Hasan found guilty of premeditated murder in 2009 Fort Hood rampage

[The Mad Monk]

Buddha.

[Lorizael]

Yeah, but then Siddhartha goes on to say 3 other things I don't think BK would particularly agree with, especially the last one.

[DinoDoc]

Is that Jesus, Lewis, or Chesterson?

The Man in Black. I'm a little surprised that Ben is quoting the Princess Bride here though. The better argument here IMO if one were a mind to support the death penalty for Hassan is simply that it would be a just end for his particular acts of perfidy. The vengeance motive here would argue for keeping him alive and in prison for the rest of his life and thus deny him the "martyrdom" he seeks.

[Ben Kenobi]

I'm a little surprised that Ben is quoting the Princess Bride here though. The better argument here IMO if one were a mind to support the death penalty for Hassan

That's where you go wrong, DD.

God has sovereignty. If God wants him to die - he will die.

[Ben Kenobi]

Is that Jesus, Lewis, or Chesterson?

"Try to exclude the possibility of suffering which the order of nature and the existence of free-wills involve, and you find that you have excluded life itself” - CS Lewis.

"Who among us has been so loved by the world that he would want to stay?" - Also CS Lewis, but I would have to check that again. I believe it's Mere Christianity.

"No agonies can be too great to buy the right to say to this accuser, 'We also have suffered.” and that's Chesterton.

As for Christ himself. Matthew 10 says it best.

[Aeson]

We should just deport him. Via catapult. From Fort Hood. Then the blood won't be on our hands. Let God decide where the chips will fall ...

[Aeson]

"Try to exclude the possibility of suffering which the order of nature and the existence of free-wills involve, and you find that you have excluded life itself” - CS Lewis.

Uttered no doubt while not getting sodomized by a broken bottle.

[giblets]

The trouble with putting mass shooters to death is that on some level they are probably mentally defective. Where's the justice in killing a crazy person who snapped? It makes more sense to put someone to death when they rationally decide to do something horrible for their own self interest but end up getting caught.

[Elok]

The Man in Black. I'm a little surprised that Ben is quoting the Princess Bride here though. The better argument here IMO if one were a mind to support the death penalty for Hassan is simply that it would be a just end for his particular acts of perfidy. The vengeance motive here would argue for keeping him alive and in prison for the rest of his life and thus deny him the "martyrdom" he seeks.

At first I thought you meant Johnny Cash--but I can picture him singing something like that, at least in his later years. Question, though: how do you define justice or desert? I don't think I've ever really believed in such a thing, since it seems to refer only to the balancing point between our hateful/vengeful instincts and our sense of mercy. Even assuming that our vengeful impulses should be indulged at all, that balancing point is bound to be subjective, and that's one thing justice is never supposed to be. I suppose I could believe in a just God, who somehow declares a clear metaphysical correspondence between act performed and reward or punishment deserved, but only in the same sense that I can believe in a God who is three and one simultaneously. Why should a person earn X amount of pain for his actions, but no more or less? I don't get it.

Just realized this is my second extremely broad philosophical request for a definition in about ten minutes. I'm going to go ahead and blame the Benadryl.

[DinoDoc]

I don't think I've ever really believed in such a thing, since it seems to refer only to the balancing point between our hateful/vengeful instincts and our sense of mercy.

God can forgive people of their transgressions. What does that have to do with the State? Seriously, what purpose do you envision incarcerating a man paralyzed as a direct result of his actions if not to enact societal retribution against him.

Why should a person earn X amount of pain for his actions, but no more or less? I don't get it.

Why has society decreed that a person who commits offense x has to suffer y sentence? I don't get it.

[Elok]

Ideally, we would imprison people for the purposes of rehabilitation or to serve as a disincentive to others. The "just" sentence, to my way of thinking, would be the one most likely to accomplish both. In practice, we mostly do it out of vengeance, and our hellish prisons rehabilitate nobody.