CLPEX Chat Board

I have enjoyed viewing the many and varied responses to this post and as always particularly valued the contribution of David Grieve who spoke out for Shirley a decade ago and continues to be a powerful voice for reason in his profession.

I have not been persuaded however that there is any real international consensus in dealing with ‘difference’. While many are extremely rigorous in applying the ACE-V process to their work others are much less so and some indeed appear to dip into the ‘lucky bag’ of distortion, slippage etc to explain ‘difference’.

While enjoying Gerard Clough’s contributions I would take gentle issue with him in respect of his definitions of subjectivity and objectivity,

‘In fingerprint terms, an objective analysis looks only at the impressions. It would be subjective only if the analysis introduced other data that recreated the analysis as an analysis of a more complex construct of his own mind, rather than analysis of the object, the impressions. But the fact that the analyst makes judgments and assigns values does not make it subjective. Fingerprint examination, done properly, is never subjective.'

I cannot agree. You cannot ever exclude the human factor completely from fingerprint examination. By effective process you can limit its effect and I would argue make the science extremely reliable but the process must take account of the human being making the decisions. Itiel Dror and David Charlton have extended the validity of this conclusion in their research into the psychological and cognitive vulnerabilities of experts.
http://truthinjustice.org/JFIexperterror.pdf

I would favour the following definition.

‘A proposition is objective if its truth depends purely on the object under study. A proposition is subjective if its truth depends not merely on the object alone, but also on the observer and the relationship between the two.’

If we accept this then inevitably the expert’s skill is subjective in nature. This does not mean of course it is less accurate or less valid but only that the necessary intervention of the individual in describing his/her opinion of the print leads inevitably to a subjective opinion.

My interest is in mapping out what moving away from the purely ‘objective truth’ to the ‘subjective interpretation’ involves and the possibility that during this process ‘objective truth’ is altered.

We need to accept that in most areas of scientific endeavour we are working to ‘objective truths’ that are by their very nature subject to development and change. As cosmology has dramatically shown over the past few decades theories of the universe are continually changing as new technology allows us to peer even further into space and view new ‘objective truths’.

This is the very nature of growth and progress and does not mean that a truth, even if subject to change, has no theoretical or practical value or application. To believe otherwise would be to accept because we can never be 100% certain about anything all of the time that human endeavour such as fingerprint examination can never be valid or scientific. The process of gaining and applying knowledge is necessarily a dynamic one and one suspects fingerprint examination is no different in this respect.

As a layperson who has suffered at the hands of experts I would stress the importance of ensuring, as far as is humanly possible, that each expert has as complete an understanding of the state of knowledge in his/her chosen specialism as it is possible to have and that the expert is applying this knowledge using proven skills and techniques.

Because of the dynamic nature of change we create structures, systems and technology to try and ensure that as individuals we have the necessary knowledge and understanding , are able to employ it consistently and are encouraged and assisted in updating that knowledge as new ‘truths’ emerge.

This of course places a very heavy responsibility on those charged with training and supervising these experts and monitoring the use of that expertise.

In the SCRO I believe that a lack of robust systems and openness to challenge, coupled with an arrogant and complacent culture, led to the move from the objective to the subjective being a cynical ‘leap in the dark’ as opposed to a consistent, structured, logical and monitored process carried through by well informed, experienced and ethical experts aware of their own vulnerability and humble enough to accept that we can all make mistakes.

Whether this culture led to dishonesty and criminality is of course entirely another matter.

I don't have any problem with your definitions of objective and subjective. One has to specify meaning if one is to be understood. I can comment from your definition or from mine, and I can readily accept yours for some purposes. Most often, I am responding to those to haven't thought through either meaning and therefore mix the two factors that would make something subjective by one or the other definition. They mix the factor of forces external to the examination, we could say external to the "system" of examiner and evidence, and the factor of the human observer nature of the examiner operating without significant external influences. They are often proposing a presumption that, because the examiner is human, they must be suffering improper external influences of the grossest kind. (I am always somewhat suspicious of those who make that assertion, having found that people often assign to others what they see in themselves. I am similarly suspicious that those who believe that everyone regularly lies are themselves regular liars and that those who believe everyone is out to steal from them are themselves prone to theft.)

Obviously, we are the product of an infinity of influences. Some of those may make us naturally more conservative or less conservative, and I agree that that must be considered as having some effect on various interpretations of observations. Examination is not a mechanical process. So we cannot predict that every examiner will interpret any particular portion of an impression in exactly the same way. In that sense, according to the common usage of the term, which is close to your definition, the examination is "subjective." But the objection (which is not one you raise) that being subjective in that way hopelessly corrupts the process is not valid. The subjectivity we are talking about in this way is simply part of the nature of the only process we can invoke or are likely to be able to invoke for a long time to come. It is similar to and related to the kind "subjectivity" of the threshold for identification. We can reliably operate this kind of "subjective" process, so long as we apply an appropriately high threshold by demanding considerable observable agreement between impressions. This sort of threshold can be poorly defined but still be effectively conservative when it has been refined from vast experience and correctly transmitted to less experienced examiners. I think we do that very well, but of course that does not prevent some examiner from violating that standard, nor does it insure that every single examiner receives it appropriately.

But of course, since it is the product of observation by human observers who not only vary among themselves but vary each in their own day to day states, we build into the larger process measures to detect when an examiner may be, shall we say "miscalibrated," too far outside the interpretations justified by the communal experience, even if it's just a "bad day." And when commenting on this, I think you revert to my original definition, introducing the structure and culture as factors, things outside the examiner-evidence system. That's exactly my kind of "subjective."

I guess that, in a sense, we always have and want that kind of subjectivity. We place examiners in a structure and culture and we intend that the structure and culture influence the examinations. We use the structure to enforce upon the examiner a consistent conservative approach through training and the knowledge that the examination product will be reviewed and confirmed. That, of course, depends on the culture's nature as one in which, if the examination appears to be flawed by plain error or your "leap in the dark," that issue is raised and resolved. Structural or cultural failure obviously is operating in just about every official erroneous identification. Sometimes, it's complete lack of any structure, as when a lone examiner is operating without recourse to any review or without appropriate training. Sometimes, it's a culture that tends to retard the freedom to object and to have the objection trigger a genuine review. (Or the review itself is corrupted, the culture directing the outcome of the review.)

So, I would submit that defining "objective" as the ultimate truth of the object makes it a term of little practical use to us, except to make the obvious point that no practical use can be made of the object without a subject to observe it. I think we make best use of the rather loaded term "subjective" by using it to distinguish between the examiner whose conclusion has purely to do with the object of his analysis versus the external subjective influences, be they beneficial or harmful, and to answer unwarranted (or at least rather pointless) objections that we are making judgments that are not wholly mechanical.