I found this book to be an excellent read, I am not a lawyer but I am familiar with statistics and causality. This books makes an excellent argument whose conclusion you could guess: some of the most costly court judgments in American history did not have scientifically valid evidence to support them. Trial lawyers litigate scientifically questionable cases in order to take a shot at potentially huge awards and they will argue anything in the hope that that the average jury will buy into it. Given a society in which every wrong and every grievance is assumed to be a result of someone's victimization, large companies are an obvious target. Thus many birth defects, accidents and many other human tragedies can be capitalized on by litigants for great financial advantage by laying the problem at the door of a "deep pocket", even when the causal connection is completely unfounded or absurd.
Huber steps through several fascinating cases (including Audi's "uncontrolled acceleration" problem and Benedectin, the morning sickness drug), showing both the junk science employed and the deceptive tactics of the attorneys. Huber effectively makes several important points: that bad science can crowd out good science because of bad precedents and court procedures that don't serve the interests of truth. He recommends reforms that would give greater primacy to scientifically valid evidence and which would more easily exclude patently false scientific claims.
It makes enormous sense to anyone who wants to see justice served and in seeing that the public is not denied products and medicines because of the enrichment of clever tort lawyers, not to mention the enormous cost to our society of this type of unfounded legal extortion.
I can't figure out the gripe of the guy who gave this book one star -- The New York Times raved about this well written book, and for good reason -- it is deeply disturbing to see how justice can be miscarried. My guess is that many members of the legal profession don't want laymen to think they can understand the complexities of their profession, and thereby be outraged by what a commonsense understanding of some of their behavior would dictate. These issues are too important to be left entirely to the lawyers, and a system that is unlikely to be reformed if left solely to their efforts. Huber has done a magnificent job of making these fascinating issues accessible without being mired in legal jargon and making it clear how every citizen's interests are at risk when junk science prevails.
You are likely to read this book in one sitting if you get caught up in it like I did.
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