Capital Punishment

[EquALLity]

I know this topic is old, but I've been made aware of an important point recently.

Brimstone, your argument is that the death penalty may be moral because we can use the money saved from killing prisoners to help people with social programs.
You say that the only reason why the death penalty is more expensive than life in prison is because of appeals, & so we should just do away with appeals.

However, without these appeals, more innocent people would die. The number of innocent people executed is already pretty high, & doing away with appeals would make that a lot worse.
Do you think that's a morally acceptable price to pay?

[brimstoneSalad]

However, without these appeals, more innocent people would die. The number of innocent people executed is already pretty high, & doing away with appeals would make that a lot worse.
Do you think that's a morally acceptable price to pay?

1. Actually, it's pretty low, but I guess that depends on your standards. The only reason you hear about it is because when it happens the media pick it up and make sure the world knows. Some studies suggest one in 25.

2. Most people executed "wrongly" are not actually innocent: in rare cases they just may be innocent of that particular crime. The vast majority of people who get death sentences are going to be violent people with a criminal history, which is WHY the jury was so willing to believe the person was guilty and give the death penalty. These aren't usually random nice people who just got unlucky.

3. A significant number of people who have been exonerated have been on DNA evidence. That is, people locked away before routine DNA analysis. Today, the chances of somebody being falsely executed are lower, and the standards of proof are very high. So, we're dealing with a massive amount of progress in criminal justice from that alone which makes wrong convictions far rarer.
Scrutiny is good of course. Thanks to more modern studies, we also understand better how unreliable witness testimony is.

This is an interesting article looking at how most people taken off death row are just left to rot in prison by being resentenced:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/elizabethlopatto/2014/04/29/how-many-innocent-people-are-sentenced-to-death/

Seems like a death sentence lights a fire under the criminal justice system. It's an interesting notion.

All of that aside:

How many innocent people, vs. how many people's lives can be saved with that money in social programs? And how many crimes can be prevented?

Even going to a hospital, you know there's a chance you'll be killed by accident through a mix up, but you have a better chance of being treated and living. Everything in life is an odds game.

[EquALLity]

1. Actually, it's pretty low, but I guess that depends on your standards. The only reason you hear about it is because when it happens the media pick it up and make sure the world knows. Some studies suggest one in 25.

1/25 seems high to me. That's like one student in a class.
Plus, it's a conservative estimate.
http://www.pnas.org/content/111/20/7230.abstract

The rate of erroneous conviction of innocent criminal defendants is often described as not merely unknown but unknowable. We use survival analysis to model this effect, and estimate that if all death-sentenced defendants remained under sentence of death indefinitely at least 4.1% would be exonerated. We conclude that this is a conservative estimate of the proportion of false conviction among death sentences in the United States.

Listen to this interview with Helen Prejean (relevant part 11:35-16:15):
http://podbay.fm/show/98746009/e/1439784000?autostart=1

I have been with seven people, seven people, I'm with the seventh one now... three of the seven have been innocent. It's broken.

And that 1/25 number would be much greater if we did away with appeals, which according to you is the only way we can make the death penalty cheaper than prison.
Removing appeals would increase the total number of people sentenced to death row, and thereby increase the number of innocent people (increasing guilty and innocent deaths are moral issues IMO, though innocent deaths more so in this case because of things that go along with being innocent).

2. Most people executed "wrongly" are not actually innocent: in rare cases they just may be innocent of that particular crime. The vast majority of people who get death sentences are going to be violent people with a criminal history, which is WHY the jury was so willing to believe the person was guilty and give the death penalty. These aren't usually random nice people who just got unlucky.

The jury isn't supposed to know about the person's criminal history, and people change.

3. A significant number of people who have been exonerated have been on DNA evidence. That is, people locked away before routine DNA analysis. Today, the chances of somebody being falsely executed are lower, and the standards of proof are very high. So, we're dealing with a massive amount of progress in criminal justice from that alone which makes wrong convictions far rarer.
Scrutiny is good of course. Thanks to more modern studies, we also understand better how unreliable witness testimony is.

Well, since we don't have that data, all we can really go by is this study's (conservative) estimate.
The only other information we have is Sister Helen's data, and her data has a higher percentage of innocent people on death row.

This is an interesting article looking at how most people taken off death row are just left to rot in prison by being resentenced:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/elizabethlo ... -to-death/

I don't understand, is that innocent people taken off death row? Why aren't they released? How are the re-sentenced if they were found innocent?

Either way, prison for life is preferable to death for most people.

Seems like a death sentence lights a fire under the criminal justice system. It's an interesting notion.

What do you mean?

All of that aside:

How many innocent people, vs. how many people's lives can be saved with that money in social programs? And how many crimes can be prevented?

Even going to a hospital, you know there's a chance you'll be killed by accident through a mix up, but you have a better chance of being treated and living. Everything in life is an odds game.

We wouldn't have to worry about it if we had enough government money to fund social programs and abolishing the death penalty, which we could have by implementing higher taxes on top earners and decreasing military spending etc..

Yes, we could just use all the extra money to fund social programs, and I guess we can't really know if it'll be better to fund the social programs more or abolish the death penalty. I still lean towards abolishing it, because I think it sends a bad message to society either way, plus republicans aren't going to increase spending on social programs anytime soon.

Maybe an alternative would be to not put people in prison for their entire lives at all.

[brimstoneSalad]

The rate of erroneous conviction of innocent criminal defendants is often described as not merely unknown but unknowable. We use survival analysis to model this effect, and estimate that if all death-sentenced defendants remained under sentence of death indefinitely at least 4.1% would be exonerated. We conclude that this is a conservative estimate of the proportion of false conviction among death sentences in the United States.

Just because somebody may be legally exonerated doesn't mean the person was actually innocent of the crime; likely many were guilty, but there were just problems with chain of evidence, probable cause, or some part of the evidence was otherwise brought into question.
The rules for process are very strict. It's hard to prove even a single one was actually innocent: the evidence just might not be enough to convict. Most of these people probably get off on "technicalities" rather than actually being innocent of the crime.

Listen to this interview with Helen Prejean (relevant part 11:35-16:15):
http://podbay.fm/show/98746009/e/1439784000?autostart=1

I have been with seven people, seven people, I'm with the seventh one now... three of the seven have been innocent. It's broken.

I don't know how she thinks she's divining their innocence. She's probably just gullible and too trusting. Criminals lie. Many of them are very good at it.

The jury isn't supposed to know about the person's criminal history, and people change.

Look into this a bit more, you may be surprised how often the jury may be informed of this (typically anything of a sexual nature). It depends on the state for details, but many past convictions are also admissible if the person takes the stand (anything that may impeach character/honesty), which prevents criminals from taking the stand to defend themselves. If a person has a clean record (unimpeachable witness) and takes the stand to defend his or herself, he or she is much more likely to get off.

And while the jury may not know in some cases, the judges know, and it's strongly considered in sentencing: both what the judge will give, and what the DA will pursue. There are actually tables of sentencing guidelines: they take into account the Crime on one axis, and crminal history on the other.
Somebody with no record and no prior jail time will almost always get the lighter sentence even with a guilty verdict, unless the person was just vicious during the trial and showed no remorse. The chances of two mistaken arrests and convictions are extremely small. The people who get death sentences almost always have long criminal histories.

Well, since we don't have that data, all we can really go by is this study's (conservative) estimate.

That's not an estimate of actual innocence, it's an estimate of how many would be taken off death row.

The only other information we have is Sister Helen's data, and her data has a higher percentage of innocent people on death row.

The plural of anecdote is not evidence.

I don't understand, is that innocent people taken off death row? Why aren't they released? How are the re-sentenced if they were found innocent?

They weren't found innocent: that's a significant part of my point. It was only found that the evidence wasn't compelling enough to demand a death penalty. The evidence was still strong enough for life in prison.

Like I said earlier in this post, there's no reason to believe these people are largely innocent. They're getting off on technicalities, or based on the evidence being weaker than it should be to kill them.

They're probably guilty of the crime. If not, they're almost all guilty of other serious crimes which is why they got such a sentence to begin with.

Either way, prison for life is preferable to death for most people.

Maybe, it's also very expensive though.

Seems like a death sentence lights a fire under the criminal justice system. It's an interesting notion.

What do you mean?

I mean another argument for the death penalty is that it means the examination of the evidence is more rigorous. Somebody who is sentenced to death is going to get more appeals, and even be more likely to be set free (if you believe they're actually innocent, which I don't think there's any evidence for -- you don't usually prove innocence) than somebody with a life sentence.

We wouldn't have to worry about it if we had enough government money to fund social programs and abolishing the death penalty, which we could have by implementing higher taxes on top earners and decreasing military spending etc..

We should decrease military spending. Increasing tax on high earners even more than they are now is not necessarily a good idea, though: it won't bring in much revenue, and it could discourage investment and spending, as well as discourage people from working as hard and earning those incomes. At a certain rate of taxation, it's no longer worth it to people to make more money.

Imagine somebody would be making $50 an hour. If you tax 90% of that at a higher bracket (say, over 100k a year), the person is just going to stop working at that point: his or her time is worth more than $5 an hour to him or her. The amount of work done is cut in half for those high earners. Then they're going to focus more on budgeting and reduce spending to save money (which hurts the economy).
You end up shooting yourself in the foot, because if you just kept it at 50% instead, you'd still be making an extra 50k a year in tax. Now you've lost that since they're working less because you taxed them too much.

The idea that taxes don't discourage people from working hard is not realistic: we need to understand better the costs of doing such things. Sometimes increasing tax can actually decrease tax revenue. It's counter-intuitive, but a very dangerous effect to not understand. And taxes on investment discourage people from making investments which hurt the economy severely (particularly small and new businesses).

Yes, we could just use all the extra money to fund social programs, and I guess we can't really know if it'll be better to fund the social programs more or abolish the death penalty.

That's my point: we can't know. We can only guess. We're as likely wrong as right. Because we can't know, we should NOT spend our time advocating for a guess when there are plenty of things we do know which we should spend time on.

I still lean towards abolishing it, because I think it sends a bad message to society either way,

Like the idea that violence in video games causes people to be violent? This needs evidence. We can't just guess at this stuff.

plus republicans aren't going to increase spending on social programs anytime soon.

Because they're worried about balancing the budget.
Even cutting taxes would probably do more good than keeping people in prison. Cut taxes on investment in certain sectors, and you encourage private money to pour into the economy which makes jobs (which are the best kind of social program for most poor).

Maybe an alternative would be to not put people in prison for their entire lives at all.

Sure. But nobody wants rapists and murderers running around.
I'd advocate for medical and technological alternatives.

[EquALLity]

^I'm going to reply to this later, but I edited it before you posted and I think you missed this part:

And that 1/25 number would be much greater if we did away with appeals, which according to you is the only way we can make the death penalty cheaper than prison.
Removing appeals would increase the total number of people sentenced to death row, and thereby increase the number of innocent people (increasing guilty and innocent deaths are moral issues IMO, though innocent deaths more so in this case because of things that go along with being innocent).

[brimstoneSalad]

And that 1/25 number would be much greater if we did away with appeals, which according to you is the only way we can make the death penalty cheaper than prison.

I think you misunderstood the study. 4% is the estimate of the total number that would be exonerated from death if death row were indefinite. Some of those people currently are let off (That full 4% is not being executed).

So, only the 1/25 at most would be killed who might not have been. The number wouldn't go up unless the standard of evidence were reduced.

Removing appeals would increase the total number of people sentenced to death row, and thereby increase the number of innocent people

I don't think there's any reason to believe that. To the contrary, fewer people would probably be sentenced to death, because the juries and judges know there are no appeals, and the prosecution and defense would both be more careful since they know it's their last chance, and wouldn't be able to pawn off the responsibility of a false conviction to some appeal down the line.

[EquALLity]

Just because somebody may be legally exonerated doesn't mean the person was actually innocent of the crime; likely many were guilty, but there were just problems with chain of evidence, probable cause, or some part of the evidence was otherwise brought into question.
The rules for process are very strict. It's hard to prove even a single one was actually innocent: the evidence just might not be enough to convict. Most of these people probably get off on "technicalities" rather than actually being innocent of the crime.

Well, that's how the process has to be.

I don't know how she thinks she's divining their innocence. She's probably just gullible and too trusting. Criminals lie. Many of them are very good at it.

Ok, that's a fair point. Her statements aren't really meaningful without more information.

Look into this a bit more, you may be surprised how often the jury may be informed of this (typically anything of a sexual nature). It depends on the state for details, but many past convictions are also admissible if the person takes the stand (anything that may impeach character/honesty), which prevents criminals from taking the stand to defend themselves. If a person has a clean record (unimpeachable witness) and takes the stand to defend his or herself, he or she is much more likely to get off.

And while the jury may not know in some cases, the judges know, and it's strongly considered in sentencing: both what the judge will give, and what the DA will pursue. There are actually tables of sentencing guidelines: they take into account the Crime on one axis, and crminal history on the other.
Somebody with no record and no prior jail time will almost always get the lighter sentence even with a guilty verdict, unless the person was just vicious during the trial and showed no remorse. The chances of two mistaken arrests and convictions are extremely small. The people who get death sentences almost always have long criminal histories.

The state can present information of prior convictions? Are you sure? Even if the person doesn't take the stand?

Ah, I see: http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files ... _Table.pdf

They weren't found innocent: that's a significant part of my point. It was only found that the evidence wasn't compelling enough to demand a death penalty. The evidence was still strong enough for life in prison.

Like I said earlier in this post, there's no reason to believe these people are largely innocent. They're getting off on technicalities, or based on the evidence being weaker than it should be to kill them.

They're probably guilty of the crime. If not, they're almost all guilty of other serious crimes which is why they got such a sentence to begin with.

That's true, but also how the process has to be.

Maybe, it's also very expensive though.

It's only more expensive if we do away with appeals, or else the death penalty is more expensive. Also, maybe we shouldn't even have life in prison sentences. What exactly is the point of that? I suppose it's for people who can 'never' be reformed, but everyone can be reformed.
Sure, some people won't be, but it's worth a shot.

If we have shorter prison sentences and focus more on rehabilitation, then even if you eliminate appeals, it still might cost less to put people in prison. Maybe once prisoners are rehabilitated and released, they can contribute to the economy.

I mean another argument for the death penalty is that it means the examination of the evidence is more rigorous. Somebody who is sentenced to death is going to get more appeals, and even be more likely to be set free (if you believe they're actually innocent, which I don't think there's any evidence for -- you don't usually prove innocence) than somebody with a life sentence.

The consequences of the punishment are also more severe, so it seems like a wash.

Also, you want to do away with appeals, so under your system that's not an argument for the death penalty.

If you want to argue that the death penalty is ok because of all the appeals that it results in, then you lose the necessary element that the death penalty would cost less money than life in prison.

We should decrease military spending. Increasing tax on high earners even more than they are now is not necessarily a good idea, though: it won't bring in much revenue, and it could discourage investment and spending, as well as discourage people from working as hard and earning those incomes. At a certain rate of taxation, it's no longer worth it to people to make more money.

Imagine somebody would be making $50 an hour. If you tax 90% of that at a higher bracket (say, over 100k a year), the person is just going to stop working at that point: his or her time is worth more than $5 an hour to him or her. The amount of work done is cut in half for those high earners. Then they're going to focus more on budgeting and reduce spending to save money (which hurts the economy).
You end up shooting yourself in the foot, because if you just kept it at 50% instead, you'd still be making an extra 50k a year in tax. Now you've lost that since they're working less because you taxed them too much.

The idea that taxes don't discourage people from working hard is not realistic: we need to understand better the costs of doing such things. Sometimes increasing tax can actually decrease tax revenue. It's counter-intuitive, but a very dangerous effect to not understand. And taxes on investment discourage people from making investments which hurt the economy severely (particularly small and new businesses).

What is your definition of 'much revenue'? And why do you say that it wouldn't generate much revenue?

Who said anything about 90% for people who make over 100k a year? Nobody is advocating for that today. The closest Bernie Sanders, the most liberal member of the Senate, came to advocating for that was him being smeared as advocating for that. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ui-fHDUnZDg
The only time we had a tax rate that high was under Eisenhower (a republican).

First, I don't think the concept of taxing anyone over 100k at the same rate is reasonable. I don't think we should be taxing someone who makes 100k a year the same as someone who makes almost 200k a year as we do currently. Do you agree that we need more tax brackets? Why are we taxing individuals who make about 400k a year the same as anyone who makes more than that? Why would someone who makes a bit over 400k a year pay the same amount in taxes as someone who makes 1000k a year?

90% at 100k a year is completely unreasonable, and again, nobody is advocating for that.

I understand that (though the tax rate isn't close to 50% for anyone in the country). But just because too much taxation is bad doesn't mean that any increase in taxation is bad. Under Eisenhower, when the tax rate for top earners was actually over 90%, the United States economy was doing better than it is today. I'm not saying we should implement the 90% tax rate for top earners today, but high taxation isn't necessarily a bad thing all of the time.

That's my point: we can't know. We can only guess. We're as likely wrong as right. Because we can't know, we should NOT spend our time advocating for a guess when there are plenty of things we do know which we should spend time on.

When it comes to harm vs good in terms of harm towards prisoners and good to people through social programs, if the death penalty costed less money, then I would agree.

However, I also think that the establishment of the death penalty as acceptable sends a bad message to society.

Like the idea that violence in video games causes people to be violent? This needs evidence. We can't just guess at this stuff.

I think that iit's more like the fact that spanking children leads to more aggressive behavior.

Violent video games don't have actual violence; it's animation that's violent. Do you really think it's the same to chop someone's head off in a video game and to watch a video of ISIS chop a real person's head off?

However, there actually is evidence that violent video games promote aggressive behavior. I'm not saying that means they should be banned or anything, but: http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/ ... games.aspx

If even fantasy violence promotes actual violence, than state violence would be much worse.

Because they're worried about balancing the budget.

I don't agree, I think it's because of their campaign contributions.

Even cutting taxes would probably do more good than keeping people in prison. Cut taxes on investment in certain sectors, and you encourage private money to pour into the economy which makes jobs (which are the best kind of social program for most poor).

Evidence?

Sure. But nobody wants rapists and murderers running around.
I'd advocate for medical and technological alternatives.

People change, especially with rehabilitation.

What kinds of alternatives are you referring to?

I think you misunderstood the study. 4% is the estimate of the total number that would be exonerated from death if death row were indefinite. Some of those people currently are let off (That full 4% is not being executed).

So, only the 1/25 at most would be killed who might not have been. The number wouldn't go up unless the standard of evidence were reduced.

Ah, good point. Though it was still a conservative estimate.

I don't think there's any reason to believe that. To the contrary, fewer people would probably be sentenced to death, because the juries and judges know there are no appeals, and the prosecution and defense would both be more careful since they know it's their last chance, and wouldn't be able to pawn off the responsibility of a false conviction to some appeal down the line.

You can't just dismiss that, regardless, many people who would've gotten off from appeals will now be executed.

I don't see any reason to support this idea. Anyone who wouldn't take the trial seriously enough in the beginning likely wouldn't be swayed by that fact. It's already an extremely serious trial.
Most people probably wouldn't even be aware of that appeals were eliminated anyway.

[brimstoneSalad]

I think you missed my point entirely.

I'm not advocating for or against the death penalty. I'm advocating leaving it alone, because it's a controversial topic, it's not obvious which side it right, and focusing on veganism IS obvious.

You're Batman, if the Joker put bombs in two buildings, and you know for sure one building is full of people and for the other you have no evidence if it contains people or not, and you only have time to get to one of them, which do you go to?

EVERYTHING you do has opportunity cost.

When you make political claims and arguments like that it requires time and energy which you could have devoted to something else.
Just now I'm spending valuable time arguing about this that I would rather spend on the Debunking Benatar argument, or Mic. the Vegan's anti-GMO arguments.

If you're making those political claims along side your vegan activism, then because they're controversial, it's going to turn off people who disagree with those claims. You saying, "end the death penalty and go vegan" will likely just cause a lot of people to do neither, when they may have been more receptive to a vegan message alone.

Not only is this a very small issue (very few people are executed every year, the vast majority obviously guilty), but it's controversial, and you don't have strong evidence against it.

My argument is to leave it alone. Don't advocate it. Don't use it as a litmus test when you vote. Don't argue against people advocating otherwise, and just focus on the things we know.

Well, that's how the process has to be.

Sure, but that doesn't mean they're innocent. You were misunderstanding the statistics (which they probably want you to misunderstand).
If you claim the sentence being overturned means they're innocent, you're misrepresenting things.

1/25 are not actually innocent of the crime they're killed for. That's not a fact, it's rhetoric and it's not in agreement with any line of evidence.
If death row were indefinite with unlimited appeals, the estimation is that ultimately 1/25 would get off death on technicalities and other matters. Most of those 1/25 are probably still guilty.

The jury NEVER rules somebody "innocent". It's just "guilty beyond a reasonable doubt", or "not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt": that is, that there's doubt of the guilt. That doesn't mean innocent.

The state can present information of prior convictions? Are you sure? Even if the person doesn't take the stand?

Ah, I see: http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files ... _Table.pdf

The judge always knows and uses it in sentencing. It's incredibly improbable for anybody to be sentenced to death without many prior convictions.

The jury may be told IF the defendant stands trial, or often IF the crime is of a sexual nature. The rules vary by state.

The point is, even if they were innocent of one crime (which they are probably not even if they have the death sentence revoked), they were not upstanding citizens. There's a difference between actually innocent and not guilty of the crime in question. Most people on death row are career criminals.

I challenge you to find a list of people who have been sentenced to death without any criminal record. You might find one, but it'll be very difficult, and if there's a list, it's a very short one filled with people for whom there was overwhelming evidence against.

I tried, I couldn't find anything credible.

That's true, but also how the process has to be.

Again, legally? Sure. But you can't use that as a moral argument. You can't claim these people are innocent based on that.

It's only more expensive if we do away with appeals, or else the death penalty is more expensive.

Correct. What I'm saying is that both arguments are sound alternatives to the cost. You should not favor one over the other.

Also, maybe we shouldn't even have life in prison sentences. What exactly is the point of that? I suppose it's for people who can 'never' be reformed, but everyone can be reformed.
Sure, some people won't be, but it's worth a shot.

The issue is recidivism. Murderers frequently murder again when let out. Rapists rape again. Thieves steal again. You have to weigh that cost too.

Maybe once prisoners are rehabilitated and released, they can contribute to the economy.

This is the best argument. The question of whether we can rehabilitate them and reduce recidivism is an important one, and it's a matter that needs more study. Currently, the system is shit.

If you want to make this argument, you have to show evidence of a system that really works. It can't just be made on a hypothetical case.

The consequences of the punishment are also more severe, so it seems like a wash.

Maybe or may not, that's your guess. It's not an argument.

Also, you want to do away with appeals, so under your system that's not an argument for the death penalty.

I don't have a system. I'm trying to convince you not to make the death penalty an important political issue that you spend time and effort on. Just leave this to non-vegans to debate and stay out of it to focus on more important things.

If you want to argue that the death penalty is ok because of all the appeals that it results in, then you lose the necessary element that the death penalty would cost less money than life in prison.

Sure, but I'm not arguing for anything in particular. I'm saying the arguments aren't strong, so let's stay out of it and focus on veganism where the arguments ARE strong rather than unnecessary disagreement where there's no evidence and just guesses.

What is your definition of 'much revenue'? And why do you say that it wouldn't generate much revenue?

The % of the population subject to the tax is small. The amount depends on the details of your policy, but it doesn't work out to much because of the size of the population. Most assets are not liquid or taxable. You probably misunderstand the statistics on this one.

Who said anything about 90% for people who make over 100k a year?

It's an example to show you how high tax rates discourage people from earning income.
Medium tax rates discourage less.

You have to do calculus to plot maximum revenue. It's a pretty basic problem in economics.

I'm selling widgets. As I raise the price, people buy fewer widgets, but I make more money per widget.
At a certain price, I make the maximum money possible. Cheaper than that, and more expensive than that, I make less money.

Look up "bell curve" as an approximation.
The X axis is how much I charge per widget. The Y axis is how much revenue I make.
The X axis is how much the government taxes at a higher bracket. The Y axis is how much total revenue they generate from that tax.

Pretty much everything respects these basic laws of economics.
Taxing people discourages them from earning money. That can be OK, but you have to be aware of that fact, and respect the effects.

I understand that (though the tax rate isn't close to 50% for anyone in the country).

Yes it is. You don't seem to be familiar with how taxes work. When you factor in all taxes, it's about that for high salaries.

But just because too much taxation is bad doesn't mean that any increase in taxation is bad.

Like I said, it's a curve. You get more money up until a certain point, and then you get less. In order to determine the ideal tax rate, you have to use some pretty advanced math.

You can't just guess at it and decide the taxes need to be higher. If they're already at or above the ideal tax rate, raising them more will lose money and hurt the economy in the process.

Under Eisenhower, when the tax rate for top earners was actually over 90%, the United States economy was doing better than it is today.

Totally irrelevant. This isn't even a correlation, it's an anecdote -- a single data point. Not useful.

When it comes to harm vs good in terms of harm towards prisoners and good to people through social programs, if the death penalty costed less money, then I would agree.

And it could cost less if appeals are eliminated, and the person is killed on the spot.

However, I also think that the establishment of the death penalty as acceptable sends a bad message to society.

You can't just say this. You need evidence for that.
This is like conservatives saying legalizing Gay marriage will send a bad message to society, all our kids will go gay, and society will collapse because there will be no more children. OK, maybe in some bizarro world.

Does gay marriage make conservatives want to go gay?
Does the death penalty make YOU think it's acceptable to do violence to others?

Evidence is the difference between rhetoric and fact.

Like the idea that violence in video games causes people to be violent? This needs evidence. We can't just guess at this stuff.

I think that iit's more like the fact that spanking children leads to more aggressive behavior.

There's no reason to believe that. The death penalty isn't doing violence to children.

Violent video games don't have actual violence; it's animation that's violent. Do you really think it's the same to chop someone's head off in a video game and to watch a video of ISIS chop a real person's head off?

That isn't what the death penalty is.

However, there actually is evidence that violent video games promote aggressive behavior. I'm not saying that means they should be banned or anything, but: http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/ ... games.aspx

See the bottom of the article:
"The views expressed in Science Briefs are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions or policies of APA."
Those are Anderson's beliefs, not the consensus of the APA. And if you look at the sources cited, you'll notice a curious trend: All but two are studies he did.

References
Anderson, C.A. (in press). An Update on the Effects of Violent Video Games. Journal of Adolescence.

Anderson, C.A., & Bushman, B.J. (1997). External validity of "trivial" experiments: The case of laboratory aggression. Review of General Psychology, 1, 19-41.

Anderson, C.A., & Bushman, B.J. (2001). Effects of violent video games on aggressive behavior, aggressive cognition, aggressive affect, physiological arousal, and prosocial behavior: A meta-analytic review of the scientific literature. Psychological Science, 12, 353-359.

Anderson, C.A., & Bushman, B.J. (2002a). The effects of media violence on society. Science, 295, 2377-2378.

Anderson, C.A., & Bushman, B.J. (2002b). Human Aggression. Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 27-51.

Anderson, C.A., & Carnagey, N.L. (in press). Violent evil and the general aggression model. Chapter to appear in A. Miller (Ed.) The Social Psychology of Good and Evil. New York: Guilford Publications.

Anderson, C.A., & Huesmann, L.R. (in press). Human Aggression: A Social-Cognitive View. Chapter to appear in M.A. Hogg & J. Cooper (Eds.), Handbook of Social Psychology. London: Sage Publications.

Bushman, B.J., & Anderson, C.A. (2001). Media violence and the American public: Scientific facts versus media misinformation. American Psychologist, 56, 477-489.

Bushman, B. J., & Huesmann, L. R. (2000). Effects of televised violence on aggression. In D. Singer & J. Singer (Eds.). Handbook of children and the media (pp. 223-254). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Rosenthal, R. (1986). Media violence, antisocial behavior, and the social consequences of small effects. Journal of Social Issues, 42, 141-154.

This is some kind of crusade he's on, along with his colleague Bushman. Only one reference, from 1986, doesn't involve either of them.

See this on Craig A. Anderson:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craig_A._Anderson#Controversies

His views are hardly consensus:

http://videogamevoters.org/learn-more/myths-about-games-and-violence

The U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Surgeon General, Federal Trade Commission and Federal Communications Commission have the same conclusion: there is no causal link between violent programming and violent behavior.[...]
"This analysis does not find support for either a causal or correlational link between violent media and subsequent aggression in viewers. Why the belief of media violence effects persists despite inherent weaknesses of research is somewhat of an open question."

You can find bad studies claiming that homosexuality causes criminality and violence too, I'm sure, if you look hard enough for them.
This kind of work is widely denounced and criticized as biased and subject to exaggerated claims and methodological problems.

There are plenty of extensive studies that contradict such claims about an association:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jcom.12129/abstract

And the APA's claims are quite a bit more modest: http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2015/08/violent-video-games.aspx

Violent video game play is linked to increased aggression in players but insufficient evidence exists about whether the link extends to criminal violence or delinquency, according to a new American Psychological Association task force report.

What is aggression?
Note we see the same kind of thing claimed to be associated with sports:
http://www.momsteam.com/successful-parenting/youth-sports-parenting-basics/contact-sports-linked-to-off-the-field-violence

Again, just a correlation. Does this increase criminality? There's no evidence of that. Not for sports, not for video games, not for violence in the media which people don't interact with, and certainly not for the death penalty that people don't even see or interact with.

If even fantasy violence promotes actual violence, than state violence would be much worse.

1. There's no reason to believe that it does.
2. Even if it did, in video games, the player is doing the violence through interaction. Even extremists like Anderson make that clear (read the link you posted).
3. And, the evidence of violence in media causing violence in reality is in itself very weak. Imagining the death penalty increases violence is even another order removed from that. This is speculation on top of speculation on top of a weak correlation with 'aggression' but not with violence and no causative evidence.

Because they're worried about balancing the budget.

I don't agree, I think it's because of their campaign contributions.

How is this not a conspiracy theory?

Even cutting taxes would probably do more good than keeping people in prison. Cut taxes on investment in certain sectors, and you encourage private money to pour into the economy which makes jobs (which are the best kind of social program for most poor).

Evidence?

That's just basic economics. What exactly are you doubting here?

Are you saying you don't believe that something being more profitable and lower risk encourages companies to invest in it?
Or are you saying that you don't think that jobs are good for the poor?

That's actually the strongest argument for solar power I've heard (as noted on that documentary in the other thread).
Jobs are empowering.

This is a related practice:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Development_Incentives
Although it has its own problems. Giving tax breaks for specific places and industries but not others can be a problem.

Does your school offer classes in economics? You should take one if you're interested in these subjects.

People change, especially with rehabilitation.

Our prison and education systems are very bad at it.

You'd need to make some test rehabilitations systems and prove it works here. Just because it seems to work in some part of Europe, doesn't mean the model can be copied here.
The problem is located mostly in early childhood. So, spending money trying to reform adults without fixing our social systems at their root is likely to be counterproductive.

What kinds of alternatives are you referring to?

House arrest, medication, stuff like that.

Ah, good point. Though it was still a conservative estimate.

There's no reason to believe it's a conservative estimate.
Their assumption is that MORE people are innocent than would be exonerated. To the contrary, because people are exonerated for reasons of technicalities and just not having enough admissible evidence they did it, it's more likely that far fewer people are innocent than exonerated.
It would not surprise me if not a single truly innocent person has been sentenced or executed in the last couple decades.

You can't just dismiss that

I can dismiss the suggestion that MORE would be sentenced, because you provided no explanation for why they even might be.

You might as well have said that more of them would be declared Queen of England. Why?

There's no mechanism by which a lack of appeals would increase sentencing.

regardless, many people who would've gotten off from appeals will now be executed.

Yes. So? That doesn't mean they're innocent. It probably means more guilty people are getting off.

I don't see any reason to support this idea. Anyone who wouldn't take the trial seriously enough in the beginning likely wouldn't be swayed by that fact. It's already an extremely serious trial.
Most people probably wouldn't even be aware of that appeals were eliminated anyway.

The Judge and Lawyers know. The point is it's a reason why it would likely be lower; it's a mechanism that would sometimes factor into the equation to lower the number. How much lower is impossible to say without study. Maybe it's not even statistically significant.


Anyway, my whole point is to say that the arguments against the death penalty are not philosophically or empirically strong. We should leave it alone and focus on arguments that are strong rather than risking alienating people with irrelevant and unnecessary political opinions without evidence.

It's great to think of alternatives, but until the evidence is there to support them, we should stick to what we know is doing good rather than what we guess might be.

[Red]

Sorry to revive this old thread, but I just wanted to say something.
There is a debate going on about whether or not we should have the guillotine used for death penalties. The current methods are said to be too painful, torturous and take too long. The guillotine, as medieval as shit as it looks, is said to be more humane due to it being a quick, painless death.

Now I'm kinda mixed about this. On the one hand, it was first used in the French Revolution as a painless way of (public) executions. It might be painless (even though there have been reports of people saying they saw the head blink/move, but we're not entirely sure), especially compared to other methods we use now. But with the Guillotine, it's messy as fuck. Blood spews out of the neck, and it's just a hassle to do all that cleaning, when the other methods currently being used are much cleaner. Secondly, it sounds like a very horrifying way to die. Having a giant, bloody, metal blade suspended above your neck waiting for it to fall can be pretty terrifying. But I guess those are just minor concerns.

What do you think?

[brimstoneSalad]

Sorry to revive this old thread, but I just wanted to say something.
There is a debate going on about whether or not we should have the guillotine used for death penalties. [...]
What do you think?

I'd just let the person being executed decide how he or she wants to die, within reason.