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Is it the dominant framework for the discussion? I don't think I have ever spoken to someone about utilitarianism outside of rationalist ajacent circles.
To me the important question for government is, how do we get all of society's moving parts to work well together? How do we build a stable society for the future? It is, for better or worse, not a very warm approach (that's just how I tend to approach problems in general though). I acknowledge the human need to feel better about wrongs, but I think it can do more harm than good in a society of many. I also think preventing future crime is more important than punishment; it is preventable and crimes that have already happened are not. There is little evidence to show that punishment acts as a deterent for crime in our current society.
The other issue with something like retributive justice is that everyone's sense of what constitutes proper retribution is different. Retribution is not just a concern of conservative justice, it is the foundation for a lot of social justice movements. I take the same stance there. If the solution creates a bigger problem, it is not a solution (obviously this is a bit of a tautology). Or a step further: if retribution is a solution but there is a solution with better outcomes that does not involve retribution, the latter is better.
I don't think the desire for retribution isn't an important factor, just that retribution in itself isn't something to maximize as a value for me. I think the greatest pitfall of retribution in a large society (versus a small one, where it makes a lot more sense) is that the moving parts are no longer in sync. You can see this with public shamings that target relatively innocent people with great impunity and consequence. Or when two groups take opposing sides, and the desire for retribution is an infinite push back and forth.
Harm to whom, exactly? Good to whom, exactly? Think about it: you're putting avoiding harm to the criminal above the well-being of his victim.
I see people say things like that, and, frankly, I find it mind-boggling.
First, this is so contrary to all human instincts and experience, that it would take some extraordinary evidence to compel me to take it seriously. Somehow, my children are deterred from committing "crime" against me by threat of punishment. I am deterred from committing crime by the threat of punishment -- for example, I feel extreme urge to smack the shit out of the street hobos that aggressively accost me, and the main reason I don't is because I know that the law will protect the menacing hobos and destroy me for it. I can come up with more examples like that.
Given that I, and many people I know are deterred by threat of punishment, the only way punishment could not act as a deterrent is if encouraged some people to commit crime. I don't believe this is plausible.
Second, this statement, even if it was true (which it is not), it is cleverly crafted to distract from the main argument for punishment as we practice it: it doesn't need to act as a deterrent in order to do the job you want it to do, which is to prevent future crime. Indeed, all it needs to do is to incapacitate the criminal, and it does so tremendously. Criminals who are in jail cannot victimize people outside of jail, and dead criminals are even less capable of victimizing anyone. This means that executing criminals is a good way to prevent crime, even if literally nobody is deterred from committing crime by the threat of capital punishment.
I think you forgot to mention what problem is created by retribution. The only one I can think of is suffering of the criminal, which I see as a benefit, not a negative.
This is just a tautology: a better solution is better.
Few cases involve any publicity. In most cases, nobody cares about people close to victim and to the perpetrator. These form a small society.
I linked an ACX article a couple times. It's a good overview. If you disagree with it I would love to know why.
I should be more clear: harsher punishment is not a deterent. Getting caught and punished generally is a deterent. Increasing a sentence is not. That makes sense for many reasons (criminals are worse at risk management, passionate crimes, crimes of opportunity where the criminal doesn't believe he will be caught, social pressures).
I agree that putting criminals in prison is the best way to prevent crime.
Cost and benefit is in terms of society as whole. It isn't free to punish people, just as it isn't free to repair a road. It costs money to detain people, or otherwise punish them. It costs money to have a police force and arrest people. Crime also costs money. The simple way of framing it: does it cost society more money to detain a criminal (easier to calculate), or deal with their crime (very difficult to calculate)? That's a cold calculus, but it's a starting point. I think you would agree that punishment clearly has diminishing returns after a certain point. Locking someone up for minor theft for 20 years costs more money than the theft is worth.
If I may, you’re giving the 101 argument which many people here already know and have moved past. Wlxd has very likely read that ACX article, and still thinks prison sentences should be increased. I’m a utilitarian and I agree. Forget deterrence, just incapacitate as much and as cheaply as possible. It is more expensive to catch & try more criminals to give them small sentences than to simply increase the sentences on those already processed.
The marginal extra year in prison of violent offenders costs society far less than the crimes they would commit during that time. And that's despite our incapacitation method costing society far more than it should. We should bring back marooning, penal colonies and exile.
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Yeah, I can believe that increasing a sentence from 5 to 20 years might not have a huge effect on people who commit the kinds of crimes that get you 5 years in prison, but I don't see it as relevant. First, it's good for the victims to inflict more retribution on criminals, and second, as the ACX article you mention clearly shows, it would prevent a lot of future crime too.
Yes, and the cost of crime in American society is tremendous. It's so high, in fact, that it would be extremely hard for government spending on crime prevention to come even close to it. We actually spend trivial amounts of money on law enforcement and justice system.
There are diminishing returns, but whether they exceed the cost in your 20 years for minor theft example is far from obvious. In fact, the way you phrase it, comparing the cost of imprisonment to just the direct cost of the theft, suggests that you either don't understand the arguments being made, or are trying to pull a fast one. You also need to include in the benefits column things like crime prevented by incapacitating for 20 years the kind of a person who'd engage in petty theft even when it risks 20 years in jail. That kind of a person is highly likely to cause enough violence, property damage, and cost to the system to make up for the 20 years of imprisonment.
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