In a message dated 2/10/2000 8:36:10 PM EST, sasha1@netcom.com writes:
<< >Of course the real problem here is juridical: is
>he guilty of his crimes, or a victim of mental insanity? Is it a crime
>to do this kind of restructuring? Should Mr. Hyde be punished but not
>Dr. Jekyll?
All punishments depend on personality persistence.
If entities are created/modified/equipped (by talents, ethical fixes,
downloaded knowledge, adjusted mental patterns) specifically fo each task,
and then reconfigured for the next one, the punishment is no longer
revenge (the criminal entity has transformed) nor deterrent...
There can be some other mechanisms, such as requirement that all
compiled entities should be insured by their owners/guardians... >>
Mens rea! Look for the guilty mind, the mind which had the intent to kill.
Those minds are to be stopped. If a mind has been reconfigured after the
fact to no longer be capable of such a crime, then there is no value in
punishing that mind. However, we still can "punish" sometimes that past mind
by not allowing any benefits from the murder to go where that mind wished.
For example, if someone kills for the inheritance, then reconfigures their
mind so they don't remember the desire or act of murder, and further has been
altered so if put in a similar situation would not choose to do so again,
then there is no need for punishment of that person. However, that editted
version of the previous mind should receive none of the ill gotten
inheritance. Of course, killing where the reward is only the death of that
individual can not be so easily handled. In this case, you want to salvage
as much of the murdered person's hopes, dreams, responsibilities, etc. Any
assets once belonging to the guilty mind could be confiscated for that
purpose (such as setting up a scholarship for the descendants of the
deceased, or cloning that person and raising the clone as the deceased would
have liked, etc.).
Glen Finney
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jul 27 2000 - 14:03:40 MDT