The Legal Mind
A New Introduction to Legal Epistemology

How do lawyers think? Bro?ek presents a new perspective on legal thinking as an interplay between intuition, imagination and language.

Bartosz Broz?ek (Author)

9781108493253, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 November 2019

266 pages
23.5 x 15.6 x 1.5 cm, 0.39 kg

'Legal epistemology is an evergreen topic in jurisprudence. The number of telling accounts on the subject has grown exponentially over the past few years. Offering an original analysis in such a crowded field of literature is no easy task. Yet, this is exactly what Bartoz Brozek has managed to do … and he ought to be praised for that. A prolific writer, Brozek in The Legal Mind has drawn from his vast and deep-rooted philosophical, cognitive, and behavioural science knowledge to shed new light on what legal reasoning and understanding really are and how they operate.' Luca Siliquini-Cinelli, The Edinburgh Law Review

How does a lawyer think? Does legal intuition exist? Do lawyers need imagination? Why is legal language so abstract? It is no longer possible to answer these questions by applying philosophical analysis alone. Recent advances in the cognitive sciences have reshaped our conceptions of the human mental faculties and the tools we use to solve problems. A new picture of the functioning of the legal mind is emerging. In The Legal Mind, Bartosz Bro?ek uses philosophical arguments and insight from the cognitive sciences to depict legal thinking as a close cooperation between three cognitive mechanisms - intuition, imagination, and language - and addresses the question of how to efficiently use these mental tools. This novel and provocative approach provides a fresh perspective on legal thinking and gives rise to important questions pertaining to the limits of legal interpretation and rationality in the law.

1. Intuition
2. Imagination
3. Language
4. Structure
5. Substance.

Subject Areas: Legal system: general [LNA], Legal history [LAZ], Legal profession: general [LAT], Legal skills & practice [LAS], Popular beliefs & controversial knowledge [JFH], Philosophy of mind [HPM], Philosophy: epistemology & theory of knowledge [HPK], Philosophy [HP]