"The presumption of innocence is a legal protection. A hypothesis-test analogy can illuminate its asymmetry, but it is not the law's hidden equation."
A Bounded Analogy
In a limited analogy, the presumption of innocence can occupy the role of a null position: the prosecution bears the burden, and the state may not convict unless the legal standard is met. Wrongful conviction resembles a false positive, while failure to convict a factually guilty person resembles a false negative.
The mapping is not exact. A trial is not a repeated experiment, evidence is not one test statistic, "beyond reasonable doubt" has no fixed α, and an acquittal does not reveal that a guilty person escaped. Rights to counsel, confrontation, silence, and admissible evidence are independent legal protections, not knobs that tune one error rate.
Why the Burden Matters
The presumption is procedural rather than a factual finding about what happened. It tells the court how to allocate the burden and how to act before legal guilt is established. Requiring the accused to prove innocence would reverse that burden and expose innocent defendants to greater risk.
Rules governing silence vary by jurisdiction and context, so the statistical analogy should not be used as a substitute for legal doctrine. The durable point is that the prosecution must establish each required element under the applicable criminal standard.