As I deduce it from reality, the death penalty is the time delayed procedure of self-defense as executed by the representatives of the victim (or victims) who, at the time of the incidence and due to the then existing circumstances, was unable to defend itself from the willful murderous attack.

The execution of the death penalty by the very humane procedure of putting the condemned to sleep, followed by a lethal injection of poison, corresponds to the Objectivist consideration that it is the attacker and not the victim who breaks the law that nobody has a right to initiate an act of violence against another person or persons (“The Objectivist Ethics”).

Further on, as per Objectivism’s indication, it corresponds to the government to take charge of the execution since the defense of the right to life of the individual attacked is the main and sole duty of government (“The Nature of Government”).

The death penalty does not constitute a vengeance nor is it to be considered as a deterrent to further willful murders, the accent falling on “willful”. Hence, neither an accidental killing nor a killing in the heat of passion can be considered to be a murder.

The lengthy procedures following the condemnation to the death penalty and the execution itself, which characterizes the American procedures of justice, is more than sufficient to proof the correspondence between the murder and the victim and also to avoid a judicial error, thus reducing such a possibility to the absolute minimum.

In accordance, it surprises me greatly that some individuals who generally defend and promote Objectivism, should oppose the death penalty.

Manfred

I am one of those barbaric savages who still roam the world and only think of protecting the VICTIMS.

Mr. Letendre:

1)      Accidental killing: As an example, this is what relates generally to what happens in a car accident.

2)      Willful murder, also called “planned killing”. Here we find an evident purpose in relation to the murder. The killer has the declared (in his mind) purpose of killing the selected target for a given reason (For example: Gangster warfare or serial killers); sometimes he “studies” the victims habits or, during a burglary, decides to kill the victims to hide his own identity (for example: “In Cold Blood”, as described by Truman Capote is such a case).

3)      Killing in the heat of passion (also called crime of passion) or the heat of an argument. The simplest case is a brawl in a bar where two or more patrons drank more than what is recommendable, get involved in a discussion and then one of them kills his opposite. When couples are involved this happens often when one decides to leave the other and tells him so. Since the one being left cannot face the fact that he (or she) will now have to live without the person loved he falls into an immediate rage and kills the one who wants to leave or hits so hard that the blow kills. These, of course, are the simplest cases, the ones that are frequently reported in the newspaper. No pre-planned purpose is involved in this third type of killing, so it falls into a category of its own. Emotions overcome thinking and the killer looses for a second the consciousness of what he is doing. Immediately after the killing he repents what he has done. This also refers to brawls where one of those involved has a bad fall against any surface (such as the edge of a table) that proves to be fatal to him.

Manfred

Mr. McGovern:

You wrote: On the basis of your argument, I take it that you would not object to giving up your own life were you, by chance, wrongfully convicted of a capital crime?

Well, man has, as they say, a contract signed with Death (and) in every corner a bad surprise expects him, as Argentine author Jorge Luis Borges said. Yes, Mr. McGovern, I would give up my life if I were wrongfully convicted of a capital crime, but I would not give up fighting every millimeter of the remaining time up to execution to prove that I was not the killer. I would involve fingerprinting, DNA curriculum (I am sure that in the very near future science will also discover that DNA can produce a profile for character and habits recognition) and every possible and available criminological tool to find out my innocence. I would NOT give up, but I would – as I have always done – accept that bad luck or bad circumstances brought me to the bizarre situation of having been considered to be a killer, though personally knowing that I’m not. I myself haven’t had many “lucky chances” in my life (to not say I had none) but this never moved me to point at society and say: “Society is the culprit”. If I were to do so I wouldn’t be an Objectivist.

Perhaps this doesn’t suit you, but I don’t dodge nor ever did and I stand by my words.

Manfred

Mr. Erickson:

You wrote: Now there's a optimistic determinist for you! No room for free will there. Think of all the fun sorting babies that will go on then. Murderers over here, nobel prize winners over there, middle of the roaders in the middle of course.

Whether you like it not we are all both a  part and a product of Nature and Nature operates in accordance to a set of physical and chemical laws and its combinations. Out of this and in a totally automatic procedure evolution developed. We could make this now very complicated indeed but since I’m no biochemist I will leave it as simple as possible. Evolution operates through the activity of the combinations of 20 amino acids who, in turn, are a product of triplets composed of pairs of adenine-thymine (or uracil, depending on the level we observe) and cytosine-guanine. As I said we can complicate quite a bit but for a fast and very entertaining description of it there are some books by a man I consider to be a really big genius and who was, while he was still alive, called Isaac Asimov. Please, please, read the books he wrote about DNA or those written by others on the same stuff.

We cannot avoid being made of DNA. It contains, in the form of chemical instructions, all that we are. It’s a determinate fact and we just can’t avoid it. We have however, through bodily exercise, through the food we consume, etc. a certain amount of power over what DNA makes of us. And, as you will see at the end of this reply, even far more that that. Hence, we may have DNA strings that determine that our body suffers or will suffer of diabetes and, since DNA’s highest product is our brain, we can even create medicines to control this or other illnesses.

So DNA is the ground structure of what we are. If you have read Ayn Rand, whom I consider the greatest genius that ever existed and humanity will ever have because of the extraordinary deductive reasoning she accomplished, you will know that while all other living beings just have to obey what DNA “says” we have the power – and, believe me, this REALLY IS POWER – to say “NO!”. “No, I will NOT do this” or “No, I will NOT do that” even if DNA is pushing us. For we, Mr. Erickson, are the only living substance (at least on this planet, I sure hope there are more out there in the universe) THAT IS NOT SUBJECT TO DETERMINISM.

As just said, we cannot avoid being what we are but we have the power to say “NO” and it is precisely this what obliges us to have a code of conduct for our activities. Only if we renounce that power, only if we keep being bodily humans but in everything else we decide to behave like low animals (as unfortunately too many people roaming in the world are) we will be subjected to determinism.

It is, as Ayn Rand clearly established, our capacity to decide what allowed us to cross the barrier that separates us from determinism. Nature brought us to that point and at it it “told us”: “This is how far I can go, as from here on humans take over. Control is yours.”

So I don’t see why “knowing” what each of us IS will determine who will be placed in the category of “Murderer” or “Nobel prize”. Sure, if we submit to idiots like Marx, Stalin, Hitler or Genghis Khan for that matter, we will stop being humans, but not if we decide for ourselves. I and my wife taught our offspring to become a man useful to himself (which, due to the laws of the market, also makes him useful to others) and there was a man in the southern part of the United States who sent a young slave to the university. And, do you know what? This small black youngster made himself one of the most important man for the world, for he was Washington Carver, who developed a new procedure of land cultivation and produced out of new breeds of potatoes and peanuts some 300 types of synthetic products which included inks and soaps and even replacements for milk and cheese! So the next time you eat a handful of American salted peanuts, think that you owe these calories that sustain your body to a black man.

So, you see, knowing what each of us is isn’t bad at all. On the contrary, it is extraordinarily useful, for it will allow each one of us to know his potential capacities so he can apply them to trace his path of life in the most convenient direction… where, who knows, a Nobel prize could be waiting, a Nobel prize the man in question would never have thought to be in his way if he hadn’t known his faculties better. But by knowing his DNA profile he took the right track.

Of course we need a moral guide for all this, I’ve said this before, but that’s what Ayn Rand provided when she decided to deduce Objectivism from reality. And that’s why I’m an Objectivist, you see, and not a determinist as you seem to consider the only possibility for us humans. For you see, we have Free Will but we have to know where and how to apply it, and knowing our DNA profile will surely do much to help us in that very difficult task.

Manfred

Mr. Erikson:

I thank you for your comments. Our exchange of communications has surely cleared the various aspects where you and I seemed to disagree at first.

I myself are no friend of government either. Governments have, through all ages, proved to be basically fiendish of freedom loving, peaceful living and productive human beings. Unfortunately for the time being we have to live with it.

However, I have ideas of my own on a completely different way of handling human affairs at the public level. It is not anarchism in the common sense of the term and yet it is not government either. It is what I call an Administration of the Means of Defense of the Rights of the Individual. Through several years I have prepared a long writing (some 70 pages long) which incorporates this idea and which I detail specifically in it, though, being as I am, I always start at the beginning because any idea relates –or at least should – relate to antecedent bases (I hear already the wailing of my wife as I write these lines: “Don’t you start again with what happened before the Big Bang happened!”).

The writing I refer to is called “Ayn Rand, I and the Universe”, it covers all the branches of philosophy and, thus, also politics, (which corresponds to the theme “Government”) but I don’t offer it to SOLO for publication for it would be too much for them to accept such a long “piece of thinking”.

It might very well be that you may not agree with all it contains. However, I offer you to send it as an enclosure to an e-mail should you like to provide a suitable address whereto I could send it. Else, since I have Mr. Rowlands e-mail address, I could send the writing to him and ask him to forward it to you. In this way you would not have to disclose your e-mail address to me. Whatever you decide, the offer stands firm.

Your reply will be welcomed.

Best regards,

Manfred

P.S.: By the way and please don’t feel embarrassed, but my name is Schieder (Sorry, German names are not the easiest).

Luke, I'd certainly be interested to  read that.