This isn't minority report, we can't convict someone on the basis of a crime they haven't yet committed.
According to you. Perhaps you should actually explain why rather than just repeating "assholes deserve it". Few murderers are that deranged. What about a family man who, struggling with debts to mafia loansharks, overdoses his ailing grandmother with painkillers to get his inheritance? Or a young hit and run driver fearful of parental reprisal? Or an impoverished single mother who euthanases the children she can't feed? Each has their own circumstances and motivations that affect the chances of them killing again. If you want to bring fallibilism into the discussion like this, it'll achieve nothing. After all, you can never "be sure" that innocent people would or wouldn't kill to begin with. What are you on about? Neither of that is relevant to the prospect of the death penalty subconsciously advocating murder. "That logic" relies heavily on the premise that murderers will reoffend if they have the chance, which is an incredibly shaky assertion. To elaborate, let's devise an extremely exaggerated hypothetical situation: There are 10,000 people in a city, 500 of which are convicted murderers. These convicts are 95% likely to reoffend, while regular citizens are only 10% likely to kill. Is the next murder likely to be a repeat offence or a first offence? The answer, of course, is the latter. One must take into account the base rate of occurrence: 95% of 500 is 475, while 10% of 9,500 is 950. Now, with this in mind, let's develop a syllogism. Premise 1: According to you, murderers must be executed in order to prevent them from killing again. Premise 2: Murderers are more likely to be first-offenders. Conclusion: Execution is unlikely to effectively prevent future murder. This hypothetical scenario, already skewed heavily in favour of your argument (the percentage of convicted murderers to the general populace and the probability that they would kill again are faaaaaar lower in reality), doesn't even take into account the impact of proper incarceration or reformation, which would drastically lower the probability of repeat offences and therefore further weaken the reasoning behind your support for capital punishment.
Consequences that the dead person wouldn't still be around to deal with. I don't fear painless death either. If I knew that I was going to die, and that the people left behind would be burdened with the negative consequences of my death; then before dying, I would feel guilty possibly. Before dying I would also lament the things that I wouldn't be able to experience. But I wouldn't be scared of a quick and painless death. I don't believe anything happens after death, I believe that there is simply nothing; I'm not scared of nothing. I don't fear going to sleep at night, death would be far less than sleep. I'm not looking forward to dying and I'm not looking to hasten the process by any means, but when it's my time to die; I'm not going to fear the ultimate lack of care and consciousness, there is absolutely no reason for me to. Maybe I'll feel differently in the future, but I doubt it.
The bolded part was by and large what I was originally referring to. The semantics of whether it's called dying or death don't really matter, as it's not like it's exclusive to the process of dying. For my part, I know I won't be able to achieve everything I want to in my life, so instead I'm just aiming to live as a man I can respect. Of course, that doesn't mean I'll necessarily be free of regret on my deathbed, but I doubt many people are.
Aladura, Asatru, Baha'i Faith, Bön, Cao Dai, Chinese Religion, Confucianism, Deism, Eckankar, Epicureanism, Falun Gong, Gnosticism, Hare Krishna, Hinduism, Jainism, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormonism (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), New Thought, Rastafari, Scientology, Seventh-day Adventists, Sikhism, Taoism, Unification Church, Unitarian Universalism and Wicca. In fact, It'd be accurate to say that the majority of religions don't teach the existence of Hell. (Mormons believe that you only go to hell if you reject God after death).
@ Gaynorvador, Gnosticism does teach the existence of hell. Well, the Gnosticism i know of is the Christian one, so maybe you are talking about a different one? @ Calvin_O, maybe you missed my post, but you also dismissed tehuber1337's claim that: So, what is your opinion on this? Do you think it is justifiable to kill 10 innocent people, if we are able to kill 100 guilty ones?
WELL, usually. I know someone pretty well that gets out next year and hes been in there half his life for murder.
I know we are getting offtopic here but; Man, this whole thing is bringing me back memories. I haven't read any gnostic scriptures for years, but gnosticism was one of the steps i took out of my catholic faith into atheism. I knew i had read about sinners being punished, and that's why i was sure there was a gnostic hell. In the link i will give you, it is rather called an "outer darkness", where sinners pass through a series of punishments. However, i also recall reading in one other gnostic gospel (The apocalypse of Peter, if i'm not mistaken) which states that in the end, hell will be destroyed, and everyone will got to heaven( might be in this gospel as well). Anyway, here is chapter 127 of the Pistis Sophia: If you actually read that chapter, you'll see that there is severe punishment in the "outer darkness", with fire "nine times fiercer then fire in mankind". So is it your opinion that it is ok to end an innocent life as long as we kill many guilty ones along with it?
I was just picking a hole in tehuber's philosopher friend's philosophy; a wrongful conviction of a single innocent person (whom is then put to death) is better, in my opinion, than allowing a thousand guilty criminals to go free (assuming that they are dangerous). My reasoning for this being that the thousand criminals released have the potential to take more than one human life (which would more than cancel out the one life that was spared). It could be said that there could be no guarantee that the criminals would commit further offences upon release; but they had already been proven to have offended to be called guilty in the first place, and they would not have been punished for their crime/s so how could they be trusted? It isn't "O.K"; but it's better than putting many more lives in danger to save just one.
But in real life, one thousand criminals aren't going to escape prison. So, what we need to do here is, (assuming everyone here agrees that killing someone who is innocent is a bad idea)get an idea of how many criminals escape life sentences, how many of those escaped go back to their murdering ways, and compare it to the number of wrongful convictions. Then we could see everyone's opinion on this. If the number of escapees who get back to killing, far outweighed the number of innocents on death row, would the death penalty then be justified? I haven't done any meaningful research on this, but i am willing to bet the number of escapees who kill again is not much bigger then the number of innocent people wrongfully sentenced to death. EDIT: I see you were talking about prisoners getting released, not escaping. My bad. In any case, we can actually join those two numbers (escapees and released prisoners who go back to killing)and compare then to the number of wrongful convictions.
As Littlekill said earlier; it's pretty clear-cut when someone is convicted of a serious crime such as murder (juries encouraged not to pass a "guilty" verdict against people whom they have "reasonable doubt" may be innocent). And it isn't just murderers (who weren't acting in self-defence or whatever) that I think should get the death penalty; I think that rapists and paedophiles (and people whom attempt such crimes) should get it also. If we could just maroon all the murderers (et al) on a desert island for the rest of their miserable lives (where they could do no more harm to innocent people); that would be ideal. But we can't, and so to protect the innocent from those that have forfeited their rights to compassion by committing horrific crimes; they need to be wiped permanently from society so that they may not ruin any more lives.
The way I see it, Maimonides' (hyperbolic) claim isn't based on any numerical benefit in terms of lives saved, but rather a moral benefit in that the judicial system isn't corrupted by wrongful executions. There'd generally be an element of doubt if an innocent person were to be sentenced to death, and Maimonides was concerned that this would lead to a slippery slope of decreasing burdens of proof.
Aladura is a collection of belives founded by more then one people... each of them have thier own believes system at least one of them (Redeemed Christian Church of God) believe in hell. Bön and Cao Dai is pretty similar to Buddhism, in fact Bön is broken from Buddhism. Confucianism is not a religion, its a philosophical system base on the study of Confucius. Chinese Religion? which one? Taoism and Buddhism are both Chinese Religion, also Taoism is many part, Fang Shui is also part of Taoism, there is also a part of Taoism that also believe in King Jade (ruler of Heaven) and Hell God and other chinese god which included Guan Yin and Money King (Son Won Kung). Deism belives God may either reward or punish them base on their action on earth. Eckankar and Epicureanism is similar to Buddhism. Falun Gong belives comes from Taoism and Buddhism, but they are know as the revival of Buddhism. Gnosticism like Aladura is a collection of believes, one of thier believes (Archon), teaching whatever you call it, believes in demon and angel. i wonder where do their demon lives. Hinduism belive in karmar, no hell, but you still get punish (eventually) if you do bad stuff. after all that i'm tired, i dont borther if the rest of them don belive in hell, so far most of the religion you post is a lesser religion who broken from the main religion (buddishm, christianity or whatever) i taught i'm clear in this. one day my lecturer ask me one question, there is 5 people crossing the street, all the sudden there is a car going at them at high speed, those 5 people doesnt know the car is coming, beside me there is a huge guy who are capable to stop the car if the car hit him. what is will you willing to do? let the car hit those 5 people or push that huge guy to to stop the car. guess my answer. IF you read all my post in this topic, you'll already know. what can cure a murderer? what can a murderer do beside killing? can you find a permanent solution to make sure they will never hurt anyone while not wasting the tax money. IF you found a way to make them as harmless as a kitten, i'll stand on your side, happily, but i fail to see if is possible. murderer is just too dangerous to be let alive. IF you want them alive, you endanger the rest of us. as the saying goes, better be safe then sorry. if any innocent get the death penalty due to human error (framing, wrong time and place, bad luck, blah blah blah).. remember you cant make an omelet without breaking any eggs and saving one tree is not worth losing the entire forest. I'm saying that fully aware that i may end up being that innocent. and those motivation can make them kill again and again. lets say those family who murder their grandmother to repay his debt, IF he could kill his grandmother, what stopping him from killing his father and mother, his neighbor, his co-working to repay his debt? so you are willing to take the risk to let go a potential serial killer and endanger the rest of you and the rest of us. IF you are willing to do so, next time someone got murder as soon as a murderer escape or paroled, dont point finger at anyone but yourself and i will certainly blame you and so do the family of the victim unless they are bunch of noble like that wife (by you, i dont me you literally, i mean people with the same point of view as yourself). you are saying that death penalty may give people the idea of killing for retaliation (any kind) is o.k, but the problem with that is common people arent law enforcer and thier target of retaliation isnt a gulity man in the court of law, so if they are going to kill for retaliation, they are just doing plain murder. plus people arent that stupid to think that since the government can kill people, we can too. i'm not good at math, plus number lack of human judgment. let say that 10% regular citizen is likely to kill also understand that if they kill, they would be kill via the death penalty, additional to that, that death penalty is very painful and suffer for a long time before being dead. would those 950 people is going to kill? most likely not unless they are under extreme emotion (potential serial killer) nor they think they can get away with it (professional killer), which you need to break that 10% down to % of people are sane, pron to extreme emotion or professional. so that 10% will be much lower. so that change of that 10% being the next murderer is very unlikely since there is 475 murderer just cant wait to kill again. if the death penalty is in place, that 500 murderer will not exist (since they are dead), making the city much safer for the rest.
How do you know the car won't manage to stop or evade before it hits one or more of the pedestrians? How can you be sure that the huge man will be able to stop the car if he's pushed in front of it? As far as I'm concerned, pushing the man equates to murder. You're taking a life on the off-chance that doing so would save all these others, which is an unlikely enough prospect to begin with. The questions I raised above introduce more than reasonable doubt, and killing a man in a situation like that contravenes the very core of modern judicial systems. Again, you seem convinced that once someone is a murderer, they will always be a murderer. As I've repeatedly tried to establish, the likelihood of a murder being committed by an ex-convict rather than someone formerly innocent are extraordinarily low. Therefore, if capital punishment exists to prevent future murders, where is the merit in executing someone who is highly unlikely to ever kill again? Wow, never let it be said that you have an optimistic disposition. Imagine you were in that position and ask yourself: wouldn't it be just a little suspicious if someone else close to you suddenly died? Would you even have the mental fortitude to try again, considering you were caught last time? Considering that the chances of success would've been lowered as a result of previous failure, would the risk even be worth taking? "Potential" is a moot point. Everyone's a "potential" killer. Should everyone therefore be executed to prevent them from fulfilling that potential? After all, convicted murderers are usually just regular people who happen to have started killing before the rest of us. This is nothing more than scapegoating. Neither I nor other proponents of my position are likely to be personally responsible for the failures of law enforcement officials in doing what they're paid to do. Yes, it's just murder. The theory states that, in effect, capital punishment advocates murder rather than deters people from it. It may seem like common sense not to think so, but the reason I brought up those examples was to demonstrate that people have their own brand of justice that they will carry out if they think they're justified in doing so. The scenario was already heavily skewed in favour of your argument. As I said, in reality, there'd be less than 10% of the population previously convicted of murder, and these people would be far less than 95% likely to kill again, especially if they were imprisoned. Besides, I've already said that the deterrent effect is unproven and explained why. I don't know why you think people "prone to extreme emotion" are potential serial killers. Again, most murders are crimes of passion; heat-of-the-moment decisions with little or no thought given to the consequences. Because they're impulse (not instinct) actions, they're also far more likely to be isolated incidents that are instantly regretted afterward rather than repeated.
got a point Most murderers kill exactly who they mean to, and will never kill again. Mainly due to being locked up, BUT they have no intention of murdering anyone else except their initial target.
And as the link i posted before demonstrated, that is a bogus claim. Ok, so basically, you are in favor of killing a few innocent people, as long as a bunch of the bad guys die in the process. What if it is you, or someone in your family, who is wrongfully accused? Will you willingly die, because you understand you are being part of a greater good? And if you advocate taking countless (over time) innocent lives just so you can feel more secure, what makes you better then the murderers who you wish to see dead?
