Should Death Row Inmates Be Used for Experiments?
- Thread starter zerobudgetgamer
- Start date
Nice trollface, but what does Bleach have to do with this?Madara XIII said:
I'm not saying that any one thing is more or less immoral than another.
Are the above mention crimes terrible? Yes, and far worse than just killing one guy that nobody really likes.
But it's still wrong to kill that one guy.
Besides, little can be reaped from human experimentation that can't be reaped from modern day computer simulations and other forms of controlled research.
The progress we could make is so minimal, it's not worth butchering anyone over.
Besides, you've never seen the eyes of horror before.
It's terrible, watching somebody pass away with fear in their eyes, in my case after an accident. (the EMT's had not arrived yet)
It's like a black stain that haunts you for a while, and then only goes away for stretches of time.
I would prefer it if people measured out their actions better in future, as to avoid unnecessary instances of this.
I have the strangest belief that world gets better in proportion to our ability to decrease the level of horror in the world.
This does not apply to fiction, of course.
Given that Death Row has proven to be ineffective for over 120 cases exclusively from DNA evidence, I would say no.
Given that even if you are found innocent, there are some states where you still need to be pardoned by the governor before you leave death row, and they can't all be bothered with it. Even if they win the Republican primary and have it used against them as a presidential candidate.
Given that even if you are found innocent, there are some states where you still need to be pardoned by the governor before you leave death row, and they can't all be bothered with it. Even if they win the Republican primary and have it used against them as a presidential candidate.
Why is this even a question to consider?
No they should not, there are some things that aren't up for debate. Human rights are named as such because they apply to all humans. ALL. If we take a murderer and torture and kill him for experiments in the style of Dr Vannacut then we are as bad as the murderer, if not worse...
There are some godawful nasty people in this world but we shouldn't sink to their level.
No they should not, there are some things that aren't up for debate. Human rights are named as such because they apply to all humans. ALL. If we take a murderer and torture and kill him for experiments in the style of Dr Vannacut then we are as bad as the murderer, if not worse...
There are some godawful nasty people in this world but we shouldn't sink to their level.
Yes, I would support this. You have to do some pretty bad stuff to get on the death row. Hell, there was a guy who had molested and raped over 20 children in his BASEMENT for about three years, and he was only put away for 18 years. So, yeah. If they're on the death row, they should die.
You are correct that I have thankfully not witnessed someone dying in such a manner. The worst that's happened was to watch a man get shot in the head while driving home and crash next door. But the way you explained yours is indeed powerful and that is something I can only hope I never have to witness.SadakoMoose said:
Simulations can only do so much imo. Secondly that Picture is basically just Mayuri. No trolling intended.
I do however respect your moral convictions upon listening to your reasons and I wish no ill will towards you just because we do not see eye to eye.
"I have the strangest belief that world gets better in proportion to our ability to decrease the level of horror in the world."
If only I could believe in such a thing. If only.
But I hold a different truth
My Truth:
You gentlemen who think you have a mission
To purge us of the seven deadly sins
Should first sort out the basic food position
Then start your preaching, that?s where it begins
You lot who preach restraint and watch your waist as well
Should learn, for once, the way the world is run
However much you twist or whatever lies that you tell
Food is the first thing, morals follow on
So first make sure that those who are now starving
Get proper helpings when we all start carving
What keeps mankind alive?
What keeps mankind alive?
The fact that millions are daily tortured
Stifled, punished, silenced and oppressed
Mankind can keep alive thanks to its brilliance
In keeping its humanity repressed
And for once you must try not to shriek the facts
Mankind is kept alive by bestial acts
Honestly It's a good idea, if they have admitted to their wicked and terrible crimes and are going to be killed anyway then yes tests should be operated on them when others are unwilling. However if it turns out to be 'testing' the new tazers the military where recently supplied then it's cruel and should be happening.
I'm not sure where that poem came from.Madara XIII said:
I'm guessing an Englishman.
They tend to just cue up and bear it when trouble hits.
I don't really see how those acts keep mankind alive...
Unlike, let's say the works of scientist Norman Borlaug or economists like John Maynard Keynes, or politicians like Lyndon Banes Johnson (who, despite what hippies say, was able to get billions for education and civil rights reform.).
Statistically speaking, the homicide rates haven't been this low since the 1950's, and the number of people who can read has been higher than ever.
I'm not saying that certain terrible action haven't resulted in good things, before.
Without the Blitz and WW2 to cause Britain to re-assess it's status as "empire" we wouldn't have had modern Britain.
Think about it:
Pre War Britain: British Raj, Hangings, Forced Sterilization of Gays, No Social Medicine, and causing the 2nd world war (with France's help) by being a dick to Germany during the end of the first one (against the advice of The US government).
Post war Britain: Free India, NHS, Roy Jenkins, Dr. Who
Coincidence?
Even a handful of Nazi doctors made some important findings about pneumonia.
Of course, these were findings that would have been made without the Holocaust, but history is set in stone.
Never the less, I don't see any real advantages to mankind that can be caused PURPOSEFULLY by "bestial" acts.
Far as I've seen, the world only ever seems to be getting better, every day because of man's natural group survival instinct.
This can be seen by people ranging from those believe that man is merely a biological machine, designed only to carry it's historical legacy of DNA or those who believe we carry a higher and intangible purpose with us by virtue of intelligence or some other factor that has made us the most capable species on the planet.
As we are now able to see the world in it's entirety, due to our advances in communication and transport, we now know that we belong to a larger group, and are coming to slowly understand the importance of mutually assured survival despite cultural, economic and geographic disparities.
The human being, now more than ever, must realize he is part of a single great tribe that can only stand to flourish as it unites toward it's most common goal.
Simple existence.
And I seriously don't see "bestial" acts such as the one listed in the OP as being a major part of that movement forward.
Yes, because everyone on death row is completely guilty, and in know way could possibly be falsely accused. Not to mention that it is completely ethical to do experimentation on people, ripping away their human rights. Yea, lets do this.
Of course they should be given the freedom to opt into medical testing. While they're given that freedom, allow them to opt into tests more invasive or involved than the average medical trial. Given they are on death row and providing consent to experimentation, you have the PERFECT test subject. Here you have a man (or woman) who's every activity is strictly scheduled and observed on a daily basis for the remainder of their lives. What you lose in sheer volume of test subjects you gain in the reliability of the data due to the high degree of control over the volunteers' environments.
Also, as mentioned by others, it provides a way for the willing to redeem themselves through contribution to society.
Also, as mentioned by others, it provides a way for the willing to redeem themselves through contribution to society.
Absolutely not. If the prisoners 100% consent to the testing, then sure but you can't force it on them. Simply because they are on death row or life imprisonment doesn't mean they aren't human beings and as such, should be given human rights. This isn't Nazi Germany, after all.
i love joining discussion's late: it's easier to find someone who expresses my opinion perfectly and just quote them. anyway, to add my five cent's:Robert Ewing said:
if there are trials going on with that person, leave em. otherwise, do it. don't waste 'em. alot of people can be helped by those experiments: and in a way, that person on death's row can use the experiments as a way of repenting for what they've done.
while i'm here: i also support stem cell research for the exact same reason. if the babies being aborted, might as well make use of the fetus. at least the fetus's death means something.
Let's put U.S politions up for these experaments.
They've done worse than all of those imates, damning millions of U.S citizens with there endless debt.
They've done worse than all of those imates, damning millions of U.S citizens with there endless debt.
zerobudgetgamer said:
To be honest, I have few real problems with what your suggesting. Just as I have no real problem with making inmates work without pay during their time in prison. There are people, largely left wingers, who complain about "inhumanity" or "slavery" but themselves seem to be fairly detached from reality.
Some of the referances your getting are also rather faulty, but it's not surprising given the political slant of the current educational system. Josef Mengele or the Japanese "Unit 731" didn't perform their experiments on condemned prisoners, the big issue was tied to the ongoing genocides, and the simple fact that they used prisoners of war (ie captured soldiers) as opposed to criminals. There are some important distinctions involved in that. Using some guy who is a prisoner condemned by a jury of his peers, and using say some family of Koreans you abducted off the street of their hometown just because they are Koreans (there was a Manga called "Island" inspired by that, and it included a section explaining the real events including photos of what the Japanese were up to).
See, I'm a big believer that the penelties faced for committing a crime are supposed to act as a deterrant. One of the reasons the US has with crime is that few people are afraid of the system itself, your typical person is more afraid of having to deal with other inmates (and say being raped) than they are of the actual sentence itself. The death penelty isn't all that scary when it takes decades to kill someone, and when it happens 99% of the discussion about it is to make it as humane as possible. Likewise I have no issue with people in prison being forced to work, having them sew, operated mechanical presses, etc.. helps cover the costs, and also helps teach them productive skills.
When it comes to protection against cruel and unusual punishment, I think we really need to dial that back substanially and simply trash a century or so of hippy, liberal precedent. If you look back to the records post 1776 and how our founding fathers interpeted what they wrote, you'll find that this did NOT in any way mean that you couldn't hurt someone or make them suffer. It was intended largely to prevent the development of professional torturers and to create a consistant system of punishment throughout the entire nation, they key word being that the punishment has to be both cruel AND unusual together in order to be prohibited. Meaning that they did things like hangings, flogging, the stocks, tar and feathering, pressing, and all kinds of things, and that was all fine. The guys who wrote the constitution would be probably laughing if you suggested that what they meant was to say ban the use of the lash or stocks because as you can see from their own actions, tbey most certainly did not. The law was to say prevent some guy three towns over from developing his own, special forms of punishment for people. Where say in Boston, Mass. you might wind up being pressed to death for a crime (putting a board over someone, and then putting rocks on top of it a few at a time to slowly crush them to death), but in Hartford,Conn. some guy invents a special flaying machine that keeps someone alive for three days of constant agony that people are subjected to for the same crime. To the way of thinking of our founding fathers the pressing was fine, the flaying machine was not, and the flaying machine was banned because it was not standard practice, and was defined as being cruel in comparison to the already horrendously painful methods being used which were viewed as being sufficient punishment. I mean being pressed to death is horrible enough, that is going to scare the crap out of people, there are worse ways to die, but do you really need them?
In the case of using prisoners for experimentation, I have no inherant problem with it, of course there would have to be some oversight involved in this. Testing a disease cure on someone seems horrible, but fairly reasonable. Vivisectioning someone while they are still alive to play with their active organs and learn more about anatomy isn't called for especially with our level of technology.
Basically you'd have to view it on a case by case basis, I wouldn't recommend a policy where condemned prisoners could just be used for anything scientists want to do, but I could see them being used for a lot of things.
Overall though I do believe it would have to be a policy adopted by the US as a whole to really work within the spirit of the constitution.
I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this... but hey, it's increasingly difficult to get someone sent to death row it seems, and when your dealing with situations where some dude might have raped, tortured, killed, and eaten little girls or whatver, I'm low on sympathy and see no reason why we should be warehousing these schmucks for decades.
The question of "well, what if they are innocent" is going to apply to any prisoner of any level, and at any level of punishment. In the USA at least we already have one of the most liberal court systems to ever exist, our "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" requirement already arguably makes the US legal system something of a joke internationally, and contributes to our crime problems. I pretty much feel that if you get the death penelty in the US, under our system, and with all the limitations in place, it's pretty unlikely that the person is innocent no matter what someone might try and claim years after the fact. If you sentence someone to death, you should just do it instead of wasting tax money.
... we also have these things called aggravating and mitigating circumstances that contribute to the death penelty. In general when someone gets the death penelty it usually means there are aggravating circumstances without any mitigating ones to begin with. Heck, in most states I think that is even a requirement. As a result the guys we're talking about aren't some dudes who just killed someone by accident, or in self defense. Unlike the movies you have to be convicted of something pretty intense to wind up on death row.
An example would be this guy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Bruce_Ross
When I took Criminal Justice, my instructor was a former head of the Connecticut State Police who was involved in this case. Apparently the whole reason Michael Ross got the death penelty was because he apparently killed two of the girls at the same time, and made one of them watch him kill the other one, which was considered an aggravating factor.
This guy spent 18 bloody years on Death Row going through all these appeals after raping and killing his way through New England (8 victims is a lot IRL). Honestly, it might make me a bad person but feel that's kind of ridiculous, and honestly I sort of think using him to say test a new cures for things like malignant testicular cancer, ebola virus, anthrax, and/or other things would have at least caused something positive to come from all of this, and really I don't think it could happen to a nicer guy.
If it's they're own choice, then sure.
I don't see anything wrong with scientific tests being done on them.
They should still be allowed to choose if the tests are done on them though.
I don't see anything wrong with scientific tests being done on them.
They should still be allowed to choose if the tests are done on them though.
Obviously yes. I can't imagine why someone would be sympathetic towards mass murdering psychopaths(or sociopaths).
Save your pity for their victims, who actually deserved it.
Save your pity for their victims, who actually deserved it.