Right Reason

Today, at the conclusion of what was probably New Zealand’s most closely followed murder (re)trial ever, David Bain was found not guilty of killing his parents and three siblings in Dunedin in 1994.

I don’t quite know what I think about whether or not David did it. “What?” you might say. “But the court found that he didn’t do it!” No, actually it did not. I want to stress before writing this that I’m not saying he did it. Maybe – and hopefully – he didn’t. But this high profile case does present the opportunity to correct a mistaken, although widely held, view of exactly what a “not guilty” verdict really is. There’s a common belief afoot that when a court declares a person “not guilty,” they are making the claim about history like this:  “It’s a fact that this person did not do what he is accused of.” Some media outlets perpetuate this belief. For example in the news article linked above, we read, “Bain spent 13 years in jail for a crime the jury took five hours and 50 minutes to decide he didn’t do.”

Although common, this view of a not guilty verdict is mistaken. Yes, a person is regarded (presumed) by law as innocent until proven guilty, so the law will treat people who are found not guilty as innocent people – as it certainly should. They will still be presumed innocent by the law. But there is a difference between legally declaring a person not guilty and stating that it has been proven that they did not do what they are accused of.

In the Scottish court, a third verdict is available – “not proven.” In our court, only two are available: Guilty or not guilty. Guilty means that the evidence establishes that the person has committed the offence in question. Our broader “not guilty” verdict actually encompasses both the Scottish “not guilty” as well as the Scottish “not proven.” “Not proven” itself also encompasses both of these, since when a person is deemed “not guilty” the case against them is deemed “not proven.” The upshot of all this is that when our courts find a person “not guilty,” they are actually commenting on the case for their guilt, not on the facts of history.

If this seems a little odd to you, think of it in logical notation. In such notation the symbol ~ means “not” or “it’s not the case that.” Let G = Guilty, which means “the prosecution has established that this person committed the crime.” “Not guilty” is ~G, which means “it’s not the case that the prosecution has established that this person committed the crime.” Many members of the public aren’t aware of this, and they wrongly assume that ~G means “it is the case that the defense has established that this person did not commit the crime.” But this is not contained in either ~ or G.

Legal experts concerned about the public perception of high profile cases have been expressing this concern for some time. In 1994 Lord Donaldson advocated that Britain adopt the “not proven” verdict instead of “not guilty,” precisely because “not guilty” gives the misleading impression that the court has found a person to be innocent. “[t]he verdict of ‘not guilty’,” said Donaldson, “says nothing about innocence. It simply says that the jury was not wholly sure that the accused committed the crime.” Bear in mind after all, in order to find a person not guilty, all the defense has to do is introduce reasonable doubt. In case there was any room for doubt as to his meaning, Donaldson says again: “The only real issue for the jury is whether they are sure the accused is guilty. Whether he is innocent or not is irrelevant for their purpose, and it is a pity that this is generally not understood.” [The Mail on Sunday, 4th Sept 1994, my birthday, incidentally]

It has been established that it has not been established that David Bain committed these murders. Is he innocent? I hope so, and I certainly have no basis for treating him as guilty.

Glenn Peoples

A friend of mine pointed me to this entry over at Michael Spencer’s blog, The Internet Monk. It’s a decent post actually, and I recommend giving it a read. The point that my friend was intrigued by was the exhortation that as we read and interpret the Gospels, “Don’t harmonize the Gospels.”

Don’t harmonise them? Why not? Michael’s reason is fine. He says:

Don’t harmonize the Gospels. That’s like taking four paintings and combining them into one. You come up with something no one painted and no one intended to paint. Let each Gospel author be an artist in his own right. However, a Gospel synopsis, such as those available from UBS, are very useful and important in comparing Gospel texts to one another WITHOUT harmonizing them.

It has long been thought, and rightly so, that each of the four Gospel writers portrayed Jesus differently, and intentionally so. They emphasised a different side of his character, or a different focus of his mission, or a specific angle on his status (e.g. Luke has a clear emphasis on concern for the poor and eschatological reversal of fortunes, and John went out of his way to emphasis the divinity of Christ).

Simply as a matter of respecting what the writers were trying to convey, you should refrain from trying to map one Gospel onto another, blending them to get one picture rather than multiple pictures. But there’s another reason too. This is a subject I’ve been considering broaching for some time, and this question has given me a good platform to do so. Here goes:

The other reason that you shouldn’t harmonize the Gospels is that to do so presupposes a very strong doctrine of inerrancy, and that doctrine is false.

There. I said it. I’m not an inerrantist.

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For a paper that I am writing, I am trying to locate the following story, which is widely cited as appearing somewhere in the Palestinian Talmud (also called Palestinian Talmud or Talmud of Palestine). Usually this is no trouble, but this particular source is proving to be a bit fiendish to locate. Here’s the story as reproduced online without citation:

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Whoops, I missed it by a couple of days.

On Friday the 26th of May 2006, the first ever blog entry appeared at Say Hello to my Little Friend. Has it really been that long? Actually, the first one you see was meant to be the second one. Being a bit of a blogging newbie, and insisting on installing the blog on my own domain, I managed to screw something up and lose the very first blog entry, which contained an introduction to the blog plus a short tribute to the then recently deceased Ron Nash.

Those were the old days when I didn’t even have a podcast! The first episode (a test episode) of the Say Hello to my Little Friend came on the 20th of May 2008, nearly two years after the blog started. Time flies! Although there is (obviously) still a blog here and hopefully a relatively interesting one at that (last I heard it was in the top 50 New Zealand blogs), the podcast has become the main attraction here (it rose quickly to become New Zealand’s top Christian podcast, which is a scary fact – and one that brings extra expenses).

I wish I had more time and resources to put into the blog and podcast, and I hope that my career direction in the not too distant future (sigh) will make that possible, but I think it’s fair to say that after three years things aren’t too shabby. I don’t know how long I would have kept it up had there been no signs of people actually reading and listening, which has been really encouraging. I’ve been blown away by some of the feedback I’ve received via my contact page (click “Main Site” in the right hand column to go to the front page where you can get to the contact page). So thanks to all of you who follow this blog and keep me going! Remember, if any of you want to write something for the site or the blog, let me know.

Thanks for being a part of this endeavour!

Glenn

According to Simon Clarke, religion is “the biggest obstacle to thinking clearly about social and political issues.” Yes, the biggest. [UPDATE 6th August 2010: that link no longer works. Here is a link to a different presentation of what looks like the same article.]

The main reason that he gives is roughly like this: Some people think that religion provides the foundation of morality, so rather then use their own mental steam to try to figure out the answers to moral and social questions, they simply appeal to a list of commandments, and that is that. No clear thought is required. When it comes to assessing the claim that religion is the basis of morality, Clarke declares, “Nothing could be further from the truth. What religion says is irrelevant to deciding what we ought to do.”

And how does Dr Clarke lay out and defend his case for this claim? Here’s where alarm bells start ringing.

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In Perth in the year 1559, John Knox preached a sermon that is credited by some with kick starting the Reformation in Scotland. Knox aroused the parishioners to destroy the religious idols and graven images of the saints in their churches. In reaction to the uproar, Mary of Guise sent troops to lay siege to Perth, but in defence of the new protestants, Alexander Cunningham, 5th Earl of Glencairn, defeated Mary’s troops by leading a force of 2,500 soldiers against them. These were stirring times where people were prepared to pay the ultimate price for their convictions.

Four and a half centuries later (today, in fact), I visited Knox Presbyterian church here in Dunedin, named after the Scottish Reformer himself. If you’re lucky enough to visit what is really a lovely church, here’s what you’ll see. First, before you enter the front door, you’re greeted with this:

It’s a bust of the Rev Dr D M Stuart, the conservative first minister of Knox church.

Once you enter the church, here is the stained glass window that dominates the view:

Click on the image for a larger view. Along with the four evangelists, the stained glass image features St. Andrew (Patron Saint of Scotland) and St. Margaret (11th Century Queen of Scotland). The figure on the bottom right is D M Stuart, and the man on the bottom left? John Knox himself.

Make a sentence out of the following words: his in grave Knox is turning John.

Glenn Peoples

Part 2 of the podcast series on philosophy of mind is well underway, and it’s shaping up to be an interesting series (for me, at any rate!).

In the meantime I wanted to share something with you purely for the sake of comic relief. I discovered this a few days ago (thanks Stacey!). My kids love it, and I have to confess to finding it thoroughly amusing. Enjoy! 🙂