Capital punishment

[fiveredapples]

Your time is yours to waste. If you think it's wasted here, you are free to go elsewhere.

You're missing the point. The point is that this is a philosophy forum, where argumentation follows certain rules, and you flout those rules. I don't care whether it's on purpose, out of ignorance, or incompetence, but you do not know how to have a philosophical debate. It's you who doesn't belong here.

If you doubt that determinism is the case, at least provide a plausable alternative.

What a joke. You assumed determinism was true to tell us what follows from determinism. Oh gee. Nobody cares. Nobody cares because nobody is assuming determinism is true. You need to argue for controversial theories. You're assuming a whole bunch of premises, the ones that make-up determinism, and then drawing worthless inferences from them. I don't even want waste my time explaining why you're confused about determinism itself, because it's all irrelevant. Learn to give arguments.

But here goes:

What matters is that the distinction between past and future is less than absolute. Any moment in time is both past and future, depending on our point of view. The distinction between past and future is made by "now", which is always subjective and never the same.

Come on! This is gibberish.

Any particular moment of "now" must be as valid as any other. If the past is set, so must the future be.

Oh. Another lame inference from yet another unargued-for-theory. This is philosophical prattle.

Since we have one past only, it figures that we can only have one future as well. And that future must be determined at some point in time. Hence, the future is as determined as the past.

FAIL. I deny all your silly assumptions.

Everything you say should always be preceded by "If determinism were true, then...." At best, you misunderstand determinism and what follows from it. You're littering this board with sermons about determinism. Which, again, you don't fully understand. Everyone believes in Free Will -- even you -- just like everyone believes that there are external objects.

Stop pretending to believe in determinism. You've yet to answer the OP.

[Notvacka]

You've yet to answer the OP.

Actually, it's you who have yet to answer the OP, or anything else for that matter. All you have offered so far is abuse disguised as critique. Trolling, I think it's called.

[Notvacka]

Everyone believes in Free Will -- even you --

If that's the case, I suppose that you wouldn't mind providing a defenition of what free will is. In particular, I'd like to know what this will of yours is supposedly free from. Claiming that everybody believes in something seems rather useless unless you can explain what it is.

[Thundril]

. . . let's get down and dirty :

OK

I believe people who meet certain criminal criteria through reasonable due process of law should be put to death, barring very limited appeal, immediately.

What do you mean to convey when you write the word 'should'?

Let's just get rid if the riff raff.

I am assuming that you are talking about making the world a little less unpleasant for all by obliging all to conform to certain behavioural standards? If so, we start off in complete agreement. There are a range of ways for a society to reach some sort of consensus about which behaviours are acceptable and which are unacceptable. The killing of small children, for example, is so nearly universally detested that we can regard it as an absolute wrong, whether we believe in actual absolutes or not. There are, in any given society, at any given time, a set of such 'absolute wrongs'.
But in any society there will be some individuals who, for one reason or another, cannot or will not refrain from unacceptable behaviours. The question then would be how to reduce to the minimum such transgressions.
We can have our behavioural standards taught to children (and adults!) as morals, as laws, as social conventions, or as a mixture of all 3.
We can raise children to adhere to the behavioural standards by various means; by encouragement, by threat of punishment, by reflexive conditioning, or by a mixture of all 3.
But still some people will behave in unacceptable ways.
So what to do?
Well, at the extreme, we could simply kill the offenders. Which raises possibly more problems than it solves.
It appears from anthropological and primate behavioral studies that the idea of 'fairness' has very deep roots. So we do feel pleasure at the suffering of someone who has wronged us, and we do feel anger if the wrong-doer gets away scot free.
Set against that is the equally instinctive reluctance to kill members of our own species, except in the stress of direct and immediate conflict.
In our process of developing social structures that work reasonably well, these two tendencies are resolved by the development of the idea that the wrong-doer 'deserves' their punishment, whether it is a smacked wrist or death, or anything in between.
So the death penalty doesn't sit well with our idea of ourselves as humane and decent persons, unless we can argue unreservedly for the idea of 'free will'.
If we get to a point where we begin to suspect that free will is very limited, or even illusory, and yet have not got to the point where we know how to handle certain kinds of offending behaviour other than by killing the perpetrator, we will have a problem.
Here is (I suspect) an explanation for otherwise remarkable fact that conservative Christians seem to advocate the killing of murderers whilst defending the rights of zygotes: defending human life from conception to execution!
But we all know that the individual's basic personality, including their capacity to learn, or to reason, or to control impulses, is determined by factors which are, without exception, in place long before the individual is capable of being responsible for their action. IOW, the factors which lead to the individual's decisions and actions, including the sense of personal responsibilty, are themselves determined by factors which cannot possibly be the responsibility of the individual.
In short, my own view on capital punishment is that we would be better off trying to be be clear-eyed about it, simply asking ourselves whether we want to kill offenders because we get satisfaction from the act of revenge, or because we don't know what else to do with them, or because it is more convenient than any other solution we can think think of. In this way we, citizens, take responsibility for our decision to execute, to imprison, or to rehabilitate, those who cannot or will not act in ways we find tolerable.

[reasonvemotion]

So the death penalty doesn't sit well with our idea of ourselves as humane and decent persons

The difference between man and animal is the ability to control our instincts. These are the urge to kill, excessive rage and control of sexual desire. What prevents man from becoming animal, is his psychological and moral beliefs. There are people who have difficulty in exercising control of these urges. They have urges, to kill, rape and torture their victims. An example of this is the BTK serial killer, who indulged in serial killings over many years without being apprehended. He killed to satisfy his urge or hunger.

It seems senseless to debate about taking responsibility for the decision to execute If you could attend a trial of a serial killer, and hear the details and view the forensic evidence, I have no doubt at all that your decision to execute would not trouble you. The horror, fear, and tortue each victim suffers before death is beyond comprehension. As a citizen I would have no compunction in voting the death penalty.

[Thundril]

So the death penalty doesn't sit well with our idea of ourselves as humane and decent persons

The difference between man and animal is the ability to control our instincts.

Do you mean the difference between humans and other animals is the ability to control our instincts?

These are the urge to kill, excessive rage and control of sexual desire.

Do you mean these include the three urges you listed?

What prevents man from becoming animal,. . .

The human is an animal.

. . . is his psychological and moral beliefs.

Where do you think we get these psychological and moral beliefs from?

There are people who have difficulty in exercising control of these urges. They have urges, to kill, rape and torture their victims. An example of this is the BTK serial killer, who indulged in serial killings over many years without being apprehended. He killed to satisfy his urge or hunger.

Acting 'to satisfy his urge or hunger' doesn't make him different from anyone else. What those urges or hungers were is what makes him different, and criminal.

It seems senseless to debate about taking responsibility for the decision to execute .

Senseless to debate something? On a philosophy forum? How does that work?

If you could attend a trial of a serial killer, and hear the details and view the forensic evidence, I have no doubt at all that your decision to execute would not trouble you.

How can you 'have no doubt at all' about that? You don't know me, you have no idea what I have experienced in terms of being a victim of crime, or a close relative of a victim of crime, or a perpetrator, or whether I have been a juror, a witness, or a jailbird. Your capacity for certainty in the absence of evidence does not add strength to your arguments!

The horror, fear, and tortue each victim suffers before death is beyond comprehension. As a citizen I would have no compunction in voting the death penalty.

I don't doubt that, RvE. What I am trying to clarify is the 'reason v emotion' of your position . Is it your anger towards the perpetrators of crimes, your pity for victims, your desire for an orderly and civilised society, the fact that you don't know how else to 'put things right', your wish or need to be considered righteous, or some combination of all the above? In what proportion? For example, would you vote to execute a gangster for the single crime of shooting another gangster? Would you vote to execute a man with a mental age of eight? If some course of pharmaceutical and psychological treatments, together with obligatory restitution, was shown to be extremely effective in rehabilitating offenders, would you still prefer them to be executed? If so, why?
Is the desire to punish a good thing in itself, in your view?

[fiveredapples]

Actually, it's you who have yet to answer the OP, or anything else for that matter. All you have offered so far is abuse disguised as critique. Trolling, I think it's called.

You're right, I didn't answer the OP's question, but then I haven't pretended to either. I've critiqued people's offerings, which is not trolling -- it's called philosophy. You've pretended to answer the OP's question but have been exposed as a hack. Don't get whiny because you can't defend positions you offer. You're in the wrong place.

If that's the case, I suppose that you wouldn't mind providing a defenition of what free will is. In particular, I'd like to know what this will of yours is supposedly free from. Claiming that everybody believes in something seems rather useless unless you can explain what it is.

The layman definition is simply that our deliberations are genuine -- that we actually can choose, and are not determined to choose, between actions A and B. The guy who scopes out your home for a week, details your comings and goings, and then breaks in to rob you is choosing to commit a crime. He could choose not to do it, but he's not programmed to do it. He thinks he's making decisions and so do we -- in the common parlance meaning of the phrase 'making decisions.' People wake up, think hard about stuff, look up pertinent information when planning stuff, etc. because they buy into the philosophical view (even if they don't recognize it as a philosophical view) that their deliberations are genuine. Nobody is a determinist in real life. Only pseudo-philosophical lemmings are. Just like nobody is an idealist in real life. And nobody is a solipcist in real life. Knowing and defending a philosophical position is one thing. In your case, misunderstanding one. But to actually attempt to argue that it's a real position, one which governs or should govern human behavior is beyond asinine. The one field in philosophy in which you cannot be strictly theoretic is ethics. If you don't incorporate the human element, then you're not doing ethics. That's like doing philosophy of language without looking at how we use language. It's beyond absurd: it's nonsense. You are here preaching nonsense. You haven't a clue about ethics.

But, foremost, you offered a response based on an ASSUMPTION -- that determinism is the case. You don't get to beg an entire controversial theory, one which flies in the face of what the majority of people believe and practice. So, your response is a fail.

[reasonvemotion]

Quote: Thundril
So the death penalty doesn't sit well with our idea of ourselves as humane and decent persons

The death penalty when handed down as a judgment, is acceptable as a suitable punishment for the crime involved. "The difference between a wild animal and man, is man''s ability to control his instincts of the urge to kill or abnormal rage or sexual desire unchecked. Most humans have a barrier which is made up of his psychological and moral beliefs, these are partly innate and partly learned. A killer does not have the ability to control these urges .That is what makes him different from other human beings. He does not have the ability to exercise control over these urges."

I can give you a personal example of this.

I would walk along a bike track to the train station in the mornings, a short cut to catch my train to the office. One morning I was approached by a school boy, he was around 16 years of age. As we came alongside each other he stopped and turned to me. He grabbed my breasts and we instantly began to struggle. He was much bigger than I am and we were locked in this silent struggle not a word was spoken. I eventually freed myself and he took off. I was pretty shaken and when I arrived at the office, (at the time I was working for two army psychiatrists} I told them what had happened. They said I must report the incident as this was the behavior of a potential rapist. "We all may want to do things, but there are times when we have to resist and exercise control over our desires or urges".


I dont see it as a personal [emotional] responsibilty when the decision is made to hand down the death penalty. The decision would be based on evidence and fact.

Thundril
You don't know me, you have no idea what I have experienced in terms of being a victim of crime, or a close relative of a victim of crime, or a perpetrator, or whether I have been a juror, a witness, or a jailbird. Your capacity for certainty in the absence of evidence does not add strength to your arguments! How can you have no doubt at all about that?

In the same manner you' dont doubt" my compunction to agree to the death penalty,

Thundril
Is the desire to punish a good thing in itself, in your view?

Desire is not an appropriate word to use. It is not the word I would choose. Punishment where it is warranted is necessary for the perpetrator to realise his or her wrongdoing and if that punishment is death by lethal injection for example, as his (or her) then it is appropriate and also closure for the victims' families.

I did report my incident to the police and I identified the boy via his school uniform and class photo. I chose not to charge the boy, on the condition his parents sought professional help for their son.

[Notvacka]

If that's the case, I suppose that you wouldn't mind providing a defenition of what free will is. In particular, I'd like to know what this will of yours is supposedly free from. Claiming that everybody believes in something seems rather useless unless you can explain what it is.

The layman definition is simply that our deliberations are genuine -- that we actually can choose, and are not determined to choose, between actions A and B. The guy who scopes out your home for a week, details your comings and goings, and then breaks in to rob you is choosing to commit a crime. He could choose not to do it, but he's not programmed to do it. He thinks he's making decisions and so do we -- in the common parlance meaning of the phrase 'making decisions.' People wake up, think hard about stuff, look up pertinent information when planning stuff, etc. because they buy into the philosophical view (even if they don't recognize it as a philosophical view) that their deliberations are genuine.

Yes. We all act as if free will existed, as if choices were real. I do that too. But, as you said yourself, this is a philosophical forum.

Nobody is a determinist in real life.

What is that supposed to mean? Even if I don't believe in actual choices, I still have to choose. I ponder my options like anybody else. Knowing that the outcome is determined does not mean that I know what the outcome will be beforehand. However, once a choice is made, I leave the illusion that I could have chosen otherwise behind. Now, criminals get sentenced for crimes committed in the past. When dealing with the past, a determinist view is perfectly reasonable in real life.

But to actually attempt to argue that it's a real position, one which governs or should govern human behavior is beyond asinine.

It is a real position. It does not affect us much in every day life, but justice, like philosophy, should adher to higher standards. Note that we are not talking about human behavior in general here, but how justice in particular should judge crimes already committed.

The one field in philosophy in which you cannot be strictly theoretic is ethics. If you don't incorporate the human element, then you're not doing ethics.

I take a rather practical approach here. Nothing particularly theoretical about it. Even the determinist angle is practical and straightforward. Note that we are discussing the ethics of judgement and punishment, not the ethics of crime.

I have two arguments against capital punishment, one which concerns its finality; it's irrevocable, while courts are fallible and it happens that innocent people are convicted. Taking the life of another person is a serious matter, and justice should not risk committing an error as bad as the crime supposedly punished. It's merely a matter of prudence and caution. May I remind you that your earlier response to this argument was utter nonsense:

Losing my virginity to a Thai hooker was also final and irrevocable and you don't hear me complaining. Oh, people make mistakes? Whaaaat! We're not perfect? No way! I mean, really, innocent people get put in jail? Sure, does that mean we should let everybody out right now because some innocent people have been put in jail? All you gang bangers -- you're free to go. All you child molesters -- skeddadle. Rapists -- here are keys to my apartment. Our entire legal system was just undermined because you reminded us that we make mistakes.

I hope you have gotten off your high horse of philosophical standards after that little reminder.

My other argument concerns punishment as something which could be deserved. It's my view that justice should be above barbaric notions of vengance, and also above nonsense like "free will" regarding choices already made.

But, foremost, you offered a response based on an ASSUMPTION -- that determinism is the case. You don't get to beg an entire controversial theory, one which flies in the face of what the majority of people believe and practice. So, your response is a fail.

Yes, i made an assumption. Because you have to assume something in order to proceed. If you make the contrary assumption, that the world is not determined, that is also an assumption. (And it doesn't even get you any closer to free will). Most people have no problem understanding cause and effect; that the future is determined by the past and that we are all products of circumstances. Choices existing in reality, on the other hand, is spceulative nonsense. The notion of free will is only useful while you are under the illusion of exercising it.

[fiveredapples]

Yes. We all act as if free will existed, as if choices were real.

That's right, we as a society act this way too. We form our ethical opinions upon this putative supposition and our legal system is informed, to some extent, by this too.

But, as you said yourself, this is a philosophical forum.

Non-sequitur. I reminded you that it's a philosophy forum because you're not doing philosophy. All you're doing is assuming the contrary view, the controversial view, as the correct view and using this to spit out an answer to the question. That's not philosophy. You didn't argue for this view. Instead, like a juvenile, you simply adopted the less popular view. Gee, I guess you're not a commoner like the rest of us. You are a sophisticate!

I mean, listen to yourself. You're telling us that you too act as if free will were real. But why would someone who believes in free will, truly believes in it, gather information and deliberated about a so-called decision? It makes no sense. You're being irrational. Do you also gather information and deliberate about whether to make it rain the next day? How about the movement of the stars -- do you think about your choices there? "Hmmm, I think I'll have this star reverse its trajectory now." Nobody who is rational ponders making choices they know they cannot effect. You are an irrational person, but of course you're here schooling me about philosophy.

Nothing you've done here is philosophy. All you do is throw out notions like "finality" and "fallible." So what if death is final? You're acting like you're telling us something we already didn't consider. It obviously doesn't sway us into thinking that it's morally wrong to kill certain people. Despite the obvious, all you was say, "Hey, let me remind you that death is final, guys, so...you know...it's therefore wrong to kill people." That's what you call an argument. So deep. So persuasive. So philosophical. The magical notion of 'finality', people: it'll win you ethical debates all on its own.

As bad as it was to remind us that death if final, you then tell us that we are not infallible, so the death penalty is wrong. I guess you don't mean that our whole justice system should be dismantled but that only death sentences should be revoked and never given again -- you know, because infallibility alone isn't enough, but couple it with the finality of death and you have an argument, right? Quick reminder for you: WE ARE HUMAN BEINGS. Nothing we do or endeavor is infallible. To give an 'fallible' argument in ethics is the most obscene and delusional argument one can make, because it means you have no clue about what ethics is. Again, I say, you are clueless about ethics.

My Thai hooker argument was actually brilliant. It showed you that the notion of finality does no philosophical work. My "Free Everybody" argument was also brilliant. It showed you what follows from your silly view that nobody is responsible for their actions and, thus, don't deserve punishment. Everybody considers the deprivation of freedom punishment. Just because you refuse to call it punishment doesn't change anything. You only refuse to do so because you know how asinine you would sound saying we shouldn't jail people either. But that's exactly what follows from your view. You're just not honest enough to bite the bullet. No matter, we all know what follows from your theory -- better than you do.

Learn to do philosophy. It means the starting point of debate isn't your controversial contrarian view. Since I offered no response of my own, as you said, then I have no onus to defend free will. You chose to assume determinism and then offered no argument. I already explained why your silly 'it's final' and 'we're infallible' talking points aren't arguments.

You can chide me for being on my high horse all you want, but I cannot pretend to be at your level or below. My imagination is limited, since, you know, I'm a human being. <-- You see how easy it is to back up particular conclusions with cliched generalizations? Just like you used "we must assume some things to proceed" and "justice, like philosophy, should be held to a higher standard." It's sham philosophy.

[Thundril]

Quote: Thundril
So the death penalty doesn't sit well with our idea of ourselves as humane and decent persons

The death penalty when handed down as a judgment, is acceptable as a suitable punishment for the crime involved.

I was not saying that the death penalty shows that we are not decent and humane. i was pointing out that when we kill, we don't feel comfortable about it, because we are, or at least we aspire to be, decent and humane.

"The difference between a wild animal and man, is man''s ability to control his instincts of the urge to kill or abnormal rage or sexual desire unchecked. Most humans have a barrier which is made up of his psychological and moral beliefs, these are partly innate and partly learned. A killer does not have the ability to control these urges .That is what makes him different from other human beings. He does not have the ability to exercise control over these urges."

Some killers, professional hit-men for example, are extremely controlled and methodical. Do you need a separate set of arguments to justify executing calculated killers?

I can give you a personal example of this.

I would walk along a bike track to the train station in the mornings, a short cut to catch my train to the office. One morning I was approached by a school boy, he was around 16 years of age. As we came alongside each other he stopped and turned to me. He grabbed my breasts and we instantly began to struggle. He was much bigger than I am and we were locked in this silent struggle not a word was spoken. I eventually freed myself and he took off. I was pretty shaken and when I arrived at the office, (at the time I was working for two army psychiatrists} I told them what had happened. They said I must report the incident as this was the behavior of a potential rapist. "We all may want to do things, but there are times when we have to resist and exercise control over our desires or urges".


I dont see it as a personal [emotional] responsibilty when the decision is made to hand down the death penalty. The decision would be based on evidence and fact.

Thundril
You don't know me, you have no idea what I have experienced in terms of being a victim of crime, or a close relative of a victim of crime, or a perpetrator, or whether I have been a juror, a witness, or a jailbird. Your capacity for certainty in the absence of evidence does not add strength to your arguments! How can you have no doubt at all about that?

In the same manner you' dont doubt" my compunction to agree to the death penalty,

I said 'I don't doubt' something you had just told me. Have I told you anything at all about my experience of crime?

Thundril
Is the desire to punish a good thing in itself, in your view?

Desire is not an appropriate word to use. It is not the word I would choose. Punishment where it is warranted is necessary. . .

Can you clarify the relationship between the words 'warranted' and 'necessary' in this statement? It looks a bit circular.

...for the perpetrator to realise his or her wrongdoing and if that punishment is death by lethal injection for example,

What exactly is the point of having the perpetrator understand that s/he deserves this death. I mean, the person will be dead?

..as his (or her) then it is appropriate and also closure for the victims' families.

I did report my incident to the police and I identified the boy via his school uniform and class photo. I chose not to charge the boy, on the condition his parents sought professional help for their son.

I'm sorry you had this horrible experience, and respect the way you responded to it.

[Notvacka]

I mean, listen to yourself. You're telling us that you too act as if free will were real. But why would someone who believes in free will, truly believes in it, gather information and deliberated about a so-called decision? It makes no sense. You're being irrational. Do you also gather information and deliberate about whether to make it rain the next day? How about the movement of the stars -- do you think about your choices there? "Hmmm, I think I'll have this star reverse its trajectory now." Nobody who is rational ponders making choices they know they cannot effect.

Are you deliberately playing stupid, or do you truly not understand? Besides, you must have lost a negation there - you are talking about somebody who does not believe in free will, right? Anyway, you seem to have missed this part of my argument: Knowing that the outcome is determined does not mean that I know what the outcome will be beforehand.

Because the future is unknown (which is not the same as undetermined) our choices seem real to us.

All you do is throw out notions like "finality" and "fallible." So what if death is final? You're acting like you're telling us something we already didn't consider. It obviously doesn't sway us into thinking that it's morally wrong to kill certain people. Despite the obvious, all you was say, "Hey, let me remind you that death is final, guys, so...you know...it's therefore wrong to kill people." That's what you call an argument. So deep. So persuasive. So philosophical. The magical notion of 'finality', people: it'll win you ethical debates all on its own.

Yeah, so what if death is final? It's not like life is a big deal, eh? Why even bother putting murderers to trial, then? Just listen to yourself. There is such a thing as caution. When the risks are high, you proceed with caution. It seems that you either don't value life or you haven't really considered the matter, despite your claims.

As bad as it was to remind us that death if final, you then tell us that we are not infallible, so the death penalty is wrong. I guess you don't mean that our whole justice system should be dismantled but that only death sentences should be revoked and never given again -- you know, because infallibility alone isn't enough, but couple it with the finality of death and you have an argument, right?

Yes, actually. But you don't get it, do you? I'll let you remind yourself:

Quick reminder for you: WE ARE HUMAN BEINGS. Nothing we do or endeavor is infallible. To give an 'fallible' argument in ethics is the most obscene and delusional argument one can make, because it means you have no clue about what ethics is. Again, I say, you are clueless about ethics.

Calling me clueless doesn't help your case. Take that reminder of yours to heart instead: We are human beings. Nothing we do or endeavor is infallible. Yes, you said it yourself. And because we are fallible, we should use caution and not behave recklessly when lives are at stake.

My Thai hooker argument was actually brilliant. It showed you that the notion of finality does no philosophical work.

Really? Let's see that brilliance at work again, then:

Losing my virginity to a Thai hooker was also final and irrevocable and you don't hear me complaining.

So, you compare your virginity, your own virginity, not the virginity of somebody else, a virginity that you were so desperate to rid yourself from that you had to pay a hooker to do it, that you compare with the life of another person? And you aspire to philosophy? Brilliant philosophy, even?

You don't complain, because you wanted to get rid of your virginity and I bet you enjoyed it too! Now, if the convicted criminal wanted to die, chose the death penalty himself, willingly paid for the execution and enjoyed it, then you would have a case.

My "Free Everybody" argument was also brilliant.

I sense a pattern here...

It showed you what follows from your silly view that nobody is responsible for their actions and, thus, don't deserve punishment. Everybody considers the deprivation of freedom punishment. Just because you refuse to call it punishment doesn't change anything.

We are discussing ethics; intentions matter. If you lock somebody up as payback for crimes committed, that's punishment. If you lock somebody up for their own good and the good of society, to prevent further crimes, that's not punishment. Again, are you deliberately playing stupid, or do you actually not understand the difference?

[reasonvemotion]

So what to do?
Well, at the extreme, we could simply kill the offenders. Which raises possibly more problems than it solves.
It appears from anthropological and primate behavioral studies that the idea of 'fairness' has very deep roots. So we do feel pleasure at the suffering of someone who has wronged us, and we do feel anger if the wrong-doer gets away scot free.
Set against that is the equally instinctive reluctance to kill members of our own species, except in the stress of direct and immediate conflict.

Thundril, I understand that you find capital punishment an abhorrent method to bring down on a convicted criminal as I see you are essentially an idealist in your proposals on how to punish a serial killer. I think that could be highly dangerous. It is similar to domesticating a wild animal, never knowing when it will strike and they always do. Dr. Katherine Ramsland is a multi-published and widely-known expert on forensic psychology and she was interviewed on this subject. She was asked if she believed if serial killers and other serial predators could be rehabilitated, or is their pathology so ingrained that treatment would be of little help.

She responded. "To this date, no pyschopath has been cured. Gregg McCrary, a former profiler, likes to say, when you educate a psychopath, you get an educated psychopath. However, contrary to this myth that they are all pyschopaths, some have been pyschotic, which can be treated, some have been remorseful, turning themselves in or commiting suicide. She said she knew of none who was freed and went on to live a productive life. There have been several who were freed and started killing again, one within hours. There is work ongoing to use atypical treatments, but this is in the future and perhaps would apply only to cases of serial murder which are caused by brain disorders."

My opinion on capital punishment remains unaltered.

Thanks T.

[fiveredapples]

Are you deliberately playing stupid, or do you truly not understand? Besides, you must have lost a negation there - you are talking about somebody who does not believe in free will, right? Anyway, you seem to have missed this part of my argument: Knowing that the outcome is determined does not mean that I know what the outcome will be beforehand.

I see I didn't miss anything intelligent. And I see no one clued you in during my absence. How can I make this clear so even you can understand.

When you say, "I am a determinist", it implies certain beliefs on your part. One belief (of yours) is that the things we call 'decisions' are not causally connected to the actions and outcomes we take them to be connected to. So, although I may think I ate pizza yesterday because I decided to eat pizza, you think my having eaten pizza had nothing to do with my "decision" to eat pizza. I was going to eat pizza no matter what I "decided" to eat yesterday. Notice that even if you're right about determinism, you cannot rightfully charge us with being irrational. That's because we believe certain Beliefs Acts causally effect certain Behavioral Acts. We're being rational if we act consistent with our belief system. You, though, do not share our belief system. Your belief system is such that Belief Acts do not causally effect Behavioral Acts. Yet you are here claiming that you perform Belief Acts whose existential purpose lies within our belief system and not in yours. To take yourself to be 'deliberating about what to eat' -- taken in the only belief system this make sense in -- implies that you do not in practice believe in determism. If you believe in both determinism and in deliberating in what you'll eat, then you do not understand what you're saying -- because "deliberation" so far only has meaning in our belief system. And if you give it a different meaning in your system, then what you're describing, this bizarro act of deliberating, isn't deliberation and you've been talking past yourself this entire time.

Because the future is unknown (which is not the same as undetermined) our choices seem real to us.

Yes, but this only really applies to people who believe in free will. You don't. You cannot, consistently, claim both epistemic ignorance (re: my choices seem real) and claim determinism is true. When you claim determism is true, you're also claiming that no matter how things seem to you, you nevertheless believe that choices aren't real, so you cannot consistently claim to believe to be making choices.

Yeah, so what if death is final? It's not like life is a big deal, eh? Why even bother putting murderers to trial, then? Just listen to yourself. There is such a thing as caution. When the risks are high, you proceed with caution. It seems that you either don't value life or you haven't really considered the matter, despite your claims.

So now "caution" and "value" are your new magic words? This is what you sound like: Uhm....life has value, therefore caution dictates that taking someone's life, even a murderer's (not that there are any murderers, only alleged murderers), should never be done and is in fact immoral!" Preposterous nonsense.

Calling me clueless doesn't help your case. Take that reminder of yours to heart instead: We are human beings. Nothing we do or endeavor is infallible. Yes, you said it yourself. And because we are fallible, we should use caution and not behave recklessly when lives are at stake.

And nobody has argued that we should behave recklessly when lives are at stake. But your proprietary definition of "behaving recklessly when lives are at stake" seems only to mean "do not ever take someone's life." Oh, I know, I know -- using caution implies that we never take someone's life because knowing that we're infallible is inconsistent with behaving cautiously when someone's life is at stake? Ha ha ha...you have an un-falsifiable theory which rests on the strength of ad hoc definitions to ordinary words. Brilliant! Could it be you believe the drivel you type? Are Liberals really this self-deluded?

You don't complain, because you wanted to get rid of your virginity and I bet you enjoyed it too! Now, if the convicted criminal wanted to die, chose the death penalty himself, willingly paid for the execution and enjoyed it, then you would have a case.

I stand guilty of having enjoyed coitus, sir. You're misapplying my analogy. In fact, your interpretation makes no sense. But at least we can glean what you consider the only acceptable way of killing a mass murderer: if he chooses death and can pay for his execution. And your argument is...?

We are discussing ethics; intentions matter. If you lock somebody up as payback for crimes committed, that's punishment. If you lock somebody up for their own good and the good of society, to prevent further crimes, that's not punishment. Again, are you deliberately playing stupid, or do you actually not understand the difference?

Ha ha ha....I said the difference won't matter much, if at all, to the person you are incarcerating. But, if you need euphemisms to sleep at night, I will oblige you. Let's kill child molesters so they don't commit their crimes again. Let's kill serial killers, mass murderers, and terrorists so they don't murder again. Wait! We're advocating the same actions. What's the difference between us? Oh, your actions aren't punishments but mine are. What a relief that will be to the person in the electric chair. Oh, please, kind sir, I want you to pull the switch, not the mean and malicious fiveredapples, for you are ethically just and he is just a reckless brute when people's lives are at stake. The dreams of Liberals are the world's greatest nightmare.

[duszek]

The execution can be inexpensive.

Someone who has forfeited his right to live (murderer, rapist) should starve to death in his cell.
An unemployed person can be asked to keep the keys while checking from time to time if the bad person is gone.