How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment

Re:How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment by oneeyedpigeon on Sunday May 11, 2014 @02:57PM (#7729516)

People take risks. No-one is going to eliminate all risk from their life. People modify their behaviour according to the risk involved. Putting hot coffee in your lap is a risk, but the level of risk depends on exactly how hot that coffee is. No-one wants coffee of any temperature soaking their lap, but coffee that causes 3rd-degree burns is a lot different from coffee that hurts a bit. I would personally try to avoid spilling coffee in my lap, but I would treat coffee very differently if I knew it would cause 3rd-degree burns, and I would not expect any coffee served to me to ever be that hot. Maybe I'm partly to blame for my own ignorance, but it also seems reasonable that McDonald's either a) remove that risk by serving coffee at a lower temperature b) mitigate that risk by informing customers just how dangerous the coffee they're serving is when in contact with skin.

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Re:How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment by blisterpeanuts on Sunday May 11, 2014 @04:25PM (#7729853)

Most people don't think and behave that logically.

If this coffee is < 200F, then I can safely put in lap. Else, I will ask nephew to hold.

Nope. People don't do that. They just do the right thing most of the time, dumb things a small fraction of the time. Some people do more dumb things than they should.

The Liebeck situation is an edge case. McDonald's sells tens of millions of cups of coffee a day (depending on the source, 10 million/day or 300 million/month or 500 million a month). If there are several burn cases a year, or even several hundred, that probably does not constitute a significant trend.

There are thousands of people who burn themselves, electrocute themselves, crash their cars, choke on a bone, and do other things that are unfortunate but avoidable with a little common sense.

You can't protect everybody from every contingency, nor would you want to; we would become a nation of prisoners in soft rubber cells, protected from every possible danger. I read a sci-fi story about that once and it was rather unpleasant!

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Re:How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment by oneeyedpigeon on Sunday May 11, 2014 @05:14PM (#7730021)

I agree. I don't think anyone actually considers actual temperatures, etc. before they handle a cup of coffee in the same way, they just treat all coffee pretty much the same - i.e. 'a cup of coffee is hot, and will hurt me if I spill it on myself, but it won't be serious / cause permanent damage'. It's for this very reason that I think either coffee shouldn't be served at such dangerous temperatures, or it should be served in such a different manner as to make people think - e.g. with some kind of warning attached. But I agree that you shouldn't take this too far; it's why I probably would choose the latter case of action over the former.

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Re:How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment by Crito on Sunday May 11, 2014 @04:42PM (#7729913)

> but coffee that causes 3rd-degree burns is a lot different from coffee that hurts a bit.

Fresh black coffee from just about any shop will cause 3rd-degree burns if you spill it in your lap. Mcdonalds coffee was not somehow unique in that respect, despite opinion to the contrary.

In this thread, meaning to condemn Mcdonalds by holding the "reasonable Starbucks" up as an example, Starbucks coffee has been pegged at "145-165F".

145F coffee can cause 3rd degree burns in less than five seconds. 165F coffee can cause 3rd degree burns in less than one second.

Industry standard coffee causes third degree burns.

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Re:How A Lawsuit Over Hot Coffee Helped Erode the 7th Amendment by oneeyedpigeon on Sunday May 11, 2014 @05:18PM (#7730035)

OK, I'm not a doctor, but presumably that 1-5 seconds difference is very significant. The higher temperature pretty much guarantees permanent damage. The lower temperature at least gives time for clothing to be removed, etc. And the McDonalds coffee was served at least at 180F, so presumably it would definitely cause 3rd degree burns instantly. That just seems way to risky, to me, to be serving as a beverage, which most people would not expect to cause instant 3rd degree burns.

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