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i'm probably not alone in this, but i think in many cases it's obvious when two letters were written by the same person. i don't think you always need an expert. where it gets tricky is when the samples are smaller or written across larger spans of time, or even different contexts (greeting card vs two page letter). i think handwriting analysis is somewhere on the pseudoscience spectrum between chiropractics and lie detector tests. a person who has studied thousands of samples of writing with a mindset towards matching writers probably has a better intuitive sense than the rest of us, but i don't think there's nearly as much science to it as is imagined.

masootz wrote:i'm probably not alone in this, but i think in many cases it's obvious when two letters were written by the same person. i don't think you always need an expert. where it gets tricky is when the samples are smaller or written across larger spans of time, or even different contexts (greeting card vs two page letter). i think handwriting analysis is somewhere on the pseudoscience spectrum between chiropractics and lie detector tests. a person who has studied thousands of samples of writing with a mindset towards matching writers probably has a better intuitive sense than the rest of us, but i don't think there's nearly as much science to it as is imagined.

Handwriting analysis and document examination, when done properly, can be quite reliable. It probably falls somewhere between fingerprint analysis and lie detection on the forensic “science” spectrum. I believe that the way Sherwood Morrill conducted his analysis was so poor that it is borderline negligent and hurt the case more than helped it.