Another shared phase of that process was that it occurred at a specific time. A bell would ring at the appointed hour and everyone would go to a designated place and uniformly, at the same time, listen to the teacher/professor/lecturer. And where did that dispenser of information take his/her position in the room? Always at the very front and center. In Plato’s day it was at the base of the amphitheatre. In professor Kingsfeild’s day it was no different, still front and center. The paradigm was simple and it was mandatory. All eyes and ears were on the central figure that served as the dispenser of information. Everyone was there at an appointed time to listen and learn. For millennia upon millenia that model remained intact. The model of “one giving knowledge to the many”, I will call it. But take note of what has happened in the last ten to fifteen years. The paradigm has been turned upside down, or, literally, inside out.
| The old model, one giving knowledge to the uniform many, looks like this: |
The new model, one taking information from the unregimented (and largely unregulated) many, looks like this: |
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The advent of the search engine, and the world’s passion for it, has changed forever the way humankind interfaces with knowledge. The new model is now the reverse of the millennia-old accepted paradigm. For the first time in history the model is what I will call, one taking knowledge from the many. Today, or tonight, or at 3 a.m. in your pajamas if you like, it all begins with a little rectangular search box, which, depending upon the size of your monitor screen, can be somewhere in the range of three to four inches wide by a half an inch high. It can be accessed most anytime from most any place. You, the knowledge taker can access the information from your kitchen table, a cruise ship, an office, or while killing time in the parking lot of a Denny’s in Sheboygan. The taker can be five years old or one hundred and five. The taker can peruse Plato’s Republic, sports scores, or stock prices or porn. The search engine is personal and empowering. It is the antithesis of being taught by the one. It empowers individuals to do what they think best with the information they get. Even radio and television are "one giving to the many". Search is the opposite - - - it is one looking at the world of possibilities and finding what one wants.
This phenomenon impacts trial presentation in extraordinary ways. Think of the paradigm of times past. One stood before many and dispensed information. Inherent in that paradigm was the assumption (correctly so) that the many desired to be there in front of the one to see and hear the information being given by the one of superior learning and knowledge. The “many” trusted “the one”. The many even went so far as to trust the one for guidance in values and in judgments about those values.
Now, fast-forward to modern times to your next jury trial. You are standing there, front and center, just like Aristotle. Do you think you stand a chance under the old model? Do you really think that you can pull off the role of the one dispensing information to the many? Did those jurors voluntarily come together so they could be assigned an arbitrary (and impersonal) number and take their respective (and sometimes uncomfortable) seats in the box because they want to listen to you lecture and learn from you? Is juror number three going to be eager to hear and embrace your values and judgments about the unfamiliar and often confusing matters placed before him? Will that room full of jurors in the venire be listening because you are legendary in your Socratic-like abilities to dispense wisdom to the masses? Or is it more likely that one or two or maybe many more of them fall into the 68% category of distrusting you. Aren’t they really a bit like you were when that salesman at the X-Car dealership trapped you? They’ve got to be there for a while, but they’d sure like to be elsewhere. Any lawyer who is unwilling to accept the monumental implications of how this paradigm shift impacts his/her work will likely not be reading this book anyway.
So…. are you a Socrates or a search engine? Are you there to present them with fact-neutrals and allow them to process the story in a way not inconsistent with their own values? Or are you there on a mission, confident that your oratory, intellect and charisma - and maybe a little help from PowerPoint - will persuade them to abandon their pre-sets and be led by you, “the one”? If you believe you have that ability, then I suggest that before you bring on your big finish you might want to check the scoreboard. I’m not sure what quarter we are in, or even if we have made it to half-time yet, but I am sure that the score is:
Jurors - 68%
Lawyers - ?