On Wed, 8 Oct 2003, Charles R. Twardy wrote: > I'm not a lawyer. In philosophy we'd separate the two questions: > 1) The subject X acted culpably, raising chance that > victim Y would be harmed. > 2) Victim Y was harmed. Possibly because of X's actions, > possibly by coincidence. > In theory you could prosecute (1) independently of (2). Within each realm, > the causal reasoning should be clear given the model, and I would hope be > an important part of the verdict.
However, in law the emphasis seems to be on (2): prosecuting (1) independently of (2) means you are prosecuting a lesser charge. For instance, a clear distinction is made between murder and attempted murder, with the latter being treated as far more forgiveable than the former. This is true even in cases where the actions and intentions and therefore (IMO) the culpability of the perpetrator are identical. How do lawyers defend this? regards, Konrad
