The Death Penalty...Is it right?

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by The Avon Lady

That verse refers specifically to cases of compensation for physical injury and was never understood to be taken literally.

That is only one verse out of dozens in the Bible that refers to criminal violations and their punishments.

I think it is more profound. The concept of blood revenge for example reflects it. One family/clan/tribe suffers a loss, one of theirs got slaughtered by another clan/tribe/family. so they kill one of them. One "system" suffered a loss, the cosmic balance is out of balance and needs to be restored. You can't put back a weight/life into the one pan, so instead you take away one equal weight from the other pan. That is the ancient concept of "justice": keeping a balance. In principal, the concept of "revenge" is nothing else, only that it can become "pathologically contaminated": by the wish to inflicht even more damage than one has suffered: you are picking away an even greater weight than what has been taken from you.

Today's western civilization thinks we have better concepts of "justice". We think, justice is to compensate for damage that one has done, or to sanction the offender's behavior by a system of penalty and motivational reinforcement, so that he may understand the first as a chance to learn, and see the latter as a second chance to prove his value for the community. And beside this understanding of justice in legal contexts, we have the social idea of justice, that is to take from those who have more, and give that to those who have less. In European societies, this is called the principle of solidarity, or "Solidargemeinschaft". But this principle has nothing to do with justice, it is an arbitrary taking, and an arbitrary giving. That is just a way to go a society by communal consensus has agreed upon to follow, originally for reasons of taking care for the weak and the old, later to form national structures - long before the greater family lost in importance.

concerning the legal context of justice, one can argue if we really are so successful in our understanding of the term. Penalty and reinforcement, I said, and compensating for damage. that all is nice and well as long as the damage is reversible, or is of a kind that one can compensate for. Which is not the case if something got destroyed that cannot be replaced, or someone got killed. Here the idea of our modern justice fails, we inflict penalty and reinforcement although knowing that there cannot be compensation and repair. So, jailing a murder for 20 years - may be a means of protecting the public, but if it is a crime of passion and the guy usually has been harmless and the pöublic does not need to be protected, it is not about compensation, and protection, and also not about learning (for the man knows that what he did was wrong). It simply is - archaic revenge again. after "we" have taken our revenge, eventually the guy is given a second chance to return into the community. but the term he has served - has been good for nothing, just our revenge.

What about the murderer who really is aggressive and dangerous by character? One can hardly argue that such a person is taught to become a better being when putting him into a crowded jail. chances are (and statistics reflect that), that in prison, with all those contacts to other prisoners, he might become an even more evil person. so here the argument can only be seen as that of protecting the community. But our idea of rehabilitation, and behavioral manipulation (hopefully for the better) often is failing.

[SUBMAN1]

Here is your murder vs excution graph for the United States by year. Less executions = more murders every time:




Also, to use the argument that capital punishment is not a deterrant, is to say that prisons should be abolished because they are not a deterrant either.

Anyway, the numbers speak for themselves. Capitol punishment works.

My only issue - make sure any evidence that can prove ones innocence be examined before death is administered.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

I forgot a note about the chart above - Why did murders rise after 1967? The death penalty was abolished. Now you can see in black and white the effect it had on the murder rate!!!

To tell me you live in a perfect world where the Death Penalty is not needed is to bury your head in the sand.

[The Avon Lady]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

Anyway, the numbers speak for themselves. Capitol punishment works.

Can you find a statistic of how many murders go unsolved? That is, there might also be an incentive to literally "get away with murder", if the odds are good enough. That, too, would influence a homicide rate, whether capital punishment is in effect or not.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by The Avon Lady

Can you find a statistic of how many murders go unsolved? That is, there might also be an incentive to literally "get away with murder", if the odds are good enough. That, too, would influence a homicide rate, whether capital punishment is in effect or not.

Its probably there too, but I don't think that changes much from a set rate. It would be a pretty flat statistic. It would of course get better with technology, but forensics is never black and white as shown on CSI.

-S

PS. This has no bearing on the numbers above however.

[Skybird]

We had such statistics during a dedicated seminary at university, 1995 I think. Indeed the number of unsolved (or even not recognized!) murder cases are what messes up that beautifully drawn graphics bar for Western countries. I cannot quote all that stuff by memory anymore, but I remember the conclusions literature described. A link between number of executions and crime rate statistically has not been proven and even was not hinted at, at least until the mid-90s. since it is also unlogical to assume that such a link could exist in Western nations (as I argued before), this is no surprise.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

We had such statistics during a dedicated seminary at university, 1995 I think. Indeed the number of unsolved (or even not recognized!) murder cases are what messes up that beautifully drawn graphics bar for Western countries. I cannot quote all that stuff by memory anymore, but I remember the conclusions literature described. A link between number of executions and crime rate statistically has not been proven and even was not hinted at, at least until the mid-90s. since it is also unlogical to assume that such a link could exist in Western nations (as I argued before), this is no surprise.

But that bar includes all murders. So unsolved or not, executions is to be held accountable for the step decline in the number of murders. So I don't quite get what you are getting at - that graph is 'ALL' murders.


A quote by Edward Koch:

"Had the death penalty been a real possibility in the minds of...murderers, they might well have stayed their hand. They might have shown moral awareness before their victims died...Consider the tragic death of Rosa Velez, who happened to be home when a man named Luis Vera burglarized her apartment in Brooklyn. "Yeah, I shot her," Vera admitted. "...and I knew I wouldn't go to the chair."

[Skybird]

It's ten years ago, and so I do not have it all on my mind anymore. But we even had very different statistics for the same time period about the same country!

BTW, your graphs only describe a correlation, somewhat (not really, but you emphasize the link between two variables without further elaboratin it). Every academic who is trained in statistics will tell you that a correlation never - NEVER - tells you something about a causal link (nor does the display of just two graphs). A correlation coefficient (or the two graphs shown) only tells you something about to what degree the two variables tend to show "linked" values, for whatever a reason (there could be third and more variables involved). So, WHY they do that is a completely different story. In your graphic it means that the fact that the two graphs in your interpretation mirror each other's meaning, does not autpmatically mean that the one variable (number of death sentences) is causing the result of the other (crime rate). Like if you find a correlation between hair colour and size of shoes does not mean that the colour of your hair has an influence on the size of your feet. the drop in crime rate could be caused by very different things, and the graph of executions simply is a coincidence. You need far more statistical analysis and an elaboration on the raw data to come to a more meaningful conclusion.

The public is often fooled by simplified statistics, to get it into the direction an interested party wants it to move at.

In other words: that simple graphic - for the time being means nothing. It could be that some defender of death penalty just arranged it while ignorring the statistical background analysis, knowing that it would catch people's eyes and that most would willingly interpret it the way you just did yourself. Even if the counting results are correct - it still does not mean anything. It is bad statistical procedure, and bad academical procedure. It could be very different. Maybe more police personnell (just an example). Less poverty leading to less robberies with murder. Less alcohol or less love affairs leading to murderings commited as crimes of passions. Or a love&justice epidemic brought out. Who knows...

As my old statistics prof time and again was preaching us: "A statistical mean value is absolutely worthless if given without a couple of additional discriptive values, such as variance, and the like." Right he was.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

It's ten years ago, and so I do not have it all on my mind anymore. But we even had very different statistics for the same time period about the same country!

BTW, your graphs only describe a correlation, somewhat (not really, but you emphaisze the link between two variables without further elaboratin it). Every academic trained in statistics will tell you that a correlation never - NEVER - tells you something about a causal link (nor does the display of just two graphs). A correlation coefficient (or the two graphs shown) only tells you something about to what degree the two variables tend to show "linked" values. WHY they do that is a completely different story. In your graphic it means that the fact that the two graphs in your interpretation mirror each other's meaning, does not autimatically mean that the one variable (number od death sentences) is causing the result of the other (crime rate). Like if you find a correlation between hair colour and size of shoes does not mean that the colopur of your hair has an influence on the size of your feet. the drop in crime rate could be casue by very different things, and the graoh of executions simply is a coincidence. You need far more statistical analysis and an elaboration on the raw data to come to a more meaningful conclusion.

In other words: that simple graphic - for the time being means nothing. It cpould be that some defender of death penalty just arranged it wshile ignorring the statistical background analysis, knowing that it would catch people's eyes and that most would willingly interpret it the way you just did yourself. But that is bad statistical procedure, and bad academical procedure. It could be very different. Maybe more police personnell (just an example). Less poverty leading to less robberies with murder. Less alcohol or less love affairs leading to murderings commited as crimes of passions. Who knows...

As my old statistics prof time and again was preaching us: "A statistical mean value is absolutely worthless if given without a couple of additional discriptive values, such as variance, and the like." Right he was.

Note the source - the very org that keeps this kind of data in the US.

I do not buy your arguments without statistical proof that you mention. Post it. Until you do, its all opinion.

-S

[Skybird]

Then take Bortz: "Statistik", for example, chapter on correlation. It all is most elemental statistics, really. Abusing data is extremely easy with statistics, and very tempting.

The crime rates in Germany for 2004, specified for different categories - were quoted with three different sets of values in 2005, in different medias and "official" publications! And all authors were referring to the Bundeskriminalamt!

Those two graphs only claim values. And this is simply too little for the interpretation you try. any scientific work doing such a job would be rejected to get published, or being taken as a base for producing e new drug, or whatever. It is crystal vision only.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Then take Bortz: "Statistik", for example, chapter on correlation. It all is most elemental statistics, really. Abusing data is extremely easy with statistics, and very tempting.

The crime rates in Germany for 2004, specified for different categories - were quoted with three different sets of values in 2005, in different medias and "official" publications! And all authors were referring to the Bundeskriminalamt!

Those two graphs only claim values. And this is simply too little for the interpretation you try. any scientific work doing such a job would be rejected to get published, or being taken as a base for producing e new drug, or whatever. It is crystal vision only.

Now I understand what you are after - yeah took this with criminal law - there is a difference between statistical - reported to police - not reported - yadda yadda yadda. THis data would be from 'police' data.

This really doesn't effect the above graph simply because you are not talking about someone who got their purse stolen and didn't bother to report it. You are talking about 'dead' bodies - something that is not a 'reporting issue' since the victim doesn't have to talk (or as I should say, does a lot of talking through forensics) when they are dead - the police already know that.

So yeah, you argument works against someone that got hit in the eye and didn't report it, but doesn't work against a murder. That is why the above graph is valid. The death penalty was reinstated because of data as shown above.

-S

[Yahoshua]

Just throwing this out there. (I already have my opinion on the DP long before this post, and nothing about it was gonna change so, have fun in the bullpen ya'll).

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.../nblair122.xml

[Skybird]

Subman,

No, you do not understand what I am after. You have given two variables. Number of executions, and number of murderings per head of population. All nice and well. But every scientist who would conclude by that that the one variable influences the other, would be laughed about, because for such a conclusion the type of data you quote simply is not good enough. You conclude on a causal connection, that is not backed by that data. The link between both variables that you conclude by the look of the two graphs - is in your eye only. There is no causal explanation that these two variables would support. Maybe it is there in reality, but the graphs and numbers do not allow you to take that as a given fact. So far, you just believe it. If that causal context is given, it would be needed to prooven by according statistical data you have won in experiment or by research, and even additonal variables, that the graphics simply does not contain.

Honestly, not kidding you, but there is not that conclusion in that graph that you want to see in it. The graphs only describe the up and down of two variables over time. It is tempting to see them interacting, for it matches your hypothesis, but the type of data does not support that. They do not say the slightest thing about wether both variables are related to each other, or not. They are purely descriptive, they describe something like a correlative context only, not a causal one. You may think this is something minor, or just a cheat, but it is not, not by logic, and not in science and statistics. Graphs like the one you have given we had been warned about time and again in statistic classes. If during the statistic exam I would have made a causal conclusion on the basis of that low-quality data that effectively describes only a correlation, it would have been game over for me. A correlation, even a highly significant one that is close to 1 or -1, never means a causal connection by itself, you need to do different statistical work if you want to proove that causal connection. You need additonal processing of the raw data if you have a high correlation that makes you believe that eventually this might be a hint that there is a causal connection, and the more variables are involved, the more work it becomes.

Such statistics and graphs like this one are given because the author does not think about what he is doing or actually does not know it (the trap you just fell for yourself is very easy and tempting to step into), or he knows it but wants to fool the reader. The data only hint at that there might be a connection between variables, but not of what kind that connection is, if it is a mutual influence or not, if a third or even more variables are involved that mediate between the primary two.

I hated statistics back then, and I still hate it today, and now I hate you becasue you made me going back to it all!!! No more comment on statistics from me. The more sophisticated stuff I already have forgotten anyway.

[scandium]

I'd brought the statistical thing up only to say I wouldn't be surprised if there was a correlation between a state's practice of capital punishment and an actually higher rate of homicides compared to those that do not. But as Skybird correctly points out, correlation does not equal causation and you would still need to look at more than two variables to even establish any serious correlation.

More meaningful than any simple graph would be studies done on this by independent, respected criminologists. I'm sure they've been done, though perhaps not definitive (because there are so many variables involved when trying to find this kind of causal relationship), and can probably even be found on the 'net. Maybe I'll look later out of curiousity.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Subman,

No, you do not understand what I am after. You have given two variables. Number of executions, and number of murderings per head of population. All nice and well. But every scientist who would conclude by that that the one variable influences the other, would be laughed about, because for such a conclusion the type of data you quote simply is not good enough. You conclude on a causal connection, that is not backed by that data. The link between both variables that you conclude by the look of the two graphs - is in your eye only. There is no causal explanation that these two variables would support. Maybe it is there in reality, but the graphs and numbers do not allow you to take that as a given fact. So far, you just believe it. If that causal context is given, it would be needed to prooven by according statistical data you have won in experiment or by research, and even additonal variables, that the graphics simply does not contain.

Honestly, not kidding you, but there is not that conclusion in that graph that you want to see in it. The graphs only describe the up and down of two variables over time. It is tempting to see them interacting, for it matches your hypothesis, but the type of data does not support that. They do not say the slightest thing about wether both variables are related to each other, or not. They are purely descriptive, they describe something like a correlative context only, not a causal one. You may think this is something minor, or just a cheat, but it is not, not by logic, and not in science and statistics. Graphs like the one you have given we had been warned about time and again in statistic classes. If during the statistic exam I would have made a causal conclusion on the basis of that low-quality data that effectively describes only a correlation, it would have been game over for me. A correlation, even a highly significant one that is close to 1 or -1, never means a causal connection by itself, you need to do different statistical work if you want to proove that causal connection. You need additonal processing of the raw data if you have a high correlation that makes you believe that eventually this might be a hint that there is a causal connection, and the more variables are involved, the more work it becomes.

Such statistics and graphs like this one are given because the author does not think about what he is doing or actually does not know it (the trap you just fell for yourself is very easy and tempting to step into), or he knows it but wants to fool the reader. The data only hint at that there might be a connection between variables, but not of what kind that connection is, if it is a mutual influence or not, if a third or even more variables are involved that mediate between the primary two.

I hated statistics back then, and I still hate it today, and now I hate you becasue you made me going back to it all!!! No more comment on statistics from me. The more sophisticated stuff I already have forgotten anyway.

I understand what you are saying, but people who have given the very subject a much harder look than what you and I have, and who know a hell of a lot more about it than you or I, say these numbers do correlate based on the data provided. So you can say this or that, but in the end, we mean nothing compared to people who study this for a living. The grpah I provided is done by our own criminal justice system, byt the very people who are typically biased towards abolishing the death penalty! So you tell me? Anyway, they have more data than what you see here and it is all over there website, so you can check it out for yourself.

The point is, it is easy to discount what I say using your ideas on statistics, and I hear what you are saying since there is some grey area that is allowed to fluctuate in there I'm sure, but the data is not as simple as one versus the other in this case. The two have been studied extensively.

If we follow your idea to a T, might as well throw out all graphs and measures in this world because they are meaningless to compare with one another.

-S