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Why not hanging for carrying out the death penalty?



A reminder that in order to limit the discussion it is *not* about the right of wrongs of capital punishment. For the sake of argument it is taken that capital punishment is legal and practiced. This thread is about the - um - least inappropriate method


Please try to stay on topic.

Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: jimbob
 
I think Vicki Lawrence said it best on Mama's Family when she remarked “If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly.”
 
TragicMonkey said:
I think Vicki Lawrence said it best on Mama's Family when she remarked “If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly.”
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Followed by her signature catchphrase, "By nitrogen gas, please?"
 
Thermal said:
Doctors do harm all the time, usually with good intentions. Amputation, for instance. So I think it might be better phrased as fo no net harm, or gratuitous harm. Then you're back to whether executing one net negative guy is a net plus or minus.
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Nonsense.
 
TragicMonkey said:
The only context that matters to healthcare is the healthcare context. Full stop. They're going to fix the broken leg whether it belongs to an innocent child or a convicted killer. They're not going to poison a healthy person to death whether it's an innocent child or a convicted killer. Philosophical musings about the ultimate meaning of harm across a spectrum of contexts and consequences is not considered. That's for Phi 101 class, not medical practice.
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:thumbsup:
 
Bit late to the thread but regarding nitrogen hypoxia you can give it a test run to see if you like it. I was joking an funnin' with some bros using helium and I passed right the **** out. Should they have been of a homicidal nature...well helium disperses quickly .
 
catsmate said:
True. There are pre-packaged euthanasia kits for vets. I knew one who killed his wife with one.
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I know at least one vet who would happily choose the 'blue juice' if their quality of life was sufficiently bad.
 
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At times, the death penalty has been used as a cruel spectacle, with the slow deaths of crucifixion and burning at the stake in public. That type of execution comes from a society that is run by very cruel, vicious men who think that by appearing tough and brutal, they will scare people into submission. The Romans and the C17th Witch finders are obvious examples of that.

When execution is in private and it is quick, such as hanging, that is done in a society which places more emphasis on law and order and civility, such as the UK, when it still had the death penalty in the C20th.

The USA treads a middle path, with slower forms of execution such as gassing, that people can go and see, but are not in public. That reflects on US society, where there it is believed that being cruel and brutal will deter crime, but they want the veneer of being considered a civil society of law and order.
 
Thermal said:
Right, but saying "you need to be removed from society for a set length of time" is not quite the same as kidnapping. Your whereabouts and care are fixed, for instance. "You can no longer exist because you made someone else not exist" carries an inconsistent moral vibe.
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I think it is less inconsistent if you believe in free will, or even in some philosophical limbo where we know somehow that we're not free but must act as if we are, because the choice to kill someone is an act of will while depriving an unwilling person of life is its opposite. The aspect of free will is evident in the fact that we have differing degrees of murder, including manslaughter and negligent homicide, which are not capital.

The religious aspect of execution still pervades the whole process. I was just reading a fairly interesting book by an undertaker, Thomas Lynch, about his role in society, etc., which at the end digressed into moral issues based, clearly, on his Catholic faith, in which, while acknowledging the necessity and overall justification of execution, condemns euthanasia, suicide, abortion and even family planning, with more or less the same brush, as short-circuiting the miracle of life or something. There's a kind of waffling "you do you" vibe,* but it's clear where he stands. I confess that after a few pages, since it was near the end of the book and near the end of a trip where shedding baggage was prudent, I did not read to the very end, but I found it an interesting reminder of the moral dilemma that colors the whole issue.

e.t.a * that includes a kind of equivocating "war and execution are bad and I wish we didn't have to... but life is complicated" attempt to fit what we might consider moral relativism into a system that disallows it.
 
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theprestige said:
No ethical doctor does a harmful amputation. Ethical amputations are not harmful, by definition.
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That's just playing fast and loose with what harm is, and declaring the net benefit to negate the harm done.

My only point was that Do No Harm is borderline meaningless in its ambiguity, and shouldn't be used as a basis for not performing executions.
 
Nessie said:
At times, the death penalty has been used as a cruel spectacle, with the slow deaths of crucifixion and burning at the stake in public. That type of execution comes from a society that is run by very cruel, vicious men who think that by appearing tough and brutal, they will scare people into submission. The Romans and the C17th Witch finders are obvious examples of that.

When execution is in private and it is quick, such as hanging, that is done in a society which places more emphasis on law and order and civility, such as the UK, when it still had the death penalty in the C20th.

The USA treads a middle path, with slower forms of execution such as gassing, that people can go and see, but are not in public. That reflects on US society, where there it is believed that being cruel and brutal will deter crime, but they want the veneer of being considered a civil society of law and order.
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Why is the speed of the execution method important to your analysis?

Also I'm pretty sure gassing was chosen because it was seen as easier to get right than hanging. The original premise of the thread is that hanging was guaranteed quick and painless. I don't think that's been shown, either that the method is so easy to administer that it just works every time, for every hangman, nor that the manner of death is as painless as surmised, even when carried out properly.

Gassing may be slow, but a steady application of humane gas mixtures is almost certainly successful, without requring the same level of technical expertise as hanging. Proper maintenance of the equipment is a necessary hurdle in either case, but after that any functionary with a checklist can consistently perform the procedure to spec. Is the same true of hanging? I don't know. I do know that I'd rather be asleep for ten minutes instead of five, before dying, than be awake and hanging from my neck for ten minutes before dying.
 
Thermal said:
That's just playing fast and loose with what harm is, and declaring the net benefit to negate the harm done.
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A medically necessary amputation does in fact have a net benefit and it does negate the detrimental effect. The word "harm" really has no place in such a medical decision.

Thermal said:
My only point was that Do No Harm is borderline meaningless in its ambiguity, and shouldn't be used as a basis for not performing executions.
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A good thing then that it is not used as a basis for not performing executions. Or do you have evidence that it is?
 
Steve said:
A medically necessary amputation does in fact have a net benefit and it does negate the detrimental effect. The word "harm" really has no place in such a medical decision.



A good thing then that it is not used as a basis for not performing executions. Or do you have evidence that it is?
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Only that which has been posted in this very thread.

But for at least the third time, I've dropped it.
 
Thermal said:
Only that which has been posted in this very thread.

But for at least the third time, I've dropped it.
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So no evidence then. The claim is actually that medical ethics would prevent a medical professional from performing executions. The words "do no harm" a) have no standing in modern medicine, and b) have not been used in this thread as a reason by anyone but you.

And I don't think anyone here would disagree with you that "do no harm", used in isolation, actually is "borderline meaningless in its ambiguity"
 
Steve said:
So no evidence then. The claim is actually that medical ethics would prevent a medical professional from performing executions. The words "do no harm" a) have no standing in modern medicine, and b) have not been used in this thread as a reason by anyone but you.
And I don't think anyone here would disagree with you that "do no harm", used in isolation, actually is "borderline meaningless in its ambiguity"
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If you care to look back, I was responding to another poster who invoked those words as a justification. No, it wasn't "me".
 
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