[ExI] free-will, determinism, crime and punishment

[gts]

On Wed, 22 Aug 2007 02:36:02 -0400, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:

> I admit to being confused on this point as well. Speaking of
> deterrence alone, which consequence of conviction is more
> to be feared:  death or a life sentence?

Curiously, states that impose the death penalty have higher homicide rates  
than those that don't. And the differences are quite large.

The total number of yearly executions rose over the last ten years.  
Although this increase in executions correlated with a decreased national  
homicide rate, suggesting a possible deterrence effect, it's also true  
that during this time the gap between the murder rate in death penalty  
states and non-death penalty states grew progressively larger. By 2005 the  
murder rate was a whopping 46% higher in death penalty states than in non  
death penalty states!

This is based on FBI statistics. See this page for some interesting data,  
charts and graphs...

See http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/php/article.php?scid=12&did=168

-gts