Comparing The Death Penalty And Moral Responsibility

Determinism and Moral Responsibility Does it make sense to impose the death penalty? Reinstatement of the death penalty is a famous topic that has been argued across nations for many years. There is no right or wrong decision of whether or not to reinstate the death penalty because there are strong beliefs and opinions supporting either side. Even though there are strong beliefs and opinions supporting both sides, I still believe that death penalty should be imposed. The reason is that I believe everybody is responsible for their own actions and the person that committed a crime must be severely punished. I am also a believer of the current justice system. When our justice system found a person is guilty, there will be good amounts
evidence that supports the finding. Therefore, when our justice system found a person is guilty, it is not likely that the person is innocent. One of the major beliefs in philosophy that support the reinstatement of death penalty is Moral Responsibility. In contrast, one of the major beliefs that do not support the reinstatement of death penalty is Determinism.
According to Wikipedia, Moral Responsibility is the “status of morally deserving praise, blame, reward, or punishment for an act or omission, in accordance with one’s moral obligations.” In other words, Moral Responsibility is a belief in philosophy that indicates a person should get the corresponding reward, punishment, praise, or blame in connection to person’s right or wrong action.
Of course, in Moral Responsibility, the person should get praise or reward when the person did something good and the person should get blame or punishment when the person did something bad or omission of doing something good (“Moral Responsibility”). For instance, a person did not serve his or her Moral Responsibility if the person runs away instead of trying to save a child inside the burning car or calling the police for help after witnessing a huge car accident. Omission of saving the child from harm and calling the police for help is the person Moral Responsibility even though the person is not legally responsible in doing so. The person is not legally responsible since the person would not be liable in our court system for not helping. Undoubtedly, the belief of Moral Responsibility would support the reinstatement of death penalty because the death penalty would be a deserving punishment in connection to his or her wrongdoing since a life was lost due to his or her wrongdoing. In contrast, Determinism is the “philosophical proposition that every event, including human cognition
and behavior, decision, and action is casually determined by an unbroken chain or prior occurrences.” In other words, determinism is a belief in philosophy that indicates there is no “free will,” human choice, or consciousness in anything that we do because everything is controlled by external factors. Those external factors include our past and present experiences, the environment, social circumstances, genetic endowment, and god. Based on these external factors, our future behavior, decision, and action are all foreseeable or predictable (Wikipedia, “Determinism”). For this reason, according to determinism, even if a person is given a choice and the person chooses one thing over another, he or she did not really have any choice. The choice that the person thought he or she made is just an illusion since his or her choice is predictable based on external factors. Since everything that a person do is predictable and nobody have any choice, “free will” does not exist. Since “free will” does not exist, then there is no such thing as right or wrong because nobody has a choice of what they do anyways. If there is no such thing as right or wrong, there should be no judgments or punishments for any wrongdoings (Landauer, 2001). Obviously, the belief of determinism would not support the reinstatement of death penalty because nobody should be punished for what they do since there is no “free will” and there is no such thing as right or wrong.
Despite the belief of determinism that do not support the reinstatement of death penalty, I think that it would still make sense to impose the death penalty and punish people for their actions, even if determinism were true.
Determinist believes that human cognition and behavior, decision, and action are determined by outside factors. However, I believe that these outside factors can be easily influenced. As a result, it will change human behavior, decision, and action. I believe imposing the death penalty can indeed affect these external factors. For example, one of these external factors is past and present experiences or Causal Determinism. If the death penalty is imposed in the past and the present, then the possibility of people committing murder would likely to decrease. The reason is that based on the person’s past and present experiences, the death penalty exists and would understand that there are punishments for his or her action. Since the past and present experience has been influenced, his or her decision of committing a murder would likely to change. Another external factor is genetic endowment or Biological Determinism. If the death penalty is imposed, people that got caught committing murder would be punished by the death penalty. If the people that got caught are punished by the death penalty, the number of people with such genetic endowment of committing murder would be lowered. Therefore, since people with such genetic endowment are lowered,
the likelihood of people that will make decision to commit murder will be lowered as well. As a result, it will change the overall human behavior, decision, and action. In addition, the children of criminals that committed murder would not be nurture by those criminals if the death penalty is imposed. The reason is that these criminals have already been punished with death. Even though this won’t change the genetic endowment the children inherited biologically, the possibility of the children to commit the same crime as their parents would likely to decrease since the children would not be learning from them. Further, since we already know these children are the children of criminals that committed murder, these children could be more closely watched and more attention could be provided for them. I believe this will help us stop the crime from happening even if the children do commit the same crime as their parents when they grow up. In short, I believe everybody is responsible for their own actions and the person that committed a crime must be severely punished. Therefore, in my opinion, the death penalty should be reinstated. Even though there are conflicting beliefs in philosophy that support and against reinstatement of death penalty, the belief that against imposing death penalty can be easily argued. The conflicting beliefs between Moral Responsibility and Determinism are an example of conflicting beliefs in philosophy that support and against reinstatement of death penalty. Determinist believes that human cognition and behavior, decision, and action are determined by outside factors. However, I believe these outside factors can be easily influenced by applying necessary punishment for people’s wrongdoing. Although determinism can be easily argued, there are still arguments for people to accept determinism. The “Argument from Alternative Possibility” is one of the arguments accepting determinism. According to the Argument from Alternative Possibility, all human behavior can only be uncaused, self-caused, or caused by something else. However, human behavior cannot be uncaused or self-caused because nothing can occur without a cause and no act can cause itself. Therefore, by process of elimination, human behavior must be caused by external factors (“Determinism,” Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics).

References

“Determinism.” Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics. 10 May 2013.
< http://www.ovrlnd.com/Apologetics/Determinism.html>

“Determinism.” Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. 7 May 2013. < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Determinism>

Landauer, Jeff and Rowlands, Joseph. “Determinism” Copyright 2001. Importance of Philosophy. 10 May 2013.

“Moral Responsibility.” Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia. 9 May 2013. < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_responsibility>