Moore, Wilbert E.

English

University of Denver

Denver Law Review Volume 47 Issue 4 Article 23 March 2021 Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment Wilbert E. Moore Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/dlr Recommended Citation Wilbert E. Moore, Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment, 47 Denv. L.J. 674 (1970). This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Denver Law Review at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Denver Law Review by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact jennifer.cox@du.edu,dig-commons@du.edu. EXTEMPORANEOUS COMMENTBy WILBERT E. MOOREI HAVE four or five unrelated joints, all of them brief. I was pro-voked by Dr. Curlin's paper into thinking once more about the poorjob the social sciences do training people in the techniques of socialinvention. Except for law, and perhaps social work, we do not havetechnological adjuncts to the social sciences. We trust social invention,therefore, to legislators and other amateurs. What brought this to mindwas his wish for an organization creature which does not exist. Withregard to the creation of such an organization, I find myself in agree-ment with Dr. Coates -we have to try several. We do not haveenough theory or experience to permit us to create the ideal assessmentorganization.I agree with Professor Bereano that we have discussed our prob-lems in elitist terms, but I would submit that it is both justifiable andproper. This is because "elitist problems" are closely related to a middleclass bias. Class has been thought to be one of the more useful conceptsused by sociology. I would say that by most standard measures, orcriteria of class membership, the United States is 85 percent or at least80 percent middle class. This leads me to the conclusion that thereis no such thing as the culture of poverty. The poor, as Dr. Bereanonoted, share our middle class values and, they develop mechanisms tohelp them cope with and endure their poverty while they aspire tomiddle class status. Thus, to say we have a middle class bias, seems toadmit that we are talking about the majority of the American populationand, the problem becomes one of getting everybody into the game.Finally, one other comment that I wanted to make is that wedo have a vehicle of communication between those lawyers and socialscientists who want it, and that is Law and Society Review. I would alsosuggest a Law and Technology Review, which would, again, not try toreach every lawyer or every technologist, but only those who want tocross the bridge or stand in the middle of it. It seems to me that thereis room for such a journal.

Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment

Denver Law Review Volume 47 Issue 4 Article 59 April 2021 Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment Wilbert E. Moore Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/dlr Recommended Citation Wilbert E. Moore, Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment, 47 Denv. L.J. 674 (1970). This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Denver Law Review at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Denver Law Review by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact jennifer.cox@du.edu,dig-commons@du.edu. EXTEMPORANEOUS COMMENTBy WILBERT E. MOOREI HAVE four or five unrelated joints, all of them brief. I was pro-voked by Dr. Curlin's paper into thinking once more about the poorjob the social sciences do training people in the techniques of socialinvention. Except for law, and perhaps social work, we do not havetechnological adjuncts to the social sciences. We trust social invention,therefore, to legislators and other amateurs. What brought this to mindwas his wish for an organization creature which does not exist. Withregard to the creation of such an organization, I find myself in agree-ment with Dr. Coates -we have to try several. We do not haveenough theory or experience to permit us to create the ideal assessmentorganization.I agree with Professor Bereano that we have discussed our prob-lems in elitist terms, but I would submit that it is both justifiable andproper. This is because "elitist problems" are closely related to a middleclass bias. Class has been thought to be one of the more useful conceptsused by sociology. I would say that by most standard measures, orcriteria of class membership, the United States is 85 percent or at least80 percent middle class. This leads me to the conclusion that thereis no such thing as the culture of poverty. The poor, as Dr. Bereanonoted, share our middle class values and, they develop mechanisms tohelp them cope with and endure their poverty while they aspire tomiddle class status. Thus, to say we have a middle class bias, seems toadmit that we are talking about the majority of the American populationand, the problem becomes one of getting everybody into the game.Finally, one other comment that I wanted to make is that wedo have a vehicle of communication between those lawyers and socialscientists who want it, and that is Law and Society Review. I would alsosuggest a Law and Technology Review, which would, again, not try toreach every lawyer or every technologist, but only those who want tocross the bridge or stand in the middle of it. It seems to me that thereis room for such a journal.

https://digitalcommons.du.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3644&context=dlr

Saving Us From Ourselves: The Interaction of Law and Technology: Extemporaneous Comment

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