Inferring and Explaining

112 And once again, the causal diagnosis was imme- diately obvious to Semmelweis: InferrIng and exPlaInIng t ″ 0 . Cadaveric particles from the hands of the physicians and medical students were being introduced into the bodies of pregnant women in the First Maternity Division dur- ing childbirth and gynecological examina- tions, and these particles were then causing the childbed fever. A Sad Story It’s late in the afernoon. Two young men in dif- ferent cars areheadedhome. One is a thirty-year- old professional who works for the state; we’ll call himTony.Te other has just graduated from high school and is planning to attend college the coming fall; we’ll call him Corey. Corey is driv- ing well within the speed limit and approaches a stop sign. He comes to a full stop. Although he sees Tony’s car coming, Corey incorrectly believes the intersection is a four-way stop, so he feels safe proceeding through the intersec- tion. Tony is also driving well within the speed limit and having no stop sign proceeds through the intersection. Te two cars collide at almost a perfect ninety-degree angle on their front ends. Corey is not hurt at all and leaves his car to check on Tony, who initially reports that he is fne too. Corey and Tony exchange contact and insur- ance information, and Corey heads home. Tony tries to drive home as well but discovers that the crumpled wheel well makes this impossible. Afer a long evening waiting for a tow truck, Tony is fnally taken home by his fancée. Our story now focuses on Tony. A day or two afer the accident, he is stif and sore and goes to see a chiropractor he has seen before. Afer hearing about the crash, the chiropractor diag- noses Tony’s complaints as a back injury and begins a treatment protocol based on this. His symptoms start to improve, but over the next few months, pain in his hip and leg gradually increase, and he consults his regular doctor. She suspects that Tony is sufering from some sort of hip injury and even goes on to guess it might be a labral tear. Afer an MRI and consulting an orthopedic surgeon, the labral tear diagnosis is confrmed. Afer months of more treatment with mixed success, Tony decides to have sur- gery to repair the torn labrum. Tony almost dies during surgery because of complications with the anesthetic, but from an orthopedic per- spective, the surgery seems to be a success. His symptoms disappear, and he is virtually pain- free. Afer just a few months, however, Tony’s symptoms begin to reappear and new surgery is planned. Tony decides to sue Corey for his expenses— almost $100,000—and for his pain and sufer- ing, he asked for an additional $400,000. I was chosen to serve on the jury for this civil suit. Although the story is indeed sad, sitting on this jury was something of a treat for me because I am a hopeless wannabe lawyer and because it gave me a chance to actually apply inference to the best explanation to a real-world case of legal evidence. Our jury was not asked to assign blame, Corey had already admitted he was at fault for the accident. Te plaintif, Tony, therefore, had already established Corey was, what lawyers call, negligent, and Tony was almost certainly going to get some damages. Te question was what the amount of those damages should be.