Dr David Caudill

Dr. Caudill holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, and a J.D. from the University of Houston. He clerked for a federal judge, practiced law for seven years, and joined the law faculty at Washington and Lee in 1989. In 2005 he became the Goldberg Family Chair in Law at Villanova University, where he teaches Evidence. He has published widely in the fields of expert evidence in courts and the crisis of expertise in US public policy.

Dr. Caudill’s research and publications have focused on the reliability of both courtroom experts and expertise in the context of governmental regulation. The recently acknowledged crisis of expertise, wherein large segments of the population distrust consensus science, has begun to appear in the courtroom. During his fellowship at SOCRATES, Dr. Caudill plans to study the phenomenon of US judges who do not defer to scientific consensus and seek solutions in light of politicized courts and judicial beliefs in fringe science.