4 ms·

> No, it follows that we should model the legal system on the basis of what protects society with the least damage to the people we lock up, on the basis that t

by mslm 6y ago

> No, it follows that we should model the legal system on the basis of what protects society with the least damage to the people we lock up, on the basis that they had no choice. How does this follow "logically"? This is just an opinion. In the end of the day if _everyone_ had no free will, legal systems are besides the question - we would busy ourselves in figuring out whether someone is going to commit a crime before it is committed, and would be capable of doing so highly reliably with enough technological advancement. Some war criminals today think they can already do that, killing innocent children by familial association to terrorists.

vidarh 6y ago
> How does this follow "logically"? This is just an opinion. On the basis that there is no justification for "punishment" or "vengeance" based on responsibility if there was no choice. We still need a legal system because events still happen that causes harm and that needs to be resolved, but if we acknowledge people have no agency, then there is no justification for assigning blame, but still a need to e.g. prevent reoccurrence. But when we take steps to protect society against people we recognize are blameless or without agency today, such as e.g. mentally ill people or children, we aim to pick the least invasive means possible, because we recognize it is not meant to be a punishment. > In the end of the day if _everyone_ had no free will, legal systems are besides the question - we would busy ourselves in figuring out whether someone is going to commit a crime before it is committed, and would be capable of doing so highly reliably with enough technological advancement. Some war criminals today think they can already do that, killing innocent children by familial association to terrorists. No, this does not follow for two reasons: 1) Sheer systems complexity. E.g. we still can't reliably predict the weather, and the weather is far simpler to predict because of 2: 2) it devolves trivially to the halting problem, in that actions can and would change depending on our actions to try to prevent crime, because people, deterministic or not, act on input from the environment in extremely complex manners. As such it is wildly unreasonable to think that we can remove crime. Reduce it, sure. We know many ways of doing that: Redistribution for example; poverty is a massive driver of crime. Education; low education is a massive driver of crime. And so on. But nothing we do will remove the need for a legal system at any point in the near future. Your war criminal example is an example of #2 above: how response feeds back into actions, and part of why trying to resolve this issue will remain largely as difficult. But it would be easier, as harsh punishment-focused legal systems are a massive driver of high reoffending rates.

by mslm 6y ago

vidarh 6y ago

> How does this follow "logically"? This is just an opinion. On the basis that there is no justification for "punishment" or "vengeance" based on responsibility if there was no choice. We still need a legal system because events still happen that causes harm and that needs to be resolved, but if we acknowledge people have no agency, then there is no justification for assigning blame, but still a need to e.g. prevent reoccurrence. But when we take steps to protect society against people we recognize are blameless or without agency today, such as e.g. mentally ill people or children, we aim to pick the least invasive means possible, because we recognize it is not meant to be a punishment. > In the end of the day if _everyone_ had no free will, legal systems are besides the question - we would busy ourselves in figuring out whether someone is going to commit a crime before it is committed, and would be capable of doing so highly reliably with enough technological advancement. Some war criminals today think they can already do that, killing innocent children by familial association to terrorists. No, this does not follow for two reasons: 1) Sheer systems complexity. E.g. we still can't reliably predict the weather, and the weather is far simpler to predict because of 2: 2) it devolves trivially to the halting problem, in that actions can and would change depending on our actions to try to prevent crime, because people, deterministic or not, act on input from the environment in extremely complex manners. As such it is wildly unreasonable to think that we can remove crime. Reduce it, sure. We know many ways of doing that: Redistribution for example; poverty is a massive driver of crime. Education; low education is a massive driver of crime. And so on. But nothing we do will remove the need for a legal system at any point in the near future. Your war criminal example is an example of #2 above: how response feeds back into actions, and part of why trying to resolve this issue will remain largely as difficult. But it would be easier, as harsh punishment-focused legal systems are a massive driver of high reoffending rates.