If the court’s known inaccuracy about a defendant’s state of mind is sufficient to explain why we don’t treat people who break a law differently based on the court’s beliefs about their knowledge of the law, it is also sufficient to explain why we don’t treat people who break a law differently based on the court’s beliefs about other states of mind, such as the difference between voluntary and involuntary manslaughter.
Unfortunately, that second thing turns out to be false… we do treat those people differently.
When an explanation turns out to explain falsehoods just as easily as truths, I don’t consider it an adequate explanation for those truths.
I chose my words carefully: I said “avoid it wherever possible”. Some distinctions will naturally fall on the side where it’s deemed appropriate/necessary, generally, as in the case of manslaughter, when the difference is of enormous perceived moral significance.
So, if the “ignorance of the law is no excuse” principle were repealed by some culture C, would that surprise you, or would you merely consider it a demonstration that punishing people who are ignorant of the law is of enormous perceived moral significance to members of C?
It would greatly surprise me if any culture viewed the possibility of punishing an accidental crime, no matter how severe, as worse than allowing people guilty of serious crimes to go unpunished using a specious claim of ignorance.
For my own part, I would find that no more surprising than discovering a culture that viewed the punishing of an innocent person as worse than letting a guilty person go free.
I view that as basically the same, and would consider that, also, to be highly surprising. No culture I’m aware of ever took an absolutist stance on that issue, in either direction. Largely because it’s incredibly impractical.
I’m not precisely sure what you mean by “absolutist” here, but I would certainly agree that for every culture there is some (P1,P2) for which that culture accepts a P1 chance of punishing an innocent person over a P2 chance of letting a guilty person go free.
Basically, every culture ever is such a culture to an extent, so the only sense in which it could be a discovery would be if a culture had (P1,P2)=(epsilon,1-epsilon) or (P1,P2)=(0,1). Which I would consider highly surprising.
Yes, which is why I said I would agree this is true for every culture.
if a culture had (P1,P2)=(epsilon,1-epsilon) or (P1,P2)=(0,1). Which I would consider highly surprising.
Yes, I would consider that surprising as well. If that’s what you mean by an absolutist stance, I agree with you that no culture took an absolutist stance on this issue, and that doing so is incredibly impractical.
But… consider two hypothetical criminal justice systems, J1 and J2, for which generally-accepted statistical studies demonstrate that J1 acquits 30% of guilty defendants and convicts 1% of innocent ones, and J2 acquits 1% of guilty defendants and convicts 30% of innocent ones.
Given a randomly selected culture, I cannot confidently predict whether that culture prefers J1 or J2. (Can you?)
Given a culture that prefers J1 to J2, all else being (implausibly) equal, I would comfortably describe that culture as viewing the punishing of an innocent person as worse than letting a guilty person go free. (Would you?)
I would not consider discovering C1 particularly surprising. (Would you?)
I claim that their (known-but-unquantified) inaccuracy is sufficient to explain it. When you know a tool is flawed, you avoid it wherever possible.
If the court’s known inaccuracy about a defendant’s state of mind is sufficient to explain why we don’t treat people who break a law differently based on the court’s beliefs about their knowledge of the law, it is also sufficient to explain why we don’t treat people who break a law differently based on the court’s beliefs about other states of mind, such as the difference between voluntary and involuntary manslaughter.
Unfortunately, that second thing turns out to be false… we do treat those people differently.
When an explanation turns out to explain falsehoods just as easily as truths, I don’t consider it an adequate explanation for those truths.
I chose my words carefully: I said “avoid it wherever possible”. Some distinctions will naturally fall on the side where it’s deemed appropriate/necessary, generally, as in the case of manslaughter, when the difference is of enormous perceived moral significance.
So, if the “ignorance of the law is no excuse” principle were repealed by some culture C, would that surprise you, or would you merely consider it a demonstration that punishing people who are ignorant of the law is of enormous perceived moral significance to members of C?
It would greatly surprise me if any culture viewed the possibility of punishing an accidental crime, no matter how severe, as worse than allowing people guilty of serious crimes to go unpunished using a specious claim of ignorance.
OK, that answers my question, thanks.
For my own part, I would find that no more surprising than discovering a culture that viewed the punishing of an innocent person as worse than letting a guilty person go free.
I view that as basically the same, and would consider that, also, to be highly surprising. No culture I’m aware of ever took an absolutist stance on that issue, in either direction. Largely because it’s incredibly impractical.
I’m not precisely sure what you mean by “absolutist” here, but I would certainly agree that for every culture there is some (P1,P2) for which that culture accepts a P1 chance of punishing an innocent person over a P2 chance of letting a guilty person go free.
Basically, every culture ever is such a culture to an extent, so the only sense in which it could be a discovery would be if a culture had (P1,P2)=(epsilon,1-epsilon) or (P1,P2)=(0,1). Which I would consider highly surprising.
Yes, which is why I said I would agree this is true for every culture.
Yes, I would consider that surprising as well. If that’s what you mean by an absolutist stance, I agree with you that no culture took an absolutist stance on this issue, and that doing so is incredibly impractical.
But… consider two hypothetical criminal justice systems, J1 and J2, for which generally-accepted statistical studies demonstrate that J1 acquits 30% of guilty defendants and convicts 1% of innocent ones, and J2 acquits 1% of guilty defendants and convicts 30% of innocent ones.
Given a randomly selected culture, I cannot confidently predict whether that culture prefers J1 or J2. (Can you?)
Given a culture that prefers J1 to J2, all else being (implausibly) equal, I would comfortably describe that culture as viewing the punishing of an innocent person as worse than letting a guilty person go free. (Would you?)
I would not consider discovering C1 particularly surprising. (Would you?)