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Eyewitnesses and the 'feeling of knowing'

I'm increasingly convinced that recent advancements in neuroscience will, in a very few years, begin to revolutionize several fundamental sets of assumptions on which the criminal justice system is presently based - most immediately regarding eyewitness identification and the reliability generally of witness testimony.In Dr. Ginger Campbell's Brain Science Podcast #42, she reviews a book by Dr. Robert Burton - On Being Certain: Believing you are right even when you are not - focusing on a question that comes up frequently in cases resulting in DNA exonerations involving erroneous eyewitness identifications: How is it that witnesses can believe to their core they are testifying accurately but identify alleged perpetrators who absolutely didn't do it?How can one be certain, in other words, and at the same time utterly and profoundly wrong?According to Dr...continue to full post

Full post as published by Grits for Breakfast on July 25, 2008 (boomark / email).