[HN Gopher] What were the earliest laws like?
___________________________________________________________________
What were the earliest laws like?
Author : crescit_eundo
Score : 116 points
Date : 2025-07-15 23:55 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (worldhistory.substack.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (worldhistory.substack.com)
| mcphage wrote:
| One thing I've heard historians mention, that is like to know
| more about, is that these law stelae, while impressive, aren't
| actually referenced in legal cases during their time. So they're
| the laws as written, not actually the laws as practiced.
| protocolture wrote:
| I think I read that these might even just be proposals or a
| statement of ideals, especially in Hammurabi's case.
| samrus wrote:
| A bill being condiered by legislative bodies (priesthood)
| parhaps?
| protocolture wrote:
| Not impossible
| ethan_smith wrote:
| Mesopotamian court records from Nippur and Larsa show legal
| decisions often diverged from Hammurabi's code, with judges
| frequently applying local customs and precedent rather than
| citing the written laws.
| samrus wrote:
| Federal versus local authority? Crazy how mesopotamia was
| advanced enough to deal with these problems all that time ago
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I really like that story!
|
| I appreciate it being shared.
|
| I had no idea about this chap.
| w10-1 wrote:
| TLDR: earlier than Hammurabi's eye-for-an-eye justice was
| Urukagina, who presented himself as a savior for the people,
| including getting them out of debt and protecting them from
| corrupt officials. (But OP is most excellent and worth reading.)
|
| It reminded me of Solon's changes in Athens, to broker some
| fairness, wipe prior debts and outlaw debtor's prisons, require
| military service (paid for the lower classes), and of course
| opening decisions beyond to hereditary aristocrats (land owners)
| to those with wealth (traders). In both cases, leaders seemed to
| be responding to stasis borne of economic oppression.
|
| However, ideology is not evidence of justice; both Putin and Xi
| present themselves as champions of the people against the corrupt
| bureaucracy (and discipline their governments via discretionary
| application of high standards).
|
| But the brutality of eye-for-an-eye might obscure the point:
| Hammurabi seems to be distinct in not associating power with the
| person, but establishing settled expectations so people could
| sort out their differences directly (freeing the leader from the
| no-win situation of judging disputes). That makes it easier for
| the laws to continue largely the same, regardless of the style of
| government (much as we in the US and EU still apply English and
| Roman law).
|
| It's a shame our sampling of ancient governance is limited to
| stone and clay tablets from the middle east. There's evidence of
| other societies of a similar sophistication but without the
| hierarchical dependence on gods and beer.
| lwansbrough wrote:
| I'm supposed to believe these were the first guys to make laws?
| Put 10 guys in a small room for a few hours and I guarantee some
| rules will develop. There are thousands of years we're missing
| records for!
| irrational wrote:
| Earliest historical laws. By definition, anything before
| writing is pre-history.
| Defletter wrote:
| I guess that's an interesting distinction: what's the
| difference between a law and a rule. I think there are two main
| differences:
|
| 1. In your example, the group of buddies all created the rules
| and consented to them. This is not true for laws which instead
| invent concepts like the social contract to justify itself.
|
| 2. When you break the law, say murder, the ultimate victim is
| the state. The person you murdered is just evidence in the
| state's case against you. This is why there are Victims Right's
| movements. This is not really true with such buddie rules:
| breaking them may hurt your friends' feelings, but there wont
| really be an equivalent to it harming the social fabric.
|
| 3. Laws imply law enforcement, which implies use of force. Are
| you and your buddies willing to enforce your rules on each
| other with lethal force?
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| The "state" didn't exist for the laws in the article, being a
| much later concept and some of the oldest systems of law we
| have good records for are religious laws like those of the
| old testament. The victim in that case isn't even in society,
| but rather a diety outside it. In case that seems like a
| stretched usage of the word "law", there are instances in the
| prophetic books where God brings lawsuits against the
| israelites.
|
| A simple definition used by anthropologists is a system of
| codes enforced by external parties.
| kybernetikos wrote:
| I think probably the distinction we're making here is just
| one of scale and acceptance. I don't see your distinctions as
| fundamental:
|
| 1. If 9 of the ten friends consent and one doesn't they can
| still be forced to follow the rule the nine friends decided
| on.
|
| 2. Although it's a smaller scale, there absolutely is a
| 'social fabric' that can be harmed in a group of ten friends.
|
| 3. I don't think laws necessitate the use of _lethal_ force,
| but yes, groups of people e.g. in sports or school do
| sometimes use violence to enforce group decisions on their
| members.
|
| In some early societies, there was a basic assumption that
| broadly speaking the head of a household should have the
| right to manage their affairs as they wished. Laws were there
| to mediate between households (rather than individuals) and
| the big benefit they give to justify the loss of freedom is
| the control and management of blood feuds, which otherwise
| can be devastatingly destructive.
| 9rx wrote:
| _> what 's the difference between a law and a rule._
|
| A law is a rule within a system. A rule, however, may exist
| outside of a system. Thus all laws are rules, but not all
| rules are laws.
|
| There is no real difference, though. Just silly semantics.
| Telemakhos wrote:
| > what's the difference between a law and a rule
|
| In ancient Greek, I'm not sure there is one. nomos covers a
| lot of ground that English divides into laws, rules, and
| customs. There are, of course, other terms for each category:
| nomoi for laws; kanones for rules, both in the sense of laws
| that straighten crooked behavior and straightedges for
| drawing straight lines; and kathestota for institutions or
| customs; but nomoi generally does duty for all of them,
| especially in, say, Herodotus, who means all three with the
| word.
|
| The victim of murder is the victim of the murder; in ancient
| Athens, anyone who wanted (o boulomenos, an important concept
| in early democracy) could bring a charge against you, but
| there was no prosecutor for the state. That's why anyone who
| wanted could bring the charge. The idea that the state is the
| victim is a very new phenomenon. There also wasn't much in
| the way of public law enforcement in Athens, at least not in
| terms of a standing police force, which doesn't really come
| around until the eighteenth century.
| jowea wrote:
| > 3. Laws imply law enforcement, which implies use of force.
| Are you and your buddies willing to enforce your rules on
| each other with lethal force?
|
| In the example, assuming they were locked in a bare room,
| maybe they will come up with some situation specific rule
| like "that corner is for pissing". I think it's plausible
| they would enforce that physically. Or at least what I heard
| about prison makes me think that.
|
| But there are also some immemorial rules/laws that they
| wouldn't need to come up with it because everyone already
| knows them, like the ban on unjustified violence, theft and
| rape. I think 10 normal guys would be willing to physically
| enforce those rules on each other with lethal force.
|
| > 2. When you break the law, say murder, the ultimate victim
| is the state. The person you murdered is just evidence in the
| state's case against you. This is why there are Victims
| Right's movements. This is not really true with such buddie
| rules: breaking them may hurt your friends' feelings, but
| there wont really be an equivalent to it harming the social
| fabric.
|
| I think that's a bit of a modern perspective. There are still
| countries that allow private criminal prosecution. And for
| that matter most of civil law does not directly involve the
| state I imagine.
| withinboredom wrote:
| > When you break the law, say murder, the ultimate victim is
| the state.
|
| Umm... aren't they just representing the victim because the
| victim is dead? If you steal, it is the victim who brings
| forward the crime (reporting it). When you perform other
| crimes, again, the victim may be society itself and society
| needs to be represented -- not the state.
| joseda-hg wrote:
| It depends on the legal system. Since the victim can't be
| made whole (especially in cases like murder), a lawyer
| could argue that representing the victim is moot. However,
| the state --and sometimes the victim's estate-- can still
| represent the victim's interests and seek justice or
| compensation.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| "When you break the law, say murder, the ultimate victim is
| the state."
|
| This wasn't the case until relatively recently (the 1700s or
| so, depending on where you live), and still isn't case in
| places that use, say, traditional Islamic law (Iran).
|
| Before modernity, people were considered parts of their
| family/household, and if someone was raped or murdered, the
| ultimate victim was the family/household, represented by
| whoever was its head, _paterfamilias_ etc. And the punishment
| was often a form of blood money (weregild, qisas), to
| compensate the familial unit for injury or loss of a person.
|
| Current reader will likely find this appaling, but, for
| example, rape of a young girl was considered _harmful against
| the future value of the bride_ , thus the father got a bag of
| money as a compensation.
|
| The past is truly a different country.
| Defletter wrote:
| > This wasn't the case until relatively recently (the 1700s
| or so, depending on where you live)
|
| While that's true, that comes from the secularisation of
| law and the emergence of the concept of the nation distinct
| from the King. Prior to this, to break the law was to
| insult the King. This dynamic was at the forefront of the
| trial of King Charles I, who argued that he could not have
| committed treason since treason was to act against the King
| - the King _was_ the nation.
|
| That said, I do take your point that different places in
| the world have/had different approaches to law. I talk more
| about Anglosphere-law because that's ultimately what's won
| out, particularly with the system of the sovereign nation
| states.
| ivape wrote:
| A lot of how we live today will be illegal in a sophisticated
| society a few generations from now.
| chatmasta wrote:
| Like what? Specifically
| ivape wrote:
| - Social Media doesn't have age restrictions, so in a
| sophisticated society it would be illegal for underage
| people to have an account on those platforms. That's just
| one.
|
| - Buying goods and services from societies that don't
| observe human rights.
|
| - Factory farming.
|
| - Entire mechanisms in the stock market.
|
| - Layoffs and cost cutting without cutting leadership.
|
| - Pay gaps within an enterprise where it's possible for
| there to be an order of magnitude difference in pay
| (executive pay).
|
| - Multi-hour/multi-day/multi-month/multi-year labor work,
| in general.
|
| - Arms proliferation that's not just nuclear.
|
| - Housing as an investment vehicle.
|
| - No equity given to labor in most industries.
|
| - Genocide would truly be illegal.
|
| - Invasion would truly be illegal.
|
| ---
|
| That's the backlog.
| verisimi wrote:
| You are just listing the laws that the UN (an unelected
| self-proclaimed authority) already has planned.
|
| But living in a highly legislated society, is not
| advancing anything for individuals - people will be far
| less free. Lots of legislation is the wrong direction for
| those who value quality of life.
| ako wrote:
| That is just nonsense, most people would enjoy living in
| a society with the right legislation much more than a
| society with no legislation. How are you less free if
| there's no genocide, nor invasions? To me it feels you're
| just thoughtlessly repeating nonsense produced by
| rightwing America.
| nradov wrote:
| The USA hasn't had any invasions or genocides lately.
| That's probably why so many foreigners want to immigrate
| here.
| verisimi wrote:
| Legislating against genocide or whatever, doesn't make it
| so. What you have is a society with lots of legislation.
| Lots of well-meaning legislation has a genuine negative
| impact on people daily. Think about queues in airports
| because of terrorists, or traffic cameras, or - the issue
| we have at present - the developments towards de-
| anonymising the internet because of children, terrorists.
| Legislation has a cost.
|
| One has to wonder whether the 'side effects' of
| legislation were actually the intended effects, and that
| the main target the legislation was intended to solve was
| merely an excuse.
|
| Edited for clarity.
| Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote:
| > But living in a highly legislated society, is not
| advancing anything for individuals - people will be far
| less free.
|
| Legislation against polluting, for example, gives you the
| freedom to swim lakes and rivers and eat their fish
| without getting poisoned. Or to breathe the air without
| it destroying your lungs. Regulations can give the
| freedom to not have financial industries 'fee' you to
| death. Laws can be to used ensure that you have the
| freedom to push back against the many other encroachments
| that powerful companies and corporations will always be
| grabbing for. In fact its our only defense.
|
| You look at laws as restricting individuals, and while
| that is sometimes the case, their real power is
| restricting and holding back the worst behaviors of tech
| companies, factories, banks, insurance companies, tele-
| service providers, mega-retail chains, property owners,
| health service providers and all the other key components
| that make our society run. If they have free reign to do
| whatever whenever, they will inevitably consolidate,
| monopolize, and then use that power to squeeze every last
| bit of an individual's freedom. Not just because they
| could set any arbitrary pricing (see drug companies), but
| also dictate behaviors through TOS. All of this will be
| for their benefit only, at the expense of your freedom.
|
| We need all of these industries to make everything work,
| but without laws and regulations, things can pretty
| dystopian for the freedom of the average individual. The
| heads of these industries will be doing great though, so
| there's that.
| verisimi wrote:
| Honestly, I read this and feel confused.
|
| You don't need legislation to swim or eat fish. In a real
| way, the legislation sanctions a certain level of
| poisoning to be acceptable. How much fluoride in water,
| zinc or metals in food, can we 'fortify' food with iron
| filings and chalk (calcium).
|
| The problem you seem to miss, is that the legislation is
| _already_ written in favour of the corporations and
| government in the first place. It is not about the
| citizens, it just has to appear that way for people to
| buy into it.
|
| Corporations _already_ have free reign to act as they
| like - mobile phones are essentially government id at
| this point - the governance system is delighted that they
| have access to your private information. There is no
| concern with protecting people from the worst corporate
| actions. Corporations are already monopolies, and this is
| fine.
|
| The legislation is _already_ corporate and merely pays
| lip service to citizens /consumers - it's there to to
| provides cover for corporates, as well as providing other
| benefits, such as creating huge barriers to entry via
| licensing, etc.
| Eddy_Viscosity2 wrote:
| You're not wrong about corporations crafting legislation
| in their interest, this exists, and continues to happen.
| I was responding to the view that 'government is the
| problem, laws hurt individual freedom - therefore all
| laws are bad' sentiment. Its an idea that is spread by
| these very same corporations to gain support for getting
| rid of the laws that bind them. Like why have any level
| at all for how much benzene I can dump in this lake? I
| should be able to dump all the benzene there. Get rid of
| the EPA because freedom is at stake! The government and
| the laws it can pass and enforce is regular peoples only
| protection against this power. We need to start using it
| again.
| ivape wrote:
| If you want to keep a house painted white, you have to
| keep painting it white.
|
| Society does get more progressive and ethical, but it's
| only one coat of paint. America had a real fresh coat of
| paint after the Civil War, Civil Rights, and progressive
| reform movements of the early 20th century. The things
| you are mentioning is the in between periods between new
| coats of paint. We're sort of due for one. And, yes, that
| coat of paint will start to look yellow and chipped too,
| where you'll notice all the failed promises.
| bawolff wrote:
| > You are just listing the laws that the UN (an unelected
| self-proclaimed authority) already has planned.
|
| The UN doesn't make laws, it just brings countries
| together to talk things through and maybe make treaties
| together. But in the end its always individual countries
| making the laws+.
|
| + im skipping over the unsc's power to make binding
| rulings under international law because i dont think that
| is the type of law you mean. Groups that are part of the
| UN like the ICJ and ILC have a role in determining intl
| law, but they more eludicate it, they dont make it.
| tbrownaw wrote:
| - why?
|
| - aiui sanctions tend to not be super effective at
| forcing improvements, so again why?
|
| - as opposed to what?
|
| - sounds silly, details plz?
|
| - this is foolish and would not have the effects that
| proponents seem to think it would
|
| - this is a demand that some job functions be contracted
| out, and that companies handling cheap roles be small.
| Both of which are silly.
|
| - what?
|
| - citizen disarmament hasn't had the best results for the
| disarmed citizenry
|
| - can't be made illegal, but not limiting housing
| _supply_ would make it impractical
|
| - it's generally considered _bad_ investment advice to
| own too much stock in your employer
|
| - it already is
|
| - is already is
| derektank wrote:
| How can you make both genocide and invasion illegal? If a
| state is committing genocide (or allowing genocide to
| take place in its borders), surely another nation state
| must be able to invade it to conduct regime change and
| civil affairs operations, no?
| ivape wrote:
| Not really. Cops breaking your door down to get you is
| not the same as you breaking doors down all over town.
| alfiedotwtf wrote:
| To be honest, your future society looks terrible
| exe34 wrote:
| Yep, exploitation and destruction are things we should
| absolutely want to keep!
| 69tg69 wrote:
| If you say so.
| exe34 wrote:
| I don't.
| bawolff wrote:
| > Genocide would truly be illegal.
|
| That's basically as illegal as anything possibly could
| be.
|
| 153 countries have signed the genocide convention. This
| treaty requires countries make domestic laws punishing
| not just genocide but also inciting it. Even just being
| the supervisor of someone who commits genocide is a crime
| if you don't try to stop & punish your subordinate.
|
| Its also considered part of customary intl law, which
| means that even if a country doesnt sign the agreement,
| its still binding on them.
|
| In addition to all that it is an international crime, so
| can be punished by the ICC or other international
| tribunals.
|
| This isn't just theoretical, people have gone to jail for
| genocide.
|
| I dont know what more you want here. Its literally the
| most illegal thing on earth.
| ben_w wrote:
| Not the poster you're replying to, but the USA, Russia,
| China, India, North Korea, and Israel are not in the ICC,
| and that list by itself is already ~45% of the world
| population: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/States_parties_
| to_the_Rome_Sta...
|
| That also means, out of all nuclear powers and all
| permanent members of the UN security council, only France
| and the UK are in the ICC.
| bawolff wrote:
| All of these countries are members of the genocide
| conventon which means that even if not members of the ICC
| they have domestic laws criminalizing genocide.
|
| The great thing about the ICC is that if the perpetrator
| isn't a member they still have juridsiction if the victim
| country is (talking somewhat informally since the ICC
| prosecutes people not countries)
|
| If all else fails, the UNSC is allowed to "refer"
| situations (basically add juridsiction) to the ICC. They
| can also set up ad-hoc tribunials, like they did for
| Yugoslavia (which did send Ratko Mladic to jail for
| genocide). Some countries (e.g. Germany) also practise
| universal juridsiction for genocide. They have indeed
| sent people to jail for genocide even though it took
| place in a foreign country (e.g. Taha al-Jumailly). In
| fact, the ICC has only ever accused one person (Omar al-
| bashir) of genocide, and that person hasn't been tried
| because he is already in jail for other things. All
| succesful genocide prosecutions have been through other
| bodies, not the ICC.
|
| My main point though is i think genocide is the most
| illegal thing in the world. The ICC is part of the
| reason, but only part. There is of course always
| challenges enforcing stuff in failed states and war-torn
| regions, but I would challenge people to come up with
| something more criminalized than genocide.
| userbinator wrote:
| Only if you (and everyone else) don't resist.
| samrus wrote:
| I mean yeah. Thats the sad/exciting thing about history. That
| the earliest written account we know about of something implies
| that it was already in the middle of a very mature environment
| for that thing, so was most definiteky not the first. We just
| dont know what the first was because we havent found records.
|
| Like idk maybe we find neandrathal records being like "grug ate
| meat first even though the children are supposed to eat first,
| so we punched him in the shoulder and said 'bro! Not cool' and
| now hes good"
| bawolff wrote:
| I don't think anyone is suggesting they are the first person to
| ever make laws. They're important archeologically because they
| are the earliest we have records of.
| lo_zamoyski wrote:
| Indeed. The title, taken at face value, is misleading. This is
| in part because English doesn't distinguish between the various
| kinds of law, save as modifiers of the word "law".
|
| The prototype for all social organization is the family, as the
| family is the origin of all human beings and the context in
| which human beings are raised. The parents, especially the
| father, is the prototype for the ruler or lawgiver or king. The
| family is the primordial society that serves as the basic
| pattern for everything else. When there is disdorder in the
| family, there is disorder in society in general.
|
| But contrary to tyrannical legal positivism, which posits that
| all it takes for a law to be a law is that is is "willed into
| existence", the classical legal tradition makes a distinction
| between _lex_ and _ius_ , and _ius_ itself is divided into the
| _ius gentium_ and _ius naturale_. The last, the natural law, is
| morality, so the remainder of the law is a matter of
| determination of broad moral principles to concrete
| circumstances. The "law" in this article is therefore "lex.
| tbrownaw wrote:
| Sound like these earliest written laws (that we know about, so
| far) were meant to answer problems people had with some previous
| laws.
| samrus wrote:
| Legislation is a dynamical and iterative process so that makes
| sense.
|
| We always make laws by looking at the previous set of laws, the
| society they resulted in, the society we wanna live in, and
| then adjusting the laws.
|
| Even the firsr laws would have been introduced to a society
| that was the result of anarchy, which is a type of law, like
| being bald is a hairstyle
| niemandhier wrote:
| Walking through the Louvre or the British museum I always feel a
| mixture of awe, sadness and relief.
|
| Awe of the artefacts. Sadness that they have been taken from
| their native lands. Relieve that they are safe.
|
| I hope at some point in the future we can come up with a solution
| that will enable all humans to appreciate these parts of our
| shared cultural heritage, without ripping them from their current
| sanctuaries or forcing the formerly conquered to engage in a
| pilgrimage to the capitals of their conquerors.
| badpun wrote:
| Right now, every responsible country that is even vaguely
| threatened by their neighbor has a concrete plan in place on
| how and where to evacaute their most valueable cultural
| artfacts, in an event of an invasion. And likewise, every
| serious invader has special units that include historians,
| whose role is to locate and plunder those valuable artifacts.
| I'd say we're pretty far from your desired state.
| kindkang2024 wrote:
| > _Schoolchildren all over the world learn that Hammurabi's code
| -- famous for its "eye for an eye" vision of retributive justice
| -- was the world's first._
|
| The more I think about ancient laws, the more I appreciate the
| wisdom of the ancients. The law that says "an eye for an eye, and
| a life for a life" contains a depth of insight that many today
| overlook. In modern society, it's often dismissed as outdated,
| cruel, or inhumane. But personally, I believe that rejecting this
| principle entirely is a serious--and dangerous--mistake.
|
| "Eye for an eye, life for a life" was never meant to destroy or
| harm, but to _protect_. This becomes clear when we examine it
| closely. If justice is reduced merely to financial compensation,
| then the wealthy can harm the poor and simply pay their way out.
| Is that truly justice? And what if someone takes a life--yet
| remains alive in prison, or even walks free years later? How is
| that fair to the victims? Just imagine yourself as the victim--
| your eye deliberately and seriously injured, or your life
| shattered by someone's malice. Isn 't the answer more obvious
| then?
|
| This principle has never brought chaos to humanity. It's often
| misunderstood as promoting endless cycles of revenge, but that
| interpretation misses the point. In fact, the principle becomes
| clearer through the lens of individual responsibility. As the
| Bible puts it: "The son shall not bear the guilt of the father,
| nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of
| the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the
| wicked shall be upon himself." In a just system built on
| individual accountability, those who seek justice are still free
| to forgive. If those in conflicts choose not to, and let endless
| hatred consume them, they both suffer. In this way, the principle
| actually has a natural tendency to limit conflict and promote
| resolution over time.
|
| In _The Evolution of Cooperation_ by _Robert Axelrod_ , this
| dynamic is explained scientifically: when bad actions are
| punished and good actions rewarded, cooperation thrives. (His
| findings, such as the "tit-for-tat" strategy starting with
| kindness fosters cooperation.) Human civilizations is possible
| with very truth. It may not always be written into law--but it
| lives through free will and moral instinct.
|
| Let those who dare to do evil face the consequences of their
| actions. Let their wrongdoing diminish their standing--their
| fitness, as some might say. Only those who intend to do evil fear
| the law "an eye for an eye, a life for a life." For good people,
| it means the opposite: that kindness begets kindness to make all
| great again.
|
| Yet today, many focus only on blind forgiveness. In my view, this
| is misguided--especially when it leads to abolishing the death
| penalty. The dead cannot forgive. They are already gone. If we
| truly believe that all lives matter--worldwide--then this
| principle deserves far more respect and appreciation than it
| receives today.
| adrian_b wrote:
| The main risk of "an eye for an eye, and a life for a life" is
| the risk of wrong punishments that cannot be reversed.
|
| On the other hand, when someone has caused an irreparable
| damage, by causing death or permanent invalidity, or by
| destroying something that cannot be recreated, e.g. an ancient
| historical artifact, or an entire animal species, then being
| punished in a limited way, e.g. with a fine or some time in
| prison, does not seem equivalent with the punished deed.
|
| I believe that punishment by prison is extremely stupid and
| inefficient. In many places prisons are more like criminal
| academies than something that may educate the inmates to no
| longer do what they have been punished for. No wonder that in
| the ancient societies this kind of punishment was unknown.
|
| In many ancient societies the main method of punishment was a
| fine, but in order to be a true deterrent the value of the fine
| was always a multiple of the damage that had been caused. In
| more lenient societies a thief or someone who had caused
| property or body damage would have payed a sum equivalent with
| the double of the damage value, but in more severe societies
| the fine was quadruple and in some societies the fines were
| even ten times greater than the estimated value of the damage.
|
| Such a multiple-valued fine seems a much better punishment than
| any kind of prison, for any kind of damage that can be
| repaired.
|
| For the other damages, like death or permanent invalidity, the
| appropriate punishment would seem to be the obligation to
| periodically pay some amount for the rest of the life of the
| punished person, instead of paying a one-time fine.
|
| In the ancient societies, the cases when a punished person was
| unwilling or unable to pay the fine were solved simply, by
| converting that person into a slave. Such cases would be more
| difficult to solve in a modern society, but spending time in a
| prison cannot be considered as an improvement over slavery.
| kindkang2024 wrote:
| > _The main risk of "an eye for an eye, and a life for a
| life" is the risk of wrong punishments that cannot be
| reversed._
|
| If harm is caused by accident and without malicious intent,
| then yes--"life for life" shouldn't apply. But we should
| never underestimate the darkness that exists in human nature.
| No matter how carefully a system is designed, there will
| always be those who can game it.
|
| That's why I still believe the spirit of "life for life, eye
| for eye" should remain a guiding principle--not out of
| revenge, but out of love and protection.
|
| > _Such a multiple-valued fine seems a much better punishment
| than any kind of prison, for any kind of damage that can be
| repaired._
|
| I completely agree with this. Wrongdoers typically commit
| harmful acts for personal gain, and if they're only required
| to repay the exact value of what they took, they still come
| out ahead in the long run. We need systems that ensure the
| net profit from wrongdoing falls below zero--so that it's
| absolutely clear: crime is silly.
|
| I've even heard news reports that in California, theft under
| a certain dollar amount often goes unpunished. The result?
| The exact opposite of justice. It acts like gravity, pulling
| people's free will toward sin and crime.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Most of the ancients used fines or weregild instead of "life
| for life".
|
| First, it was a way to stop a potentially endless cycle of
| retaliatory violence, especially where a central government was
| weak or nonexistent (Islamic deserts, Corsica, the Vikings,
| Indian tribes).
|
| Second, the logic behind blood money was in some contexts quite
| compelling. Look up _Ex parte Crow Dog_ , an American legal
| case from the 1880s. _Even the family of the murder victim was
| against the perp hanging_ , because they had nothing to gain
| from a corpse. They lost a valuable person and its ability to
| work and protect his relatives, and they wanted this ability
| compensated. A winter on the Plains is dangerous and it made no
| sense to weaken the tribe further by killing yet another
| strong, adult man. It made sense to make him compensate and
| protect the victim's family.
|
| Big centralized settled states can afford to waste lives, in
| war or by judicial punishment. Other, pre-state units, cannot.
| kindkang2024 wrote:
| > _It made sense to make him compensate and protect the
| victim 's family._
|
| I don't think that's a good idea/practice--mainly because it
| underestimates the darkness within human free will.
| Wrongdoers can game such systems and kill without hesitation,
| which ultimately weakens the tribe even more.
|
| Humans have all kinds of ideas and wills, but in the long
| run, only the fittest wills survive and prevail. And I
| believe that "life for life" wasn't invented to hate and
| kill, but to love and protect. I hope it triumphs.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| These systems aren't purely algorithmic and the tribal
| council / althing / whatever body judges the cases
| understands that people will try to game them. In old
| Iceland, murderers from wealthier families were often hit
| by massive weregild, precisely in order not to repeat their
| crimes.
|
| "Life for life" is, across the entire history and spectrum
| of cultures, a minority position, for all sorts of reasons.
| Including the one that you don't want anyone who kills in
| cold blood (the executioner) living next to you.
|
| Even societies which had the capital punishment usually
| tabooized executioners, or forced the job on slaves etc.
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