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The idea of punishing someone by making them the victim of the same crime is such a childish notion of justice that I have a hard time understanding why anyone would use it as a rationale. Like maybe it feels right, but that's not a good reason. It's literally the teacher going "Would you like it if Bobby killed you! Then stop killing Bobby!" The immediate goal of punishment is (or, rather, should be) to prevent more crime from happening. Just detain the guy, and then figure out if you can get him to stop doing it again.
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Mar 4, 2017 14:51
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VitalSigns posted:Because there's no conceivable benefit that would justify doing something like that even to a bad person. E: killing a murderer has at least one benefit, you can be 100% sure he'll never reoffend. Raping a rapist doesn't even guarantee that. Obvious conclusion: rape then execute rapists for 0% recidivism. But if the rapists' victims are still alive they must be executed to balance the moral scales.
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Mar 4, 2017 20:33
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hakimashou posted:You missed it. Plenty of people commit murder and get away with it. Plenty of people believe they can get away with it, and get caught. Plenty of people are found guilty and not executed. There, I separated them into three separate parts for you. The choice to commit murder is clearly not the choice to also be executed, there are many different possible outcomes. And yes, the logical solution is to not commit murder at all, but not everybody looks at the world that way. T8R fucked around with this message at 00:53 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 00:51
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Here's a shocker for you: People who commit murders either a) don't think they're going to be caught or b) are so emotional that they don't even think about the fact. The idea of the drunk man doing a loving risk-reward calculation before bashing in the face of the mailman they find loving their wife is loving laughable. As is people as rational actors in general.
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Mar 5, 2017 01:20
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I can confirm that yeah. If i thought the cops could catch me i would have stopped murdering years ago
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Mar 5, 2017 02:04
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Excluding self-defense it's wrong to kill people, even murderers, rapists, etc. They're still human beings, entitled to basic human rights. Also even people who commit atrocious crimes sometimes change. The world isn't black and white. Some people come to deeply regret their crimes and commit to living good lives moving forward. This is a positive thing for society and we should encourage it. But it can't happen if they're murdered by the state.
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Mar 5, 2017 05:38
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Whether or not the death penalty is justified, I feel comes to down to how accountable you think people should be for their actions, and what the practical consequences are. In terms of cost/benefit, it makes no sense to support the life of someone who is a threat, and who has committed some heinous crime. When, say, a serial killer starts murdering random people, they're demonstrating an inability/unwillingness to care about the well being of others - what obligation, then, do others have to care about the well being of said serial killer? If we're being fair about it, the answer is 'none'. Practically, there are other issues with keeping them alive. There's the possibility of escape, or that someone dangerous will get let out early on parole or whatever, and then commit more crimes. There's also the possibility of, while they're in prison, encouraging other prisoners who will escape to commit more crimes. We see this kind of thing in the modern prison system, where neo-nazi groups are able to operate inside prisons, as continuous social organizations, and even start spreading their influence outside of prisons. The cost is that there's legitimate problems with how fair the justice system is, and that's especially notable on issues of racial bias. But the deeper philosophical debate is one over identity - what makes a person, a person? If you believe that a someone who is a criminal simply has that as part of their 'nature', then you're not going to be sympathetic towards them. There's no possibility of reform. If the crime was a result of some ignorance, false knowledge, but deep down they're a good person or whatever, then you could reasonably make a case that they probably don't deserve to die. The issue is just how much crime is a result of the former, and how much is a result of the latter? Obviously there are some people who fit in the former, people who act stupidly. But what % of violent criminals are of the later type? Does the later type even exist, or is every crime a result of some kind of ignorance? That's not an easy question to answer. But my gut feeling is that there is a small percentage of criminals that are of the later type, people for whom reformation is impossible, because they're not so much 'broken', as 'fundamentally immoral'. An obvious example of this are sociopaths/psychopaths. There is no cure for sociopathy, because they just do not care about anyone but themselves. They lack empathy. And because they lack empathy, the entire structure of morality as we know it is alien to them, and always will be. Ergo, you have to kill them, because you cannot afford to keep them alive. rudatron fucked around with this message at 08:29 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 06:24
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Even supposing for the moment that that's true, and we have no reason to think it is: how would you ever be able to reliably tell the difference between those two types of people.
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Mar 5, 2017 08:09
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You can't reliably tell the difference, in all cases, and that's part of the problem. But there's some that's beyond doubt. Let's use an example of someone who was punished under the death penalty, Ted Bundy: quote:Theodore Robert Bundy (born Theodore Robert Cowell; November 24, 1946 – January 24, 1989) was an American serial killer, kidnapper, rapist, burglar, and necrophile who assaulted and murdered numerous young women and girls during the 1970s, and possibly earlier. Shortly before his execution, after more than a decade of denials, he confessed to 30 homicides committed in seven states between 1974 and 1978. The true victim count remains unknown, and could be much higher. Or, go full godwin and start talking about people like mengele: quote:Josef Mengele (German: [ˈjoːzɛf ˈmɛŋələ] ( listen); 16 March 1911 – 7 February 1979) was a German Schutzstaffel (SS) officer and physician in Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II. Mengele was a notorious member of the team of doctors responsible for the selection of victims to be killed in the gas chambers and for performing deadly human experiments on prisoners. Arrivals deemed able to work were admitted into the camp, and those deemed unfit for labor were immediately killed in the gas chambers. Mengele left Auschwitz on 17 January 1945, shortly before the arrival of the liberating Red Army troops. After the war, he fled to South America, where he evaded capture for the rest of his life.
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Mar 5, 2017 09:04
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bitterandtwisted posted:You didn't answer it above. Not true, there is a discussion above about guilt and culpability. Also any post that touches on the categorical imperative. It's up there.
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Mar 5, 2017 12:42
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N. Senada posted:The idea of punishing someone by making them the victim of the same crime is such a childish notion of justice that I have a hard time understanding why anyone would use it as a rationale. Like maybe it feels right, but that's not a good reason. Preventing crime or deterring it are some rationales for punishment, but there is also a different school of thought according to which punishment is something that people deserve because of wrong actions they choose to take. I have an issue with the notion that 'don't do that, how would you like if somone did that to you?' Is a useless idea. It's the foundation of empathy, that something happening to someone else is like it happening to you, that other people experience things just like you do, and that they are equal to you. The fact you don't want to be murdered by bobby should give you a reason not to murder him. Since if you don't want to be murdered by bobby, you can understand why murder is wrong. hakimashou fucked around with this message at 13:05 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 12:47
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T8R posted:Plenty of people commit murder and get away with it. Plenty of people believe they can get away with it, and get caught. Plenty of people are found guilty and not executed. It's bad when people get away with murder because justice isn't done, they should be punished for what they did, like they deserve to be. Anyway I've tried explaining the idea that an action legislates a maxim a few times but I don't know how to get it through to you, I apologize. If I can come up with a better explanation I will post it. Morally speaking, what you do to others, you simultaneously do to yourself, since you are equal to other people. It's like a light switch connected to two lights, if you turn one on, you also turn the other one on. One action does both, one choice does both. hakimashou fucked around with this message at 13:04 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 12:51
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Chomskyan posted:Excluding self-defense it's wrong to kill people, even murderers, rapists, etc. They're still human beings, entitled to basic human rights. Also even people who commit atrocious crimes sometimes change. The world isn't black and white. Some people come to deeply regret their crimes and commit to living good lives moving forward. This is a positive thing for society and we should encourage it. But it can't happen if they're murdered by the state. I would argue that it's not wrong to execute murderers, because it's what they deserve. Also, they are entitled to some rights, but by the act of committing murder give up their own right to live. Taking a right away from someone else is simultaneously giving it up yourself. It's impossible to take away somone else's right, and still keep your own, it's a contradiction. If we are going to treat people according to their deserts, based on the choices they make - which we are obliged to do if we want to be treated according to our own deserts - then we must punish them for their crimes. hakimashou fucked around with this message at 12:59 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 12:57
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hakimashou posted:Not true, there is a discussion above about guilt and culpability. Also any post that touches on the categorical imperative. It's up there. You said: quote:The death penalty for murder is as proportional as you can possibly get. It's truly identical. You don't have to take into account anything about the perpetrator's subjective experience of the punishment, or the victim's subjective experience of the wrong, since they are both identically dead. ie the justification for the death penalty being proportionate is that both the victim and killer have the same experience This is not changed by guilt. This is not changed by culpability
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Mar 5, 2017 14:26
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rudatron posted:Sociopath/psychopath and the morality of killing them.
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Mar 5, 2017 16:58
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would be cool to strand all sociopaths on an island and film the resulting shenanigans
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Mar 5, 2017 17:02
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hakimashou posted:Deserve I think it's funny you're trying to build your justification of execution off of the writings of philosophers, and you're totally ok using the idea of what people deserve. Nobody 'deserves' anything except when we apply subjective and/or arbitrary ideas to the situation. There is no way to epistemology your way into execution being some sort of justified universal good. This will always just come down to a matter of opinion about what the best way for the law to operate is for everybody (let's call this justice), and I say that if even one person has been put to death wrongly by the state than executions cannot be just. Your argument about a perfect world where the courts are flawless is pointless because it is not the case.
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Mar 5, 2017 17:08
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hakimashou posted:You missed it. This isn't true through. Sometimes a person chooses to murder, never gets caught, then dies of complications from getting too old. The choice to murder cannot also be the choice to be executed unless their correlation is 100%.
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Mar 5, 2017 17:33
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nm
Calibanibal fucked around with this message at 17:45 on Mar 5, 2017 |
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Mar 5, 2017 17:35
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WillyTheNewGuy posted:This isn't true through. Sometimes a person chooses to murder, never gets caught, then dies of complications from getting too old. The choice to murder cannot also be the choice to be executed unless their correlation is 100%.
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Mar 5, 2017 17:58
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rudatron posted:I don't think you can reasonably say that these people can be anything but malicious. Of course you can. Do you honestly think these two men maliciously cooked food? Maliciously read books? Maliciously went to bed? They were human beings who committed a whole range of actions ranging from benign, to mundane, and yes to malicious. But you'd have to be an idiot to think that they were somehow actual literal golems made out of the abstract concept of malice. And you're not an idiot, are you Rudatron?
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Mar 5, 2017 18:31
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N. Senada posted:The idea of punishing someone by making them the victim of the same crime is such a childish notion of justice that I have a hard time understanding why anyone would use it as a rationale. Like maybe it feels right, but that's not a good reason. It seems absurd to think that an individual life is so sacred and important that the entire justice system should turn on rehabilitation, even for the worst humanity has to offer.
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Mar 5, 2017 18:48
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the trump tutelage posted:It's not about punishing an individual for their individual transgression, eye for an eye, victim restitution, etc; rather, it's about maintaining a sense of fixed, objective morality that isn't subject to negotiation with sentiment and context (ie. excuses and claimed exceptionalities). Ok, but if there's no tangible societal benefit in that "fixed, objective morality" there's literally no point in maintaining it. Also there are many people, myself included, who think your sense of morality is pretty loving evil, so it's obviously not objective.
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Mar 6, 2017 00:56
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Chomskyan posted:Ok, but if there's no tangible societal benefit in that "fixed, objective morality" there's literally no point in maintaining it. Also there are many people, myself included, who think your sense of morality is pretty loving evil, so it's obviously not objective.
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Mar 6, 2017 01:49
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the trump tutelage posted:There are a lot of people who think the Earth is flat, too. That doesn't mean "the Earth is a spheroid" is a subjective claim. Prove that there is objective morality then. I want at least as much evidence for it as there is for a spheroid earth and no less.
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Mar 6, 2017 01:52
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Who What Now posted:Prove that there is objective morality then. I want at least as much evidence for it as there is for a spheroid earth and no less.
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Mar 6, 2017 02:00
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hakimashou posted:Maybe if you cut someone's hands off, and then had your hands cut off in turn or something. Treat others the way you want to be treated, after all. This isn't solely related to this topic, but I want to point out that "treat others as you would want to be treated" is actually not a good idea and can lead to a lot of bad things. People are different, and some people are hurt by things that other people enjoy (for example racists find racist jokes funny while the minority in question finds them hurtful). While it's true that it can apply to most situations, it is a bad idea to use it as some hard guideline for what is acceptable and what isn't. edit: A better rule would be "treat other people as they have informed you they'd like to be treated, and if you're uncertain ask them." hakimashou posted:That's probably less true when it comes to executing murderers than it is for anything else. All murder is not equal. Context/intent matters as well, and punishments should vary based on this. Someone who was under the influence of alcohol or some other drug killing someone during a heated argument is guilty of a lesser crime than someone who carefully premeditated someone else's murder and exhibited no remorse afterwards. hakimashou posted:The choice to commit murder is also the choice to be executed, they are inseparable and one and the same. The act of committing murder is the act of choosing to be executed. You can use this argument to justify literally any punishment, no matter how severe or absurd. For example, if the punishment for theft were to cut off a person's hands, you could argue "well, they shouldn't have committed theft if they didn't want their hands cut off!" This isn't to say that you can't have some other justification for the death penalty, but this specific argument is not a good one. VitalSigns posted:You continue to dodge the question of why this reasoning doesn't apply to other criminal acts: rape, torture, maiming. Lying, even. I have an app on my phone where I record every time a person has lied to me, so that I can be reminded to lie to them as well in the future. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 02:26 on Mar 6, 2017 |
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Mar 6, 2017 02:02
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the trump tutelage posted:Sure, and then I'll explain what existed before the big bang. You're the one that insinuated objective morality was real. Don't say what you don't mean, idiot.
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Mar 6, 2017 02:33
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Who What Now posted:You're the one that insinuated objective morality was real. Don't say what you don't mean, idiot.
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Mar 6, 2017 02:56
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BRJohnson posted:I think it's funny you're trying to build your justification of execution off of the writings of philosophers, and you're totally ok using the idea of what people deserve. That's a bizarre way of looking at the world and I don't agree with it one bit. I think it would be wrong to reward people who do bad things instead of punish them, because they deserve to be punished not rewarded. Also if no one deserves anything, how can people have rights? Does no one deserve to live? To be free? To be treated like an equal or with respect? Can people only deserve good things but never bad ones? Why? hakimashou fucked around with this message at 03:28 on Mar 6, 2017 |
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Mar 6, 2017 03:14
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WillyTheNewGuy posted:This isn't true through. Sometimes a person chooses to murder, never gets caught, then dies of complications from getting too old. The choice to murder cannot also be the choice to be executed unless their correlation is 100%. Whoosh!
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Mar 6, 2017 03:14
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bitterandtwisted posted:You said: There "justification" for proportionate punishment is that it isn't arbitrary. I'm not sure what you're getting at but the death penalty is proportionate for murder because both victim and perpetrator end up identically unable to experience anything ever again. You seem to be confusing what makes someone deserving of punishment with what makes a particular punishment proportionate to a particular crime. A person deserves to be punished if he is guilty and fully culpable and responsible for some wrongdoing, as above. Many people think that one of the criteria for a punishment being just is that it is proportionate, and the death penalty is a proportionate punishment for murder.
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Mar 6, 2017 03:19
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Ytlaya posted:This isn't solely related to this topic, but I want to point out that "treat others as you would want to be treated" is actually not a good idea and can lead to a lot of bad things. People are different, and some people are hurt by things that other people enjoy (for example racists find racist jokes funny while the minority in question finds them hurtful). 1. Yeah its easy to think about a little bit and arrive at ideas like "I want to be treated with respect so I will treat others with respect." 2. If you see above, different levels of culpability have already been covered. Twice now a list has been posted of crimes where most people would agree the perpetrator has the highest level of culpability and responsibility. Maybe we just stick to those ones for the death penalty? 3. Looking above again, you'll find you're in luck, It isn't the justification for anything, its helpful advice!
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Mar 6, 2017 03:26
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the trump tutelage posted:It's no more or less axiomatic than the claim that morality is relative. I don't know what point you think you're making. Or is it that you think the relativists have won and everyone is already in agreement? Do you think objectivity is the default position?
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Mar 6, 2017 03:32
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Who What Now posted:Do you think objectivity is the default position?
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Mar 6, 2017 03:55
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the trump tutelage posted:Maybe in some 'historical inertia' sense; otherwise, no. Give me an exact scenario where something is considered to be by default objective, but can't by demonstrated to be that way, and explain why it is.
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Mar 6, 2017 04:13
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hakimashou posted:That's a bizarre way of looking at the world and I don't agree with it one bit. I said the concept of deserve is silly because the universe doesn't work that way. It doesn't matter if it's deserving something 'good' or 'bad', it's a construction. I think the death penalty (state executions) are unnecessary and unjust (and the reasoning for that line of thought has been well documented in this thread), so it has no place in the world we have a part in cultivating. That's not even what you're arguing against, though, is it? You're arguing that it is morally correct and good to kill people sometimes, not to prevent another imminent death but as retribution for what they did or in fulfillment of some contract you've drafted and declared the pinnacle in morality (which you acknowledge isn't even applicable in our world). What a thoroughly egotistical and fruitless place you've arrived at. It's pretty clear to me that we disagree on a fundamental level here, I wouldn't expect to change your mind. I just took issue with you adorning your opinions with philosophical dressing, when it's clear you're selectively picking things to arrive somewhere you're already quite stuck at.
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Mar 6, 2017 04:37
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Who What Now posted:Give me an exact scenario where something is considered to be by default objective, but can't by demonstrated to be that way, and explain why it is.
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Mar 6, 2017 04:40
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I believe we should punish suicides by killing ourselves. If some guy thinks the world would be so great with him dead, we should show just how bad things would be if were all suicidal! That'll show his corpse. Also, all values about morality are axiomatic and truth must be in the middle. Thusly, I propose the Dent Method of execution where we just flip a coin when we murder someone because at least that's a kind or arbitrariness that gives you a 50% chance of still being alive.
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Mar 6, 2017 04:44
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the trump tutelage posted:The alleged existence of dark matter, which we cannot yet conclusively prove exists for lack of the necessary tools, though the observational evidence is compelling. It has not yet been show to objectively exist, though. It has only been shown to probably exist and it is useful to assume that it does in some certain and explicit cases. If you can't tell the difference between these two things then I'm afraid you simply aren't smart enough to talk to further.
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Mar 6, 2017 04:50
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