The entire tradition of Western law is predicated on intent.

in ethics •  2 years ago 

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I'm starting to think that the factor of intent is one of the more incoherent components of a lot of people's moral calculations. It's an after thought for seemingly most people; but, it shouldn't be.

A person who runs another person over with his or her car with intent to kill goes to prison while a person who runs another person over because his or her foot slipped is civilly liable. This is also why I still think that Kim Potter shouldn't be in prison -- she clearly did not intend to cause deadly harm.

I think that this is a major blind spot in a lot of utilitarian ethics that causes a lot of problems in how we operate in the world.

It seems that the majority of the anti-Israel crowd leans on body counts to make their arguments seem coherent; but, that's lazy thinking. Every rocket that Hamas has fired has been fired with the intent of killing whomever they can indiscriminately. Hamas's stated goal is to eradicate the Jews even if it means that a few Muslims have to be blown up in the process. When Israel kills Arab civilians, it's reliably accidental on the part of Israel and commonly designed by Hamas.

At the micro level, the logic of using outcomes as the only moral calculation without including intent makes no sense. If I walk in on three men murdering a friend, and they turn on me, and I pull my gun and kill them, I would be responsible for three dead bodies while they're only responsible for one. Still, it would be moral insanity to say that I was the bad guy in that scenario.

Still, it's a popular mantra to say "No harm, no foul." among people who are trying to defend disgusting human beings.

Maybe you can say that the people who clearly intended to cause harm to Keziah Daum over a damn prom dress didn't succeed; but, they intended to inflict as much harm as they could. Maybe you can say that Antifa hasn't managed to kill many people and the girl who was pepper sprayed for wearing a Make Bitcoin Great Again hat is fine now; but, that doesn't change the fact that these assholes were engaging in potentially lethal behavior and they were fine with the possibility that what they were doing could result in death. Also, yes, pepper spray can be lethal. Any responsible person who educates you on self-defense practices will tell you that it can be lethal. I've had respiratory problems most of my life -- being pepper sprayed could easily kill me.

The reality is that outcomes can be horrible; but, they aren't always illustrative of who you are as a person. If you kill a person by complete accident, or by negligence, or even by recklessness, you've still clearly hurt people and there should be scalable consequences; but, you're still a better person than a person who fully intended to kill someone and failed.

Way back in 1994, The Simpsons gave Sideshow Bob a line in which he says that he's in prison for a crime that he didn't commit, "Attempted murder, now honestly, did they ever give anyone a Nobel prize for attempted chemistry?" That's the logic of these people who dismiss what people wanted to do when they fail to inflict the pain that they wanted to cause. You may not have committed the murder; but, the fact that you intended to commit the murder says something consequential about who you are.

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