>IMO, there is no temperature at which coffee could be served that would justify a plaintiff's award in this kind of case (inasmuch as it cannot exceed 212 degrees, more or less

At what temperature does hot coffee cause 3rd degree burns? Though I don't recall the specific temperature, the Defense expert in a case my office handled testified that relatively short exposure to water at a temperature significantly lower than 212 degrees Fahrenheit would cause serious burns. Would you at least be open to actually hearing the evidence before passing judgment?

>>(used to be called contributory negligence, though that doctrine has been battered beyond recognition by legal "reformers" who think that no one should ever have to pay for their own stupidity)

Just for the benefit of the non-lawyers here:

Contributory Negligence is a system where if the plaintiff's negligence contributed to the injury even in the smallest amount the Plaintiff can not recover anything. Thus if 99% of the responsibility is the defendants but the Plaintiff had 1% the Plaintiff can not recover.

So if you are driving down the street, without wearing a seatbelt and some blind drunk guy driving at an excessive rate without his headlights on of speed goes through a Red Light swerves into your lane and hits you head on causing serious injury to you and the jury finds that your not wearing your seatbelt was a negligent act that caused 1% of your injury, the other driver is completely of the hook. You can spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair without any compensation

This system has largely been replaced (due to the inherent injustice) with what is called Comparative Negligence. Under a Comparative Negligence system, the Plaintiff is not totally barred from recovery by virtue of his own negligence. However he can only recover that portion which is the the fault of the Defendant. So if they the Plaintiff is 50% at fault he can only recover 50% of his damages. This system makes sense as it holds both parties accountable for their actions.

>BTW, the use of "frivolous lawsuit" laws will never stop them because the standard for "frivolousness" is nearly impossible to meet (at least in California).

In NY the standard is essentially that it lacks any basis in fact or law. I don't have the exact language here, but that is the essence of it. The real problem with this is that I see few frivilous lawsuits and those I have seen have been commenced by non-lawyers.