(June 21, 2011 at 1:27 pm)martin02 Wrote: Not to single anyone out or put words in anyone's mouth; if fallibility is not a problem to supporters of the death penalty, can they explain how they can guarantee this? Or that it's not a problem to kill the wrong people? The thought experiment is intended to give a platform to explain.
It is not a problem to kill the wrong people if the people you were going to kill were worth killing.
Only a problem if the nontarget killed was worth a great deal.
Empimethean Wrote:"We are all guilty. Pushing that button would condemn all of us."
Only when it is applied, as it was here discussed for heinous crimes befitting the death penalty, not for stealing a Kit-Kat from 7-11.
Slippery slope argument notwithstanding ...
Stealing a Kit-Kat from 7-11 is worth chopping someone's hand off. Some would consider it worth killing them.
Worth is entirely subjective. What is a 'heinous crime' anyhow? Killing someone? Childish. Speaking state secrets? Juvenile. Butchering trillions of sapients and other creatures? Seen it; done it.
This program says it determines who is guilty. We are all guilty. This program is useless.
Please give me a home where cloud buffalo roam
Where the dear and the strangers can play
Where sometimes is heard a discouraging word
But the skies are not stormy all day
