In cases involving scientific evidence in the form of a test result linking the accused to a crime (e.g., DNA match), expert testimony sometimes can also provide a suitably reliable estimate of the chance of a coincidental match (the random match probability). Considerable controversy, however, attends the question of whether to allow testimony reporting that probability and, if so, in what form it should be given. Additional and related controversy concerns the implications of proficiency test results for testimony about the chance of false positive lab error, especially when that figure greatly exceeds the random match probability. This paper reports a large scale empirical study, using members of an Illinois jury pool, designed to contribute to our understanding of the issues involved. Our results confirm earlier research suggesting that jurors, rather than being credulously overwhelmed by the science, tend to undervalue forensic match evidence. On the other hand, our results differ from most prior research in showing that variation in the way the random match probability is presented and explained can reduce the extent of the undervaluation, without at the same time inviting inferential fallacies that would exaggerate the probative value of the match. And contrary to predictions, our results also show that incorporating information about comparatively large lab error rates, when it has any discernible effect, actually increases the jurors' assessed probability of guilt and willingness to convict.Some forensic science techniques, such as DNA analysis, allow expert witnesses no only to testify that a marker associated with one sample "matches" that associated

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Adottando quale premessa la prospettiva offerta dalla filosofia ermeneutica attraverso i suoi importanti contributi, il presente scritto analizza i diversi temi del processo giudiziale. Più esattamente, si dedica particolare attenzione alla costruzione delle narrazioni fattuali, alla presentazione delle prove e alla scoperta della verità fatta dal giudice nella sua decisione conclusiva fondata sulle prove.PArole chiAve: costruzione del caso; narrazioni fattuali; prova; giudizio; verità. AbstrAct:The text analyzes several topics of the judicial process from the point of view of the important contributions offered by the hermeneutical philosophy.

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social epistemology explains what most evidence law scholars in fact do, "regardless of their explicit philosophical commitments," a claim which I take to mean that most evidence scholars follow the general approach of modern naturalized epistemology, whether or not they are aware of that fact. If so, then such evidence scholars are admirably, if fortuitously, in tune with developments in modern philosophy. But problems arise, say Allen and Leiter, when we come to certain theoretically oriented evidence scholars who fail to recognize or to internalize appropriately the insights of social epistemology. Allen and Leiter quickly pass over the work of those evidence theorists most concerned with "postmodern" conceptions of truth and knowledge,' and so will I. Their principal targets, which they summarily characterize as those in search of an "algorithm" for decisions at trial, are expected utility theory, Bayesian decision theory, and microeconomics. 5 These theories seem to have the following elements in common: They are wide ranging in what they purport to explain or rationalize; they involve-at least in principle-quantification of probabilities and (sometimes) costs and benefits; and they are formal, in the sense that they attempt to model decisionmaking by simplifying the structure of the task at hand to a form that permits quantitative manipulation. The first of these features does not appear to be the culprit, for in the course of their paper, Allen and Leiter advance their own fairly comprehensive theory of evidence law-the "relative plausibility" theoryprimarily a theory about burdens of proof but with claimed implications for the principles of admissibility as well. 6 The real matters of concern appear to be the explicit quantification of probabilities and costs and, perhaps especially, the simplification of reality necessary to utilize formal models. According to Allen and Leiter, algorithmic approaches-or at least the ones they criticize-neglect two important insights of naturalized epistemology. 7 First, prescriptions generated by any useful theory of evidence should comply with a general constraint: 3 Id. 'Id. at 1492 & n.l. 5 Id. at 1492-93. 6 Id. at 1527-49. 7 Id. at 1498.