Barack Obama has nominated Sonia Sotomayor to fill David Souter’s seat on the Supreme Court. I don’t know much about her on the merits; I was idiosyncratically rooting for Kathleen Sullivan, who I had met while I was a grad student and impressed me as uncommonly brilliant. One thing that immediately strikes you about Sotomayor is her personal history — raised in housing projects in the Bronx by a single Mom, she fought her way up to graduate summa cum laude from Princeton, and then to law school at Yale where she edited the Law Review. Doesn’t mean she’ll be a great Justice, but it’s an impressive record.
The opposition research has been out for a while, of course, because that’s how politics works. One of the things brought up by Sotomayor’s critics is this clip, where she talks about the difference in emphasis between a district court and an appellate court. (Appellate courts need to look beyond the facts of the case to consider implications of setting precedent for future decisions.)
This clip drives people crazy, because she says that the courts of appeals are “where policy is made.” You’re not supposed to say that! (As Sotomayor immediately jokes.) The legislatures make the laws, and the courts are merely referees, interpreting the words of the statutes by lights of their objective and unchanging meanings.
In reality, of course, Sotomayor is simply telling the truth — a cardinal sin in law as well as politics. In law and politics, and for that matter theology, we are presented with a sacred text of one form or another. And we are supposed to pretend that the text has a One True Meaning — we may, of course, argue at great length about the proper procedure for divining what that meaning actually is, but admitting that the text is inherently ambiguous (or even contradictory) is not allowed. We need to act as if the authors of Leviticus and the Framers of the Constitution were trying to say something very clear about contemporary debates, if only we had the interpretational acumen to figure out what it was.
Which is why, as much as I enjoy the rest of the world of human endeavor, science will always be my true home. Our job is to interpret the natural world, which really is unambiguous and non-contradictory, if only we can make sense of its behavior. Other fields have a professional obligation to pretend that there are right and wrong answers, but we actually have them. Yet another way in which being a scientist is so much easier than other jobs.
May 26th, 2009 at 11:22 am
One of the best essays about the political system I’ve ever read: http://www.overcomingbias.com/2008/01/the-american-sy.html
May 26th, 2009 at 11:37 am
What drives me crazy is not so much the reality that courts will not always be able to “divine” the original intent of the Constitution or statute, but that they often don’t even seem to try. Rather, for an activist judge, the written word seems to me an obstacle to him making the ruling he wants to make.
Certainly the Constitution needs occasional clarification, and even updating. Hence, it has an amendment process. Federal statute can be clarified or changed by Congress at any time. There is no excuse for judges to just make up meaning where there is no evidence it was ever intended.
To the extent that judges feel free to invent meaning not present in the text, we in the USA live in an oligarchy, not a constitutional republic. That is a reality that drives me crazy.
May 26th, 2009 at 11:47 am
what does this have to do with science? What qualifications does Sean Carroll have to be blogging about this?
“…Which is why, as much as I enjoy the rest of the world of human endeavor, science will always be my true home…”
so stop writing about things you know nothing about then. If we wanted amateur political analysis we’d go to a different blog.
May 26th, 2009 at 11:53 am
I suppose, technically speaking, one should note that it is a testable hypothesis, not an assumption — as your words could be misunderstood to imply — that the natural world is unambiguous and non-contradictory.
May 26th, 2009 at 11:59 am
Sean:
“Which is why, as much as I enjoy the rest of the world of human endeavor, science will always be my true home. Our job is to interpret the natural world, which really is unambiguous and non-contradictory, if only we can make sense of its behavior. Other fields have a professional obligation to pretend that there are right and wrong answers, but we actually have them. Yet another way in which being a scientist is so much easier than other jobs.”
Such tongue in cheek comments are likely to be misunderstood!
You should have at least started with: “…which is hopefully unambiguos an non-contradictory”, ended with: “…but we actually approach them.”
May 26th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
I guess “have” was ambiguous — I meant “right and wrong answers actually exist,” not “we know what they are.”
May 26th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
I can’t help but wonder if perhaps some parts of natural reality *might* be ambiguous. All of our experience indicates, however, that right and wrong answers *do* exist, although sometimes that answer is about what is a meaningful question. For instance, Quantum Mechanics tell us that the right and wrong answers are about probabilities, and that some questions (like, “what is the the momentum of this electron who is exactly at x=0, y=0, z=0″) don’t have answers at all. Of course, that is the unambiguous answer: “it’s completely uncertain.”
The fact that we treat law as clear when it’s not drives me utterly apeshit. Whenever you get into any kind of question about what’s legal, what’s OK, it’s always, “consult a lawyer, and ultimately it depends on what a judge decides.” We’re bound by these laws, but we either need expensive training, or to pay for an expensive opinion, to understand them.
May 26th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
I’ve always been of the opinion that the common law system is fundamentally broken — battalions of special cases are a terrible way to organize almost anything. That said, there’s no question that a group of 9 people can make coherent decisions more effectively than a group of 100.
May 26th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Don’t worry. With a bit of luck Sullivan will get the nomination when Scalia has an apoplectic after Sotomayor (I like that name) is confirmed. Dominoes!
May 26th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Precedent is certainly set in district courts as well (and is applicable nationwide, as long as it does not conflict with other precedent nor is reversed on appeal).
May 26th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
@ eric schmidt (#3):
Why does this comment show up every few months, without fail? Maybe Sean et al. needs to put a little note somewhere to address this … oh wait, they already have:
“Our day (and night) jobs notwithstanding, the blog is about whatever we find interesting — science, to be sure, but also arts, politics, culture, technology, academia, and miscellaneous trivia.”
May 26th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
Any lawyer (and I admit to being one, although I sometimes wish I had chosen science) understands perfectly what she meant. The English language is not the most precise means of communication, and legislators are sometimes the worst practicioners.
A judge’s first job, whether at the trial court or appellate level, is to attempt to give meaning to oftentimes ambiguous statements of the law. Lawyers argue over such meanings every day of their professional lives, and no lawyer would argue that the judge’s experiences and opinions do not enter into their decisions. Judge Sotomayer was stating the obvious: at the trial court level the judge has more of a chance to do individual justice, while an appellate judge must be concerned about the use of their opinion as precedent in a wide variety of cases.
Congratulations to her for her honesty.
I confess your comparison between the judicial process and theology left me feeling pretty uncomfortable, but I will continue to pretend my endeavors are more closely related to science than to theology.
May 26th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Eric Schmidt yearns for the day when, if someone said “What qualifications does Eric Schmidt have to be blogging about this?”, other people would know who the hell they were talking about.
Sean Carroll: 1
Eric Schmidt: 0
May 26th, 2009 at 6:43 pm
“Our job is to interpret the natural world, which really is UNAMBIGUOUS and NON-CONTRADICTORY, if only we can make sense of its behavior.”
Really? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretation_of_quantum_mechanics#Comparison
Only about a dozen or so “serious” ones. And most major religions only have 2 main factions (ie Catholic/Protestant, Sunni/Shiite). Perhaps Science is not so different as its practitioners would like to “believe,” after all it is done by humans just like law, economics, et al.
My “belief” is that when the next great leap of understanding comes, it will seem as strange and wonderful as quantum mechanics and relativity were almost a century ago.
Unless of course, our machines rise up against us and become the next dominant evolutionary branch for intelligence.
May 26th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
Everettian, only two, think again. Last I heard there were some thirty thousand odd xian cults alone and while they have similarities, they differ widely in their interpretation of what is important. The RC split into factions fairly early on, i.e. Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Rome etc. and even in the main Rome version there are significant splits, such as Opus Dei. Even Islam has far more than two main branches, though you only tend to hear of the two most vociferous in defending their interpretation.
The difference between them and even something as difficult to understand as QM, is that while there is a lot we don’t yet know, and admittedly might never know, reality does tend to be in accord with what we do know so far. However, that’s the beauty of science, we never stop looking and learning. Conversely, pray tell us in what way does any religion accord with reality to even the merest degree beyond the metaphorical.
May 26th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
Everettian Says:
“Really? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretation_of_quantum_mechanics#Comparison
Only about a dozen or so “serious” ones. And most major religions only have 2 main factions (ie Catholic/Protestant, Sunni/Shiite). Perhaps Science is not so different as its practitioners would like to “believe,” after all it is done by humans just like law, economics, et al.”
Everettian,
The fact that science “is done by humans just like law, economics,” etc. certainly exposes its practice to the full complement of human follies and foibles, but the basic philosophies and methods of science appeal to me.
I enjoy the philosophy that beliefs are subject to challenge and potential refutation by observation.
Note that the OP did not claim that the BELIEFS AND THEORIES of scientists were unambiguous and noncontradictory but only that the NATURAL WORLD was unambiguous and noncontradictory.
May 26th, 2009 at 9:07 pm
From the NY Times article by Baker and Zeleny: In a lecture in 2001 on the role her background played in her jurisprudence, she said, “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”
Smells like racism to me. Maybe it is still worth supporting her to balance out the other nuts—but can’t be enthusiastic.
May 26th, 2009 at 9:27 pm
I wish he would have picked someone who had not gotten a “centrist” ranking. Heck we elected him to lead us into a century of socialism and he keeps tacking towards the middle. I am disappointed.
e.
May 26th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
@ Sean (#17):
You’re right, it does sound racist. A white man would never be able to say that and still occupy any public office. On the other hand, this restriction on speech seems to be a small price to pay for all the other privileges that automatically come with being a white man.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:38 am
The 2001 statement by Judge Sotomayor is contained on page 6 of the document at the following site:
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/6444523/Sonia-Sotomayors-2001-speech-at-UC-Berkeley
The speech was titled “A Latina Judge’s Voice,” in which she argued that we are kidding ourselves if we insist that our backgrounds do not influence our decisions (my very loose paraphrase). The remark quoted by Sean in post #17 is part of her dissent from a statement made by at least one Supreme Court Justice to the effect that a wise old man and a wise old woman will reach the same conclusion when deciding cases.
Similar to the video in the OP, she argues that the reality of the decision-making process does not match what some would consider the ideal, and I infer that she thinks we are better off at least acknowledging the existence of that reality than pretending it doesn’t exist.
May 27th, 2009 at 6:19 am
Sad but true. But having empathy and creating policy are specifically forbidden by the constitution! I thought Obama was supposed to be a constitutional lawyer. please…
Supreme Court Oath:
According to Title 28, Chapter I, Part 453 of the United States Code, each Supreme Court Justice takes the following oath:
“I, [NAME], do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the POOR AND TO THE RICH , and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me as [TITLE] under the Constitution and laws of the United States. So help me God.”
May 27th, 2009 at 6:40 am
[...] on science: a scientist talks about why he is grateful to be in science (where one can just search for “truth”) rather than in a field where the answers ought [...]
May 27th, 2009 at 7:40 am
Sean you say
“In law and politics … we are supposed to pretend that the text has a One True Meaning”.
Now that is a thoughtless characterization that betrays the simplistic world of science that you inhabit.
There is no One True Meaning. Law and politics are not about revealing Truth, they are a Process to find an optimal solution in the face of competing interests. Of course we try to do this more or less with some consistency, hence the Law and the constitution. Your answer will depend on where you are coming from and it won’t be the same as another person’s answer.
May 27th, 2009 at 8:17 am
Re: quantum mechanics, there are debates about the interpretation of quantum mechanics. That reflects more of our imperfect understanding of it than it does of any ambiguous nature in the underlying reality, though.
And, even beyond that, people with different interpretations about quantum mechanics agree on what the equations predict for the results of experiments.
May 27th, 2009 at 10:03 am
@ Ellipsis
Rulings at the trial court level are binding only on that trial court. Other courts may find them to be persuasive, but that is unlikely unless there is no appellate ruling anywhere near point or the author of the opinion is a particularly brilliant jurist.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:15 am
Ambiguity and contradiction are attributes of language and perception. They only exist in the natural world in so much as language and perception are a part of the natural world. You cannot have a liar’s paradox without language and you cannot have an “impossible object” (a la Escher) without perceptions (and expectations).
So science will always have ambiguity and contradiction because scientists must use perception and language to study the natural world. But those things creep in during observation and description and are not a part of the natural world (being studied) per se.
In law and theology, however, that which is being studied and applied exists only in language. So while ambiguity and contradiction will inevitably slip in during interpretation and application, it was also there from the beginning.
In this sense, Sean is right about science versus law and theology.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Hmm. I still think that the lack of ambiguity and non-contradictoriness of nature is an experimental phenomenon, not some sort of received truth about nature and science. We believe it to be true because it makes successful predictions, not because ambiguity and contradiction are excluded a priori. That is, “right and wrong answers” *might* not exist in some cases in nature — it is just that we don’t have any compelling case of that actually happening on our hands right now.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Justin — yes, indeed district-level precendent is not of the binding kind on other districts, but it is still regarded as “precedent” of the persuasive variety, assuming that it is in fact reasonable. Although I think Sotomayor is an excellent candidate, and this particular soundbite is just not her at her best, to say district-level opinions are “not precedential” sort of implies they can be ignored, obviously not the case. I know what she means and that’s fine, though.
May 28th, 2009 at 11:32 am
The different interpretations lead to the same predictions because we cannot do reversible measurements. If you consider the general case of an observer that can implement arbitrary unitary transformations on a system, then one could verify that the Copenhagen interpretaion is false.
As David Deutsch has pointed out along time ago, you could do a measurement of a system, then forget about the result of the measurement, but not that you have measured the system, and the wavefunction of the system won’t have collapsed (one has to forget by dumping the information back on the measured system). That the wavefunction has not been affected can be verified.
June 1st, 2009 at 7:28 pm
When I lived in a housing Co-op back in the late 70s we apprehended a thief taking food from our larder. The police arrived an hour after our call which was unfortunate as the thief tried to escape several times. When we asked the officers why they took their time one of the explained that they had assumed that we would beat the thief, the frats always did, and they didn’t want to witness it.
Judge Sonia Sotomayor notion of judicial activism is so comfortable to her that she is willing to put it on tape. It reminds me of the quote that the law is a very human institution. What we today acknowledge as abuse through repetition and familiarity becomes method in time. In the future all judges of various political beliefs will be activists. One more restraint lost in the dust of history.