Applicability of Shannon’s Entropy Formula to Legal Entropy in Epistemological Analysis: A Study of Narco-Analysis Test Evidence in Indian Judicial Decision-Making
Lead author · Corresponding
Nayama Smith Joseph
Student at St. Joseph’s College of Law, Bengaluru, India
Abstract
The present study explores the interdisciplinary application of Shannon’s entropy formula, originally developed for information theory, to assess the epistemological uncertainty termed as "legal entropy" in judicial processes. By mathematically conceptualizing the unpredictability and information loss associated with narco-analysis through Shannon’s entropy model, the research demonstrates that such evidence often increases epistemic instability rather than mitigating it. This framework provides a novel lens to evaluate scientific evidence in courts and urges a reassessment of how the Indian judiciary integrates such ambiguous inputs into legal reasoning.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits remixing, adapting, and building upon the work for non-commercial use, provided the original work is properly cited.