Related papers: The Prosecutor's Fallacy and Expert Testimony: A M…
Many resources for forensic scholars and practitioners, such as journal articles, guidance documents, and textbooks, address how to make a value of evidence assessment in the form of a likelihood ratio (LR) when deciding between two…
In this article we provide a rebuttal against the possible perception that a single number, such as the Likelihood Ratio, can provide an objective, authoritative or definitive weight of evidence. We also illustrate the extent to which…
When presenting forensic evidence, such as a DNA match, experts often use the Likelihood ratio (LR) to explain the impact of evidence . The LR measures the probative value of the evidence with respect to a single hypothesis such as 'DNA…
Lennard (2013) [Fingerprint identification: how far have we come? Aus J Forensic Sci. doi:10.1080/00450618.2012.752037] proposes that the numeric output of statistical models should not be presented in court (except "if necessary" / "if…
The forensic science community has increasingly sought quantitative methods for conveying the weight of evidence. Experts from many forensic laboratories summarize their findings in terms of a likelihood ratio. Several proponents of this…
Forensic experts use specialized training and knowledge to enable other members of the judicial system to make better informed and more just decisions. Factfinders, in particular, are tasked with judging how much weight to give to experts'…
The present letter to the editor is one in a series of publications discussing the formulation of hypotheses (propositions) for the evaluation of strength of forensic evidence. In particular, the discussion focusses on the issue of what…
For several decades, legal and scientific scholars have argued that conclusions from forensic examinations should be supported by statistical data and reported within a probabilistic framework. Multiple models have been proposed to quantify…
In the Bayesian paradigm for presenting forensic evidence to court, it is recommended that the weight of the evidence be summarized as a likelihood ratio (LR) between two opposing hypotheses of how the evidence could have been produced.…
In many jurisdictions, forensic evidence is presented in the form of categorical statements by forensic experts. Several large-scale performance studies have been performed that report error rates to elucidate the uncertainty associated…
I think we can agree that dealing with uncertainty is not easy. Probability is the main tool for dealing with uncertainty, and we know there are many probability-related puzzles and paradoxes. Here I describe a rather idiosyncratic…
The likelihood ratio (LR) is a commonly used measure for determining the strength of forensic match evidence. When a forensic expert determines a high LR for DNA found at a crime scene matching the DNA profile of a suspect they typically…
Early warning signals have been proposed to forecast the possibility of a critical transition, such as the eutrophication of a lake, the collapse of a coral reef, or the end of a glacial period. Because such transitions often unfold on…
A prominent weakness of modern language models (LMs) is their tendency to generate factually incorrect text, which hinders their usability. A natural question is whether such factual errors can be detected automatically. Inspired by…
Debates about juridical proof are often framed as a conflict between probabilistic approaches and relative plausibility theory (RPT). This paper argues that this opposition rests on a level-of-analysis error. Drawing on Marr's distinction…
Legal probabilism (LP) claims the degrees of conviction in juridical fact-finding are to be modeled exactly the way degrees of beliefs are modeled in standard bayesian epistemology. Classical legal probabilism (CLP) adds that the conviction…
This article examines the overlooked risk of false negative errors arising from eliminations in forensic firearm comparisons. While recent reforms in forensic science have focused on reducing false positives, eliminations--often based on…
Current legal outcome prediction models - a staple of legal NLP - do not explain their reasoning. However, to employ these models in the real world, human legal actors need to be able to understand the model's decisions. In the case of…
Ideas from forensic linguistics are now being used frequently in Natural Language Processing (NLP), using machine learning techniques. While the role of forensic linguistics was more benign earlier, it is now being used for purposes which…
Triggered by a recent interesting New Scientist article on the too frequent incorrect use of probabilistic evidence in courts, I introduce the basic concepts of probabilistic inference with a toy model, and discuss several important issues…