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Astronomical Data Used for Litigation (FAQ)

by vba616 on 1/26/24, 12:29 PM with 20 comments

  • by antognini on 1/27/24, 3:39 PM

    A friend of mine used to work at Carnegie Observatory in Pasadena. Apparently every now and again a lawyer would come by looking for an astronomer to be an expert witness in a trial. Usually it was to testify about the position of the sun at the time of a car accident. (One party might claim that they were blinded by the sun but the other would argue that the sun couldn't have been seen in that location.)

    The funny part was that it didn't really require any specialized skills. They'd just look up the position of the sun at the time of the accident in an astronomical almanac like anybody else would. But in the context of a trial it lends some weight if it comes out of the mouth of someone with a PhD in astronomy.

  • by lifeisstillgood on 1/27/24, 11:58 AM

    Slight tangent - I often find project managers and senior management wanting a “zipper” project - where some big brained architect predicts the future use cases and needs and can plan pulling together the teeth in 15 steps ahead

    Which is of course rubbish - mostly it’s amazing if you can predict the next zip.

    And this reminds me of that - what did the first naval rating think when he sat and read a letter from an attorney saying “my client says it was too dark for the cops to recognise him can you please …”

  • by clbrmbr on 1/27/24, 12:31 PM

    What else is astronomical data used for in litigation other than determining (upper bound on) illumination levels?

  • by ragtagtag on 1/27/24, 11:38 AM

    In case the site is unavailable for anyone else: https://web.archive.org/web/20240127101027/https://aa.usno.n...

  • by a2800276 on 1/27/24, 12:00 PM

    These whimsical post are the best thing about hacker news! Thanks for posting...

    (I hate to call the linked page "whimsical", because in most ways, the provided information is the opposite of whimsical: clear language, deep subject matter knowledge, authoritative and extremely well presented. I use whimsical in the sense that it is likely of no immediate use to the overwhelming majority of visitors here)

  • by whatgoodisaroad on 1/27/24, 8:11 PM

    Lunar illumination was once used by Abraham Lincoln to defend a murder suspect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duff_Armstrong#Murder_trial