Legal Research

On the Influence of Slaw

By David Cheifetz

Dear all,

For those who don’t have or won’t find  more compelling reasons   - without limiting the generality, etc., getting together with family, giving and getting presents, unwrapping presents, staking out garbage, getting a pedicure, washing the dog, herding cats,  discovering the next unknown prime in Pi, successfully rendering coherent some of the jurisprudence of … [subject optional]  - occupying their time in the immediate future, I’m pleased to announce I’m going to be a guest blogger on the University of Alberta, Faculty of Law, Faculty  Blog.

What can I say?  I’m sure my occasional musings, here, played some part in the invitation. Well … that and the fact that it is the holiday season, even in Alberta, so the first (N-x) choices were, no doubt, otherwise occupied, where 

 ”N” represents the last number in the set of all real numbers greater than zero.  (Or it’s the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.)

and

“x” is the numerical value, rounded off to 3 decimal places, of the possibility that I’m not one of the “academic” spillers of ink to whom the SCC referred in Resurfice Corp. v. Hanke, 2007 SCC 7 at para. 20, [2007] 1 S.C.R. 333: “ Much judicial and academic ink has been spilled over the proper test for causation in cases of negligence.  It is neither necessary nor helpful to catalogue the various debates.”

I have it on good authority that that statement was probably not intended as a compliment. I suppose the saving grace is that I didn’t have to complain that they didn’t spell my name right.

Feel free to lurk, or more. The nature of that blog means, of course, the focus of the discussion is supposed to be about Law and law but, then what Law is is often in the mind and eye of the beholder. Sort of like religion, no?

I suspect that those of you familiar with my writing “voice” will find proof of your suspicions, such as they are.

Cheers,

David

Full post as published by Slaw.ca on December 24, 2009 (boomark / email).