From a legal standpoint, the whole "genes made me do it" argument is crap. Our genes may make us predisposed towards a certain behavior, but every legal (and moral/ethical) system is operating on the assumption that, whatever the circumstances, we have a choice at some point. I do think however that, in a certain situation, influencing factors have to be taken into account, and genes could be amongst those (though I dont think this cigarette case would be a legitimate use of that kind of argument). But even from a scientific perspective, genes only predispose us towards certain behavior, they dont remove choice. Im my father was an alcholic, I am more likely to be one myself, even if I never met my father in my life, because I am predisposed to become an alchoholic genetically. But not all people with genes that predispose them to be alchoholics are alchoholics, so clearly one has a choice in the matter. Maybe you have to make the choice to never drink anyting in the first place, maybe you have to work a lot harder to quit drinking, but at some point you have a choice about it, even if the genese make that choice much harder.
I mean, you could make a strong argument for example that we dont actually make any real choices at all, and everything going on in our brains is a very complicated cause and effect scenario, but if you actually embrace that as an outlook, you probably shouldn't be in the business of making legal decisions, since morals, ethics and legality are really moot points from that perspective.
And, even supposing we are just biological robots, it still wont do us much good to acknowledge that fact, since that information will, in a cause and effect way, probably have negative results (although negativity would become a meaningless concept at that point I suppose).
Course, Dostoevsky covered all this about 150 years ago with Notes from the Underground and Crime and Punishment, albeit minus the Genes part.
Well, I dont believe we are biological robots in the first place. I was just saying that, even if we were, it probably wouldnt be good to have people who acknowledge that fact as judges. Ultimately, who does what for whatever reason is meaningless in that context, since stuff just is in that scenario, and value judgments are rendered meaningless for the most part, but from the perspective of my values, it would be bad.
People who have a well informed comprehensive understanding of the role of legality in society, and who integrate that into a consistent understanding of legal theory, and whose primary aim is to uphold the law. I dont suffer under the illusion that judges are apolitical, but I do think judges should aim for impartial readings of a case, even though I realize that, especially at higher legal levels, legal reasoning has to be informed by some sort of underlying legal philosophy, which itself is inevitably political in nature. Above all, the aim of the law should be justice, and that means having the best prosecution, best defense, and best judges working in the most equitable manner possible to each do their respective jobs. I actually think the jury system should be changed, and that the current imbalance in defense quality needs to be tinkered with so likelyhood of succesfull prosecution is not inveresly propotional to wealth. In that respect I do think the English legal system has a few things to teach us. But, for the most part, despite the constant media efforts to emphasize seemingly ridiculous legal situations (often times ignoring the results of a case in favor of emphasizing the oddity of a case itself, or ignoring the reasoning behind a decision and making their own uninformed explanation), I do think our legal system works pretty decently for most people (the poor excluded), and is probably one of the more fair legal systems in world history.
People who have a well informed comprehensive understanding of the role of legality in society, and who integrate that into a consistent understanding of legal theory, and whose primary aim is to uphold the law.
I dont suffer under the illusion that judges are apolitical, but I do think judges should aim for impartial readings of a case, even though I realize that, especially at higher legal levels, legal reasoning has to be informed by some sort of underlying legal philosophy, which itself is inevitably political in nature.
I personally prefer legal philosophy that has arisen from secular humanism, based on mutually agreeable law designed to utilize the collective to best protect the interests of the individual, a sort of social-legal derivative of enlightened self interest (which are the legal underpinnings of democracy, and which seperate it from authoritarian style Rule of Law).
We all have an individual interest in having a collective legal body that best reflects and protects our interests, freedoms, and security short term and long term. Since those interests are a naturally evolving thing, I think law has to be open to change with the availability of new information, technolocy and understanding, but I do think certain basic underlying assumptions have to exist for law to have any meaning. Foremost among those is that we, as human beings, are capable of making choices.
I would oppose any ban of any private consensual sexual act between adults, for a variety of reason. I consider the two most important reasons to be as follows:
A) as an individual, I don't want governments to have the power regulate my sex life
B) the private sexual life of any group of consensual partners has no direct impact on me or my life, be they gay, straight or otherwise.
C) The consequences of private consensual sex are the responsibility of the people engaged in it, not the responsibility of the government.
Dogs, by every normal definition of consent, cannot consent, just like a 12 year old can't reasonably be considered to give informed consent. Consent requires rational consideration, which is something that is, at best, limited in all animals.
Now, supposing you (or my dog) could somehow illustrate to me that my dog can in fact give rational consent, then I suppose that would be between you and my dog. But, as it is (dogs not being able to talk for starters), you cant really illustrate that.
I should add, by normal definition of consent, I mean in the context of sexual relations, and a general legal and social understanding of what it means to consent to an act.
Okay I just looked up consent in the dictionary online, here are the results:
con·sent /kənˈsɛnt/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[kuhn-sent] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation -verb (used without object) 1. to permit, approve, or agree; comply or yield (often fol. by to or an infinitive): He consented to the proposal. We asked her permission, and she consented. 2. Archaic. to agree in sentiment, opinion, etc.; be in harmony. -noun 3. permission, approval, or agreement; compliance; acquiescence: He gave his consent to the marriage. 4. agreement in sentiment, opinion, a course of action, etc.: By common consent he was appointed official delegate. 5. Archaic. accord; concord; harmony.
Seriously dude, there is a reason no one considers dictionary citation an acceptable form of argumentation in college writing courses. The terms in a dictionary are superficial in scope, meaning they are the most general explanations of the usage of a term, and fail to encompass specific meaning in a context. Otherwise dictionarys would be millions of pages long, and they would forgoe things like legal dictionaries, science dictionaries, sports dictionaries, and so forth.
Now, I myself made a typical writing mistake that would also be frowned upon. Namely, I failed to define my terms, although in this case I didn't think you would be so pedantic, since I am fairly certain you know what I meant when I said consent. At a minimum, you should have been able to infer my meaning by my statements. Regardless, for the sake of argument, I will clarify my terms. Consent, when referring to sexual relationships in any legal sense, is assumed to mean informed consent. To be informed requires knowledge of the thing, and the consequences of the thing itself, as well as the ability to weigh those considerations at the appropriate time.
So, since I assume you would agree that a dog, and most 12 year olds cannot really make a fully informed decision about sex, and indeed about drinking, or voting, or going to war, it is probably reasonable that these acts are prohibited to those groups.
Of course, if you do think these categories can give consent, I struggle to see why you dont think dogs should have the right to vote, for example, since clearly they are such informed decision makers.
I am not in any way offended by your assumptions about me. In fact, it is in some ways uplifting for you to assume I'm smarter than I actually am. I simply assumed you meant consent in its most basic fundamental usage, which is simply permission.
So if a 12 year old can not grasp the knowledge of sex then could you say the same about a virgin?
Also about the Bible, I could argue from that perspective if you'd like, but I assumed that you would know that I wasn't asking what the Bible said about homosexuals or pedophiles since I didn't ask "What is the Bible's opinion on homosexuals" rather YOUR opinion. So I guess I'm guilty of the same thing as you and for that I sincerely offer my apologies.
So if a 12 year old can not grasp the knowledge of sex then could you say the same about a virgin?
Yes, albeit obviously not experiential. And indeed, I think I mentioned that even some sufficiently mature 12 year olds probably can too, it's just a rarity. Without question, their understanding will be more limited than someone who has had sex, but we have to accept that, at some point virgins will need to have sex if we are to procreate. The primary point however is that they should be capable of real decision making as a standard for consent, which in this case will be imperfect, which I certainly recognize, but that is simply an informational problem that cannot be gotten 'round.
But, I imagine, you agree that there is something qualitatively different about the consent of an adult versus the consent of a child, and the consent of an adult human versus the consent of a dog, and that generally speaking, for purposes legal, consent and agreement should only be legally binding between parties that are aware of the scope of the agreement. I dont think 12 year olds or dogs can really be aware of what it means to have sex in the way an adult can, or what it means to sign a contract, or what it means to vote, or drink alchohol, or sign a lease for that matter.
Now, ideally, the standard of consent would be based on the individual rather than the somewhat arbitrary measure of age, but age is really the only practical way of measuring adulthood in a society as large as ours.
And, for the record, I do think you are an intelligent person, which is why I find it so frustrating when you throw dictionary qoutes at me, because I do assume you know what I mean in cases like this, and since you do otherwise seem quite intelligent, it seems to me you are just doing it to get on my nerves. Obviously I was incorrect in that assesment, and for that I myself apologize. As I may have mentioned to you before, that is a pet peeve of mine.
So then, is the point of this Socratic inquiry just to understand my views? That was what I thought at first, but I was beginning to sense that you were attempting to direct the questioning in a way such as to attempt to get me to trip up, something which in itself doesnt bother me as long as you are actually weighing what I have to say. I was beginning to feel however that maybe you werent really listening so much as trying to achieve some alternative aim, which based on the line of questioning, I assumed was biblical in scope.
I mean, you could make a strong argument for example that we dont actually make any real choices at all, and everything going on in our brains is a very complicated cause and effect scenario, but if you actually embrace that as an outlook, you probably shouldn't be in the business of making legal decisions, since morals, ethics and legality are really moot points from that perspective.
And, even supposing we are just biological robots, it still wont do us much good to acknowledge that fact, since that information will, in a cause and effect way, probably have negative results (although negativity would become a meaningless concept at that point I suppose).
Course, Dostoevsky covered all this about 150 years ago with Notes from the Underground and Crime and Punishment, albeit minus the Genes part.
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Reply
Which law?
Reply
I dont suffer under the illusion that judges are apolitical, but I do think judges should aim for impartial readings of a case, even though I realize that, especially at higher legal levels, legal reasoning has to be informed by some sort of underlying legal philosophy, which itself is inevitably political in nature.
I personally prefer legal philosophy that has arisen from secular humanism, based on mutually agreeable law designed to utilize the collective to best protect the interests of the individual, a sort of social-legal derivative of enlightened self interest (which are the legal underpinnings of democracy, and which seperate it from authoritarian style Rule of Law).
We all have an individual interest in having a collective legal body that best reflects and protects our interests, freedoms, and security short term and long term. Since those interests are a naturally evolving thing, I think law has to be open to change with the availability of new information, technolocy and understanding, but I do think certain basic underlying assumptions have to exist for law to have any meaning. Foremost among those is that we, as human beings, are capable of making choices.
Reply
Reply
A) as an individual, I don't want governments to have the power regulate my sex life
B) the private sexual life of any group of consensual partners has no direct impact on me or my life, be they gay, straight or otherwise.
C) The consequences of private consensual sex are the responsibility of the people engaged in it, not the responsibility of the government.
Reply
Reply
Now, supposing you (or my dog) could somehow illustrate to me that my dog can in fact give rational consent, then I suppose that would be between you and my dog. But, as it is (dogs not being able to talk for starters), you cant really illustrate that.
Reply
Reply
con·sent /kənˈsɛnt/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[kuhn-sent] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
-verb (used without object)
1. to permit, approve, or agree; comply or yield (often fol. by to or an infinitive): He consented to the proposal. We asked her permission, and she consented.
2. Archaic. to agree in sentiment, opinion, etc.; be in harmony.
-noun
3. permission, approval, or agreement; compliance; acquiescence: He gave his consent to the marriage.
4. agreement in sentiment, opinion, a course of action, etc.: By common consent he was appointed official delegate.
5. Archaic. accord; concord; harmony.
Reply
Now, I myself made a typical writing mistake that would also be frowned upon. Namely, I failed to define my terms, although in this case I didn't think you would be so pedantic, since I am fairly certain you know what I meant when I said consent. At a minimum, you should have been able to infer my meaning by my statements. Regardless, for the sake of argument, I will clarify my terms. Consent, when referring to sexual relationships in any legal sense, is assumed to mean informed consent. To be informed requires knowledge of the thing, and the consequences of the thing itself, as well as the ability to weigh those considerations at the appropriate time.
So, since I assume you would agree that a dog, and most 12 year olds cannot really make a fully informed decision about sex, and indeed about drinking, or voting, or going to war, it is probably reasonable that these acts are prohibited to those groups.
Of course, if you do think these categories can give consent, I struggle to see why you dont think dogs should have the right to vote, for example, since clearly they are such informed decision makers.
Reply
So if a 12 year old can not grasp the knowledge of sex then could you say the same about a virgin?
Also about the Bible, I could argue from that perspective if you'd like, but I assumed that you would know that I wasn't asking what the Bible said about homosexuals or pedophiles since I didn't ask "What is the Bible's opinion on homosexuals" rather YOUR opinion. So I guess I'm guilty of the same thing as you and for that I sincerely offer my apologies.
Reply
Yes, albeit obviously not experiential. And indeed, I think I mentioned that even some sufficiently mature 12 year olds probably can too, it's just a rarity. Without question, their understanding will be more limited than someone who has had sex, but we have to accept that, at some point virgins will need to have sex if we are to procreate. The primary point however is that they should be capable of real decision making as a standard for consent, which in this case will be imperfect, which I certainly recognize, but that is simply an informational problem that cannot be gotten 'round.
But, I imagine, you agree that there is something qualitatively different about the consent of an adult versus the consent of a child, and the consent of an adult human versus the consent of a dog, and that generally speaking, for purposes legal, consent and agreement should only be legally binding between parties that are aware of the scope of the agreement. I dont think 12 year olds or dogs can really be aware of what it means to have sex in the way an adult can, or what it means to sign a contract, or what it means to vote, or drink alchohol, or sign a lease for that matter.
Now, ideally, the standard of consent would be based on the individual rather than the somewhat arbitrary measure of age, but age is really the only practical way of measuring adulthood in a society as large as ours.
And, for the record, I do think you are an intelligent person, which is why I find it so frustrating when you throw dictionary qoutes at me, because I do assume you know what I mean in cases like this, and since you do otherwise seem quite intelligent, it seems to me you are just doing it to get on my nerves. Obviously I was incorrect in that assesment, and for that I myself apologize. As I may have mentioned to you before, that is a pet peeve of mine.
So then, is the point of this Socratic inquiry just to understand my views? That was what I thought at first, but I was beginning to sense that you were attempting to direct the questioning in a way such as to attempt to get me to trip up, something which in itself doesnt bother me as long as you are actually weighing what I have to say. I was beginning to feel however that maybe you werent really listening so much as trying to achieve some alternative aim, which based on the line of questioning, I assumed was biblical in scope.
Reply
Leave a comment