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> but the idea that you have to protect people from "future harm" is absurd. Is it though? It shows up in the legal system in lots of places already. If you
by ska 5y ago
> but the idea that you have to protect people from "future harm" is absurd.
Is it though? It shows up in the legal system in lots of places already.
If you are shown to be professionally negligent, depending on the specifics you can be charged or sued (or both) even if nobody yet was harmed; you've only created a risk.
- ping_pong 5y agoBut the harm hasn't happened yet. That's like prosecuting Tesla right now for their Autopilot before anyone has been killed because of their faulty software.
- tshaddox 5y agoWhat’s odd about that? Isn’t it illegal to sell a car without seat belts, and wouldn’t you run into legal trouble before anyone bought the car and was injured in an accident?
- bombcar 5y agoIt's the idea behind "no ex-post-facto laws" part. It's illegal to sell a car without seat belts, not because someone may be injured in an accident, but that there is a law requiring seat belts. Otherwise all activities could be found to be harming after the fact. Note that this doesn't apply to civil suits.
- ska 5y ago> Otherwise all activities could be found to be harming after the fact. Right, but that's not the case here - that's not what the court is doing. If they were levying a fine for past damage based on todays knowledge, it would be ex-post-facto. Agree the tesla example isn't great, if that's all you were responding to.
- ska 5y agoSo if I design and build a bridge using sub-standard materials and the city discovers it before it collapses and kills people, you shouldn't be able to charge me? There are lots of areas of law where this concept, or similar ones, crop up - that's all I'm saying. Pretending it "doesn't make sense" is illogical, because we've made (legal) sense of it.
- xbar 5y agoAgreed. This a very well understood and legislated concept.