OT: Moron Sues Over Roof Jumping

[Imperious_Leader]

Sorry AT on this we'll have to agree to disagree . I simply can not see how anyone myself included can stick a hot cup of coffee between their legs open it up and not accept responsibility for the risk they are taking.After all it is really a question of degree [pardon the pun]do you have a reasonable degree of expectation of not burning your self by taking the lid off the coffee?Answer no.Coffee is hot if she had spilled coffee that was only 120F would she have been burned? answer yes.So did she have a reasonable expectation of not being burned? Answer no.The sevarity of the burn is not relavant.She had no reasonable expcation of not being burned so , in doing what she did she must accept responsibility for the risk.If the coffee had only been 120F and had only caused first degree burns instead of third degree burns would she still have had pain and suffering medical bills? What she did and I and probable most of you have done is not without risk , alot of things in life are not , but if we ignore the risk and do it anyway we shouldn't be rewarded for it.A few years ago someone talked me into going sky diving...Before my first jump I had to sign a ton of papers saying that if I got killed they couldn't be held responsible.I thought it was crazy how could any rational person jump out of a perfectly good airplane and not accept that there was risk involved but they had to cover themselves just incase someone got killed or injured one wouldn't want the greving family to claim that the deceased didn't understand that dropping from 10,000 Ft could cause signifigant injury would one?
As to your question about who wouldn't sue....in a society where no accepts responsibility for what they do but instead blame how they were raised or the violent games they play or the music that was on the raido their mother , father , God ,the devil,or whatever other crack pot excuse they can think up.....most would sue .

[Fyron]

She did not sue them for spilling the coffee. She sued them because it was dangerously hot. There is a _huge_ distinction that you seem to be missing. Coffee that will cause 3rd degree burns in 2 to 7 seconds is way, way too hot to be serving at a fast food restaurant. McDonald's had been warned for 10 years that it was dangerously hot, and yet they chose to do nothing. McDonald's _had_ been negligent in this case, and they deserved to pay her medical bills. This was really all she was after...

[Atrocities]

I agree that you should not be aloud to sue over your own supidity, however in this instance, it is a commonly known and often performed practice of people, especially people who drive cars. McDonalds new that this could happen and did nothing. Therefore they assumed the major portion of the risk.

In contrast, it is not socially accpetable, nor was it even conceivable that people would want to jump from parking garage to parking garage. In that case the garage is not at fault as they could not have concieved that any one would be so stupid.

[Atrocities]

Imperator Fyron said:
She did not sue them for spilling the coffee. She sued them because it was dangerously hot. There is a _huge_ distinction that you seem to be missing. Coffee that will cause 3rd degree burns in 2 to 7 seconds is way, way too hot to be serving at a fast food restaurant. McDonald's had been warned for 10 years that it was dangerously hot, and yet they chose to do nothing. McDonald's _had_ been negligent in this case, and they deserved to pay her medical bills. This was really all she was after...

Thank you Fyron. You explained it very well.

Now if she had dilibrately taken the top off and pured the coffee into her lap, knowing how hot it was, then yes I would have to say that she would have no case. And believe me people did that after this case was filed.

[luke_slovakian]

ok the boiling point in farenheite is 212*, so if the coffee is 180 that makes it hot But not burning hot. Mcdonalds should of not been because it was her fault. I mean i will carry a starbucks drink on a roller coaster with me. So i spilled some on me darn darn now ill sue. It is really stupid. And the 180* is maybe 5* hotter than normal coffee

[Atrocities]

Starbucks coffee is on average about 110 to 120. A hell of a lot less hot then hers. Luke read the link Fyron posted about this.

[Joachim]

Imperious_Leader said:
I thought it was crazy how could any rational person jump out of a perfectly good airplane and not accept that there was risk involved but they had to cover themselves just incase someone got killed or injured one wouldn't want the greving family to claim that the deceased didn't understand that dropping from 10,000 Ft could cause signifigant injury would one?

The fall is fine - stopping is the killer....

Sorry, had to inject some lame humour....

[Imperious_Leader]

I hope that we're all argueing nicely and that no one is getting all bent out of shape over this , I'm new here so I don't know anyone well enought to know if I'm going to far with this.So for now I will asume that we're all adults here and can freely exchange opinions without any hurt feelings.

That said...Imperator I don't belive I'm missing your point at all , when I said that the sevarity of the burn was irelavant I belive that I was addressing the point you are trying to make.....that in your opinion the coffee was too hot 'dangerously hot' to quote you.So may I ask how hot is coffee allowed to be,obviously you and others belive it should be less than 180F how about 170 F 160F perhapes how many seconds to cause a burn is acceptable? Unless you are buying iced coffee it is reasonable to expect that coffee is going to be hot.How far do you go with this do you legslate how hot coffee is allowed to be?Many psycologists belive that playing violent computer games is harmful to our mental health if asked I'm sure they could produce studies which demonstrate the truth of that.Since we're all here I must conclude that you disagree with them and that if you someday glass your home town you won't sue MM for turning you into a mass murderer.I usually drink capichino which is so hot they double cup it so you won't burn your hand by the time I get to work it's just right if they started making it colder I wouldn't buy it.One of the sites I visited mentioned that in surveys people overwhelming said they wanted their coffee to be hot.At the time of the incident the woman in question had almost no public suport.

AT you raised an interesting point that McDonalds should have been aware of the common practice of people drinking coffee in their cars....to you I would submit that the people who drink McDonalds coffee would have been equaly aware that their coffee was very hot...the way it should bein regards to the case of the garage I'm not fimilar with the case Was it a child or an adult?If it was a child then I'm sure their lawyer will argue that they should have had an expectation that some child might be attracted to their roof....nonsense of course and if it was an adult I hope he had his helmet on and was carrying his sign.He absolutely deserved what he gotIMO

Therein lies the problem opinions are like elbows everyone's got one.So again I ask at what temp do you legslate that coffee must be.....what is a safe temp?Shall we stop at coffee or do we move on to the rest of the menu....I've never burned myself with their coffee but I have burned myself on their apple turnovers that filling really is hot,oh but wait it says that right on the packaging dosen't it.How hot should a turnover be?

If the woman was a normal inteligent person she knew that coffee was hot if she had had Mc Donalds coffee before she knew it was very hot , she had absolutely no expectation of safty McDonalds was not negligent in the least.... SHE WAS.

Imperator you said that all she really wanted was money for her medical bills...and that may have been true in the begining but when she sued it certainly wasn't...in fact it wasn't even just for medical bills and legal fees but rather it was for 1 million.....I know your going to argue that if they had just paid her in the first place it would have been much less and in fact they had settled other similar frivolus claims out of court,my answer to that is that it was more than time enough to take a stand.We can't all go through life wearing a helmet to keep from hurting ourselves.

The legal standard should be what can we reasonably expect I submit that we can reasonably expect coffe to be hot and that if we dump it on ourselves we can reasonably expect it to burn everything else is nonsense.

On a diffrent note AT I love your mod haven't played the regular game since I started playing yours.I read in someones post that the federation is way too strong I must really be doing something wrong...photon torps suck I might aswell get out and chuck rocks at them.....and if I glass my home town it's all your fault.

[Slick]

some approximate relative "hotness" scales for comparison:

the hottest shower or hot tub you have probably ever been in would be around 107 or so,

at around 140, you can briefly touch something but can't stay in contact without serious pain. significant contact can cause 1st degree burns. water at 140 will slightly steam at room temperature/pressure even though it is well below its boiling point

at 180, there is significant steaming, but no boiling yet. this will cause easily 1st or 2nd degree burns if liquid is spilled on the skin

at 212, water boils. this assumes 1 atmosphere of pressure; i.e. at sea level. water will boil at temps less than 212 at higher elevations. contact with boiling water obviously will lead to 2nd degree burns for minimal contact and 3rd degree burns for significant contact

at 1 atm of pressure, once water starts boiling, it will stay at 212 degrees no matter how much heat you put into it. adding heat to boiling water will just make it boil more violently. the steam comes off at 212 degrees as well. this is known as saturated boiling. the temperature of the container won't go over 212 until all the water boils away. There is a rare exception to this which is not normally encountered in everyday life, but you can actually get a pan/pot to exceed 212 if a large enough amount of heat is applied such that the entire surface becomes steam-blanketed. you can see this in small quantities when a drop of water "dances" on a hot griddle. you need at least several degrees above 212 before this will happen. what actually is happening is that the liquid water can't make contact with the griddle because the radiant heat is causing the bottom of the droplet to flash to steam with enough energy to keep the droplet suspended.

there are several stages of boiling water: subcooled nucleate boiling, saturated nucleate boiling, film boiling, and others, but let's not get into a lecture on heat transfer and phase transformation of water.

[Atrocities]

Thanks Imperious_Leader Tort reform is needed in this country yes. As for the mod, I am glad that your enjoying it. over 1500 downloads in four months is a testimate to its appeal. I just hope I can make it even better over the next few months.