tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5945843206427351559.post978945894583783561..comments2024-01-25T14:51:13.377-05:00Comments on Gamso - For the Defense: The Problem of Evil - Part I(A)Jeff Gamsohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09869425697771419546noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5945843206427351559.post-19516236560021676372013-03-24T01:35:16.333-04:002013-03-24T01:35:16.333-04:00Yes, there's a difference between philosophica...Yes, there's a difference between philosophical uncertainty and practical uncertainty. As a matter of physics, the uncertainty principle seems to be correct. We can never fully know. As a matter of epistemology, we might always be wrong. And it's absolutely true that some things virtually every sane person once believed to be true are apparently false. Certainty - even in the face of overwhelming evidence - isn't necessarily the same as accuracy. <br /><br />Nevertheless, as Younger said, "the world's work must be done." I suspect there's more to the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building than we've been told or are likely to learn, but you're right that I don't have any doubt that Tim McVeigh was fully involved in setting off the bomb. What then?<br /><br />You wrote, "When you have a McVeigh, you execute." But that doesn't follow from guilt, whatever our degree of certainty. It's ultimately a moral judgment about the appropriate response to the determination of guilt.<br /><br />If we're going to have a death penalty and use it, then we're going to execute someone who is factually innocent. I think it's happened a number of times. You may believe it's never happened. But the math is that it will, ineluctably. We've caught mistakes in people who were sentenced to die and people who were convicted of crimes but not sentenced to die. (We can argue about the number, but there are some.) We are fallible humans in a fallible system. Someone, sometime, will slip through the cracks. Is that a sufficient reason to never execute anyone? Because it's always at least theoretically possible that the person is factually innocent? Maybe.<br /><br />Or maybe it's just that the person isn't irredeemable no matter what the jury and judge and public opinion might say. <br /><br />You're right that I'm not a pacifist, and you're right that the correct question that follows is what the circumstances are in which taking a life should be authorized. And here's a tentative answer: When there's no alternative. <br /><br />You're argument (and you don't really believe it) is that it's OK to kill 10 convicted killers because 1 or 2 or 3 or 9 of them might kill someone else if we don't. And the one who wouldn't? Collateral damage. The numbers are no more central to your support for executions than they are to my opposition.<br /><br />Your underlying point is really what you didn't quite say about McVeigh - he deserves it. Oddly, I'm not sure I disagree in principle. I don't, in any case, doubt that there may be people who deserve killing. I don't think that human beings are capable of distinguishing them from those who don't. And I don't think that any of us is sufficiently pure to be making the decisions or pulling the switches. There may be those who deserve killing, but we don't deserve to kill them. I'm not a Christian, but John 8:7 ("He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her") speaks powerfully to me. <br /><br />Jeff Gamsohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09869425697771419546noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5945843206427351559.post-45447682645165998382013-03-17T13:39:07.834-04:002013-03-17T13:39:07.834-04:00Mr. Gamso:
You write a great deal without impeach...Mr. Gamso:<br /><br />You write a great deal without impeaching a single word in the three sentences of mine you quote. They are: "The premise that human beings are fallible is incontestable. The conclusion that we can't ever know if Defendant X did it is absurd. Every practicioner knows that, in the great majority of cases, factual guilt isn't in doubt and isn't even contested."<br /><br />Look, the world consists of real things -- real crime, real criminals and real victims. It's not a philosophy class. The world also consists of tradeoffs. If you refuse ALL executions regardless of the facts, the killer not executed will, in some instances, do it again. This is not speculation; it's fact and you know it. It has happened time and again that incarcerated killers have killed again in jail. Executed killers don't kill again, ever.<br /><br />Indeed, the number of persons killed by those who legally could have been sentenced to death but weren't vastly exceeds the number of even arguably innocent people executed in this country for at least 50 years. The upshot is that the death penalty saves more innocent life than it takes. Does that make a difference to you?<br /><br />It wouldn't if you believe that the law can never permit the taking of life. But you believe no such thing, and almost nobody else does either (self defense and war are two obvious examples). The only realistic question is IN WHAT CIRCUMSTANCES the law should authorize the taking of life, not whether killing must always be barred.<br /><br />No sane person could doubt the guilt of, say, Timmy McVeigh. All the philosophizing in the world isn't going to make him innocent or arguably innocent. The idea that we can't really know anything is preposterous, and I'm sure you don't live your own life thinking that you can't really be sure.<br /><br />When you have a McVeigh, you execute. Eighty percent of this great country agreed with that. Perhaps you'll consider the possibility that a person in so outmanned a position should ride a less high horse.<br /><br />Bill OtisAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5945843206427351559.post-12316063688272512042012-12-16T12:47:26.974-05:002012-12-16T12:47:26.974-05:00The uncertainty goes both ways. How do I know tha...The uncertainty goes both ways. How do I know that I'm not unleashing wave after wave of evil upon the earth? That the next man I free won't kill someone I care about?<br /><br />I think, as a practitioner, to answer the puzzle placed before us by Mr. MacDonald, that we as defense attorneys must embrace chaos. We must not only deal with darkness but be comfortable with its presence. That is the strength we have before the government and the jury. While they rage against it, we stand by, smiling ironically. Our answer to every question is "maybe, maybe not." Not because it's true in every case, but because we know the system is broken, because we know that overall, the innocent do get trampled. That our presence is simply to ensure the appearance of justice, but that as a practical reality, we accomplish far more- we make the juggernaut of power that is the state stand still, and worry. We make it drop a perfectly good attempted murder charge to a misdemeanor assault. We are the keepers of the dark. Because if the dark ever dies, we know it will be because it has been replaced by an all consuming, power-hungry, invidious state that will make our darkness seem like a child's boogeyman when compared with the state's prince of darkness himself.nidefatthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03182341120896265482noreply@blogger.com