History
The Reasonable Person Standard in Negligence Claims
Quick fact
In negligence law, the 'reasonable person' is a legal fiction with no real counterpart: it's an ordinary person with normal intelligence, perception, and memory, but also with average self-control and prudence. Courts apply this objective standard to decide if a defendant's conduct fell short of what society expects.
Why this is interesting
Imagine you're a judge in a car accident case: how do you decide if a driver was careless? The law uses a surprisingly fictional yardstick—the 'reasonable person'—to judge real people.