their conviction rate belt. Any prosecutor who allows eyewitnesses to be coached, cajoled, influenced in "interviews" is only interested in their conviction rate and nothing else. There are countless of scientists who can attest to just how often eyewitness testimony is wrong and unreliable and can show just how often their memory has altered since witnessing the crime or event. They can also point out how personal bias affects it, how the personal bias of the interviewer can affect it, how time and distance can affect it.
Look at my previous post in this thread, where I showed just how people who all witnessed the same event, gave different accounts of it. And then ask that question again.
Read the studies I linked, and then ask that question again.. Honestly.. Can you do that? I bet you cannot.
Scientists will repeat studies and tests, to ensure their accuracy. They document everything along the way.
When results of experiments are reported and posted in a journal, it has gone through extensive peer review. The results are sound, because it has been tested, calculated by different scientists.
An eyewitness does not always have that luxury. Often, they will be questioned by an investigator who knows the identity of the perpetrator, who knows the ins and outs of the case already. They often ask leading questions or encouraging questions. Half the time, eyewitnesses are not questioned until long after the event, after their own memory has been tainted by time and influenced by factors around them, such as the media, family, friends and their own experiences and self doubts. By the time they get to court, their testimony will have been honed by people such as yourself, who "interview them", they will be coached on how to testify, to give a good result, how to withstand questions from the opposition, they will be coached on how to address the judge or jury. Often, they will be stressed and will want to give a good impression.
No it does not.
But it also does not mean that the guy who claims to have been in the military for 9 years and claims to have never seen a military or police helicopter fly over people's houses at night with floodlights on, is correct when he posts a video of the "mothership" UFO and argues that the lights cannot be helicopters and have to be UFO's because he's never seen a military or police helicopter do that, nor should he be taken seriously.
Or to put it another way, you provided a stunning example of just how "eyewitness testimony" can be unreliable, when you took what I said and turned it into something else and injected me and your own interpretation and personal bias into this thread about something you deliberately misrepresented about me and what I actually said. And the irony is that I had not even been participating in this discussion.
You can believe whatever you wish to believe, Yazata. Does not mean that the rest of us have to give your personal beliefs credibility.
I have often told MR that the issue I have is that he takes flashing lights in the sky and automatically leaps to aliens and ignores and disparages everything else it could be in between.
Bells
Staff member
You know, the irony of that is that you factor yourself in those who would be deemed irrational.. Since you do not believe that you are a rational person who has shown up, because you are apparently still waiting for those to show up.
Because eyewitness identification is the greatest source of wrongful convictions...
all involved in the criminal justice system, including jurors, should be educated about the often counterintuitive ways in which memory works.
Both from SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT STUDY GROUP ON EYEWITNESS EVIDENCE.
...mistaken eyewitness identification is responsible for more wrongful convictions than all other causes combined
Here.
Or take your pick from these.
all involved in the criminal justice system, including jurors, should be educated about the often counterintuitive ways in which memory works.
Both from SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT STUDY GROUP ON EYEWITNESS EVIDENCE.
...mistaken eyewitness identification is responsible for more wrongful convictions than all other causes combined
Here.
Or take your pick from these.
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
All your stats are entirely pointless without a comparison with how many non-overturned convictions there are with eyewitness convictions. So spare me the useless data, and spare me the moralizing self-righteous flaming. Eyewitness testimony is so reliable it leads to the capture and conviction of thousands of criminals everyday across our nation. It is a pillar of the prosecutorial process and of a justice system that works far more often than it fails. You should be so lucky to have witnesses come forward when a crime is committed against you. It's a shame you must dismiss them all as unreliable liars just because you don't want to believe in ufos. lol!
Then I will expect nothing more from you other than your usual arrogant flaming and petty vindictive personal attacks. You are a shining model to new members here that's for sure. And we wonder why this forum is dead as shit.
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Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
Actually it's more like thousands of eyewitness accounts over 70 years all over the world of metallic disc-shaped craft hovering and flashing colored lights and then taking off at high speeds in the sky taken to be ufos. I never claimed them to be aliens as I have already told you. But hey, let's not let the facts get in the way of a good smear.
http://www.ufoevidence.org/
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I think the fact that hundreds of innocent people that were locked up based on apparently-faulty eye-witness testimony, only to be proven innocent by DNA and other forensic evidence, makes the point rather plain...
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
Any studies on how many criminals have been caught and convicted with eyewitness testimony?I mean, you know, so we can see if the wrongful convictions were relatively common or uncommon?
I guess it should be a short run of irresponsible BS from you, then...
Any studies on how many criminals have been caught and convicted with eyewitness testimony?I mean, you know, so we can see if the wrongful convictions were relatively common or uncommon?
Sorry, you don't get to demand others to do your homework for you MR - if you wish to make a claim, do so and back it. Otherwise, per James, you will continue to be held to task for it.
DaveC426913
Valued Senior Member
unsub
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
LOL! Is that what it comes down to? Childish "I know you are but what am I"'s? Grow up Bells. You're a moderator here, not a common troll.
Another shining example of your apparent inability to parse even basic vocabulary...
Youv'e more than proved you'r pont Kitta... an you have the backin of James R... an im sure im not the only one wonderin --- why do you continue to put up wit all the nonsinse from 4 people in this very thred that have harmed Sciforums for years.???
Sign us who continue to wonder as:::
Supportive but Impatient.!!!
Sign us who continue to wonder as:::
Supportive but Impatient.!!!
The number for one month, in one city, is 60. Sorry if this number conflicts with your illusions. I know you have issues with reality.
I quoted your own posts where you claimed that such memories were reliable and how their accuracy "screams loudly."
If, from there, you have problems with basic English, consult a nearby high school English teacher. They can help you with interpretation.
Magical Realist
Valued Senior Member
You really shouldn't make up shit you can't back up. It just makes you look foolish.
Yet not a word about them being "nearly infallible". Why do you continue to lie that I claimed that?
Pure irony.
Bells
Staff member
Of course it is for you. Because heaven forbid you have to deal with reality instead of residing in the land of make believe.
Ya. Including, at the time, the case of Bernard Baran. You should look that one up.
Sadly, Bernard died after being wrongfully imprisoned for decades, after some parents objected to the fact that he was gay, falsely accused him of raping their children, they influenced the children, leading them, as 'eyewitnesses' to lie to investigators because of the level of suspicion that already existed against Bernard for being a homosexual and working as a teacher in a child care establishment, Bernard was sentenced to multiple life sentences for his "crimes". His sentence was overturned and he was released after spending 21 years in prison. He died shortly after his release, aged 49.
How reliable do you think the eyewitnesses were for his trial, MR? Or are you going to dodge this one too? How about in the case of Brown, where each eyewitness provided completely different eyewitness evidence to the very same event? You avoided that too. But you have a habit of doing that, don't you?
As I said, your arguments could be excused if you were simply stupid. But you aren't stupid, so it just makes you reprehensible and malicious.
How can anyone gloat about a legal system that is literally imprisoning people wrongfully because of an unreliable way in which eyewitness testimony is is gathered?
If it is gathered properly, sometimes, yes. But the majority of the time, as countless of studies have shown, it is not. Which is why prosecutors always want other more reliable evidence, because any prosecutor knows that any lawyer can rip eyewitness testimony to shreds because of the manner in which it is gathered and tainted so much of the time, by police officers themselves. Are you aware in your country, only around 13 States have implemented the recommendations of scientists and the DOJ to try to prevent tainting the eyewitness? Only 13. Doesn't that concern you? Oh wait, no that's right. You just said that as far as you are concerned, stats are pointless and asked for something that was already provided to you, but you failed to understand that the 75,000+ of convictions from eyewitness testimony will also include a large chunk where people have been wrongfully imprisoned due to tainting. The issue, MR, is that no one knows the true extent of it, despite the pleas of scientists and legal scholars that police implement better practices and undergo further training to stop people being wrongfully convicted because of the unreliability of eyewitness testimony.
You know, I provided you with the studies, you have failed to provide a single thing to prove that eyewitness testimony is reliable. So frankly, your argument in this thread is pretty much trashed since you are completely unable to back up any of your claims.
Provide the science to show that it is reliable as you claim it to be, MR.
A crime was committed against me, MR. I was raped in my own house. They had DNA evidence that they got from me, and in my house, as well as my eyewitness testimony and that of my neighbours who had seen my attacker hovering around my property and on the day of the rape itself and they refused to prosecute. So perhaps you should try a different line of argument. I know how the system works. It's a shame you utterly dismiss science because you prefer to believe videos of helicopter lights being a UFO mothership.
I want you to read up on Bernard Baran, so that you might understand how easy it is to convict someone who has committed no crime, but the "eyewitnesses" were so easily led to believe something that never even happened.
Do you know what one of the biggest complaint we have about this forum? It is that we allow the Fringe section to remain open, that we tolerate threads about UFO's and ghosts. That is the one thing that is the most prolific in complaints about this website. And a lot of the current crop of complaints is because of you.
It's interesting though, that I have been one of your most vocal defenders in the back room. Hell, I have been the only person to defend you against all the other staff quite a few times and you think I am vindictive? Do you think I am vindictive because I have asked you to take your whining about staff to the proper channel (ie admin)? Or do you view my posting studies and facts as being vindictive, MR?
And it is also interesting that you view studies, links, statistics, science, to be "arrogant flaming and petty vindictive personal attacks".. Because essentially, I provided you with actual studies and reports that counter your claims about the reliability of eyewitness testimony. You have yet to provide a single study that shows that it is reliable. You have repeatedly dodged answering questions or addressing actual science and instead, fallen on this hick type argument that it is reliable and I say hick like, because of the fact that a large portion of those wrongfully convicted based on eyewitness testimony have either been minorities or members of the LGBT community. I mean, is that why you think it is so reliable?
Is that why you are wishing to throw down for a system that has a 20%+ error rate that results in people being imprisoned and even executed for crimes they never committed? Or is it because the videos you post and the many threads you create about UFO's are all about "eyewitness testimony" who go from seeing lights in the sky and automatically deem it is alien? Either way, the maliciousness of your support for such a biased system because of your belief in UFO's is, as I said before, reprehensible.