Hope you saw that PJ's episode, otherwise the subject won't make much sense.

Anyway...

>>Well, what I'm saying is: that's
>>not my (or anyone's, including
>>our judicial system's) call to
>>make.
>
>Why not? We have to
>live with these people.
>Should we not want to
>remove the molesters, rapists, and
>murderers from our ranks?

Imprisonment (i.e. removal) and capital punishment are not the same thing. I think we should separate them.

>>as
>>far as I'm concerned, no
>>one person or group of
>>people can decide another person's
>>death.
>
>Why not? Do you support
>a woman's right to choose
>in the absolute sense?

Boy, am I ever not going to be baited by that.

>>Well, most societies I'm aware of
>>do not condone murder (or
>>violent assault).
>
>Warfare?

Good point. I was talking about domestic policy, but I should have made that clear. As for warfare...I think that's often a CRITICAL mistake. And, societies don't have to condone warfare (see Vietnam, the Gulf, the Balkans) for it to occur.
But yes, that is a form of murder that is at least allowed for by society.

>
>The precept
>>operating in these societies is:
>>the individual lives of its
>>participants are valuable.
>
>Under whose definition. That's certainly
>not Locke, Rosseau, Mill or
>any of those other cats,
>from which most governments are
>based on.

Okay, I wanted to avoid social contract theories (Rousseau) or utilitarianism (Mill), but here goes. By superficial and standard definitions of both theories, the the good done by removing criminals from society outweighs the personal harm done to the criminal as a result of that act. Nowhere, by the way, does punishment enter into these theories as a goal in and of itself (as a deterrant, etc. yes).
So by that superficial logic, capital punishment can be rationalized according to Mills and Rousseau. However, the DEATH of a member of society is a concrete cost, and one that can be avoided through incarceration. It's unnecessary.

>It's religious reasoning. It's kinda
>odd coming from a socialist.

Socialist? Never woulda guessed! Ha. :-)

>Punishment is not the ultimate goal
>of the death penalty?

No, punishment is not the ultimate goal of the judicial system. And, in fact, there are many people that argue (unsuccessfully, in my mind) that deterrance (assuming that's a word) is the ultimate goal of the death penalty.

>that's another topic altogether. I'm
>sure our philosophies are in
>much more accord when it
>comes to reformatting prisons.

Maybe, man. You never know. We haven't hit a commonality yet...:-)
Did you like _The Unbound Project_?


>- deliberate. planned, conscious murder -
>life

Okay.

>but if it reaches a capital
>level, particulary brutal, involving torture,
>kills a lot of people,
>- death.

See, I don't particularly see any one murder as more brutal than another. The circumstances may be much more painful, but in that case you're really sentencing based on the circumstances BEFORE the murder, in other words, the criminal dies for a crime that isn't murder, just assault. What about kidnappers who torture their victims? What about rapists?

As for killing a lot of people, I still don't see a distinction where capital punishment is involved. Just like you can't kill someone on a Princess Bride-type spectrum of "not that dead" to "pretty dead" to "really dead." Conditions of incarceration, yes. Forty, Fifty life consecutive sentences, yes. No parole, yes. But death for one murder and not death for another? I don't see that (course, I don't see capital punishment in the first place, so I guess that goes without saying).

Alek

____________________________
"All I want is the truth,
just gimme some truth."