What's your alignment? and why?

Those examples are negligence not product liability. those blurbs fail to disclose the whole story. Be careful about critiquing the legal system when your info is from the media. The famous is example is the woman who spilled coffee from McDonalds on her lap a sued. The way the media and late show hosts portrayed it she was an idiot and McDonalds was blameless. They never talked about the other people who had spilled coffee on them and also suffered 2nd and 3rd degree burns. The point is McDonalds knew this was happening but decided it was cheaper to ignore it rather than change coffee machines. Once a company knows people are using their product in a manner that causes harm they have a burden to cure the defect. When said company ignores them then the courts will step in a slap them with punitive damages.
Now are there people who practice vexatious litigation? But tort reform should be more about procedural safeguards rather than elimination of a valuable area of law. Oh and very little tort law is legislative in nature the main body is common law. The law of torts is reactive rather than proactive. Product liability developed as a result of abuses by business. I guess I don't see the problem with punishing businesses that decide profit is more important than somebody’s husband or mother.

 

I thought a tort was a type of flan.... :razz:

The examples I gave were of people who used the product liability clause to their own evil gain and won. I do understand that it was put there to protect the small guy from big businesses etc. but it is heavily overused nowadays for reasons that it was not meant for.

Also, America is highly over-legistrated. How else do you explain the high number of lawyers. I can't remember the exact figure so don't go criticising me, but it is around the area of 20% of working Americans are lawyers.

 

that would be tart but since you are english and therefore have a funny way of pronouncing things, the mistake is understandable.

Part of my comment was that your examples (here I am assuming) were from the popular media. In reporting on cases the media often omit facts that would take away from the impact of the story. Don't mean to go off on you, but your argument is the same one conservative commentators have been making for years. Big on heart small on facts.

 

Those examples were from a thesis a friend of mine made for her 1st year law degree.

Oh and I'm thinking of Torte (with an 'e') - and it's French. It's a type of pudding (dessert), usually similar to a flan, with a sponge base and edge and filled with a cream-based filling. acman:

 

is it anything like a crepe?

 

Having been there myself. Nothin worse than a 1st year grad student. I mean you made to grad school so you must be smart. Anyway ask her for the cites so I can take a look. Oh and torte has slour flan does not. flan is another name for crem carmel.

 

Not in any country or cookbook that I know! A flan is a sponge base and edge, with a fruit and jelly (-like) filling. Also another name for Quiche.

A creme caramel is french for caramel custard!! Where the HELL did you learn to cook?!?!?! I wouldn't like to eat one of your meals....

Also, I'm no longer in touch with this friend. It was 4 years ago now and I changed university to do Biology. Last I heard though she was practicing law for a big firm somewhere...

Rosie, crepe is French for pancake (the first 'e' has a circumflex above it and the second 'e' is acutely accented). A pancake is made from a thin batter, fried in oil as a very thin layer until golden-brown. It then has a fruit (usually, but you can have savoury pancakes) filling put on it and then rolled up. You can also use fresh citrus juice and sugar. The French (and Germans I think) eat them flat with a knife and fork.

I believe the Americans have really thick pancakes with maple syrup on it (and a fried egg? or was that just a film I saw....)

*£dit* Also, a tart is a pastry. Usually with a fruit filling.

 

Flan is definetly a custard based desert with a caramel topping.

 

Can you give me an example? I got literally dozens (probably more than a hundred) recipies in front of me by various people that beg to differ....

What country are you from? It could be just a variation in the 'lingo'...

Excerpt from Oxford English Dictionary:

flan: n an open sponge or pastry case filled or spread with a fruit or savoury filling. [F, orig. = round cake]

Hope this clears it up! :razz:

 

wow you know what is really embarrassing? When you are wrong and then keep insisting you aren't. You should have definitely run a search on google prior to that last post.

 

I'm in the US, and I've personally had flans from two different countries. The Philippines and Mexico.

The Filipino one is called Leche Flan, the Mexican one... just "flan" I guess. Both are very similiar. The Filipino one tends to be lighter.

Both of them are egg custards that are topped with a caramel sauce. Just a simple syrup cooked to medium brown stage.

I'll try to dig up a picture of what I'm talking about. The Flan I know could only be confused for quiche in a very very general way.

 

Here's a link to a Leche Flan recipe with a nice big picture in it.

http://lutongpinoy.hypermart.net/pages/lecheflan.html

 

Milo wrote:

That means 'milk tart' in spanish. Flan means tart in some continental european languages. I have always been describing the British flan (the originators of the flan).

By who???

Notice, classically, it is a real flan. Is this an American answer? Whoever made up the fact that a flan is an egg-custard tart obviously used the term wrongly.

It's like flan is also used wrongly in Britain to mean Quiche - it's a layperson's term and is wrong!

 

I trust you and all Ferret, but I'm going to need a cite before I believe that the British originated Flan. "Flan" sounds like a distinctly hispanic word to me.

 

Yeah Ferret I just can't see taking advice on food from a Brit. I mean if you are interested in eating pudding made from some unspeakable part of the cow then british cuisine is the way to go otherwise....

 

I don't actually have a cite, as such - just what I've read in cookbooks and heard on various cooking programs. Delia Smith, Gary Rhodes, that sort of thing. Might have been 'ready, steady, cook!'

And what pudding are you talking about? The nearest I can think of is black pudding, made from congealed pigs blood - but that's a main course!

We can probably argue this indefinitely, so shall we just agree that a flan means different things in different countries and cultures? eace: (<-- peace offering)

 

Ah, no cite. I see.

I believe you about the Flan. It was created just prior to the British invention of the Pinata, correct?

 

I have no idea, but judging from the word pinata (and that is possesses at leat one accent in it and the English language doesn't use accents) then I would put it to you that you have submitted a trick question and are trying to catch me out?

 

However, you may wish to consider taking advice on the English language from an Englishman. Both senses of the meaning are correct, in the US, according to sites I've looked at. In Britain, we tend to restrict it to the meaning Ferret described.

American usage link

For etymology, check out this full but concise account. In essence, it says the filled tart sense of meaning was created by the Romans (with some Greek help) and presumably went via Britain to the USA. The second meaning, commonly used in Spain and Portugal, probably went straight to the US, perhaps via Mexico.

You may find, as with quite a few other words, the usage varies across parts of the US, with the south being more prone to the hispanic.

BTW, unless you want another one of these little debates, I'd avoid using the word "pudding".