Reflections on the Guillotine (1957) • Hacker News Board

Re: Reflections on the Guillotine (1957)

#51

Post by halperter » Sun, Jul 05, 2026, 7:47 PM UTC

RestlessMind wrote: post #47

halperter wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What criteria would allow for someone to "deserve" death? Is it as a form of revenge, like most "deserved" punishments? Camus believes that state sanctioned revenge just breeds more violence. The death penalty is not a deterrent, it is something that offends the senses, and it is ultimately served on the platter as a criminal getting their just punishment in revenge. Either such a revenge is public, to declare that j…

> What criteria would allow for someone to "deserve" death? As a framework - death penalty should be legalized when a majority members of the society support that as a punishment. When applying that framework - it should be applied for the cases beyond any reasonable doubt. Once you agree on these principles, all other details can be easily negotiated.

I know that the belief in the majority is a core part of our democracy, but I'd like to challenge it for a moment here. First, does common belief make sonething right? Lets say society A has a majority vote that says people who murder are horrible and should be executed. Society B says no, murder is okay, because the majority say its okay. So, is murder right or wrong? The point is that a crowd doesn't always have a right answer. Second, opinions are not homogenous, and popular opinion can be wrong (think geocentric systems, newtonian laws, disease, etc.). A morality by plurality is arbitrary and non-universal which seems to defy the point of moral frameworks.

Re: Reflections on the Guillotine (1957)

#52

Post by halperter » Sun, Jul 05, 2026, 8:00 PM UTC

quantummagic wrote: post #40

halperter wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What criteria would allow for someone to "deserve" death? Is it as a form of revenge, like most "deserved" punishments? Camus believes that state sanctioned revenge just breeds more violence. The death penalty is not a deterrent, it is something that offends the senses, and it is ultimately served on the platter as a criminal getting their just punishment in revenge. Either such a revenge is public, to declare that j…

Camus is just wrong. And the word "murder" is doing a lot of work in hiding the deception. It hides the artificial difference between cases where you cause the death of someone. Murder is used, almost by definition, to classify the _unjustified_ causing of death. But there are many cases where causing of death is justified, and we all agree; for instance you are fine to cause the death of someone who is actively tryi…

Camus does talk about this in I believe part 3. He doesn't have a problem with killing someone who would cause harm to you. His problem is that the framing of the justification of death by the state is after the case, preventing no harm, and in fact creating harm-see comments above and the article. Secondly, assuming the innocence of the victim is put on society so that allows for execution by the state is just incorrect. It is not justice for a victim but a show for an undeserving audience. I don't think I explained it well, so if you have time, I really encourage reading Camus's article. Even if you don't agree, I still find his reasoning and viewpoints interesting.

Re: Reflections on the Guillotine (1957)

#53

Post by RestlessMind » Sun, Jul 19, 2026, 5:30 PM UTC

halperter wrote: post #51

RestlessMind wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What criteria would allow for someone to "deserve" death? As a framework - death penalty should be legalized when a majority members of the society support that as a punishment. When applying that framework - it should be applied for the cases beyond any reasonable doubt. Once you agree on these principles, all other details can be easily negotiated.

I know that the belief in the majority is a core part of our democracy, but I'd like to challenge it for a moment here. First, does common belief make sonething right? Lets say society A has a majority vote that says people who murder are horrible and should be executed. Society B says no, murder is okay, because the majority say its okay. So, is murder right or wrong? The point is that a crowd doesn't always have a…

> The point is that a crowd doesn't always have a right answer... > popular opinion can be wrong

By that logic, all the laws, regulations and norms would possibly be meaningless. So if we were to ignore those, we all would descend into anarchy.

> A morality by plurality is arbitrary and non-universal

In fact, a majority of popular support is a necessary (may not be sufficient) condition for morality of a society. Something is not considered moral if it is not supported by most of the members.

> society A vs society B

irrelevant. Morality based laws in a society generally consider morality only of that society. That's why we have the notion of sovereignty.