Suppose that two consenting adults fight to the death on TV ...

[hu324b]

Because its nothing more than blood lust for those who would actually want to view something like this - the question is why would someone want to be involved in something like this to start with - to entertain ourselves by watching someone brutally die - if you can’t see whats wrong with this you are lost.

 

[inocente]

… and half of the advertising revenue is guaranteed to be donated (anonymously, so that it cannot be refused) to the needy, via already well-established registered charitable organizations that have good reputations.

The end doesn’t justify the means.

 

[PseuTonym]

The end doesn’t justify the means.

If prisons imposed significant, daily, unpredictable inconveniences on inmates compared to what the inmates were accustomed to before they were arrested, but otherwise didn’t punish inmates, then might that be enough to deter people from committing crimes?

If it would be enough, and if the end doesn’t justify the means, then deterrence doesn’t justify punishment that goes beyond significant, daily, unpredictable inconveniences.

Would inconveniencing prisoners impede rehabilitation of them?

 

[inocente]

If prisons imposed significant, daily, unpredictable inconveniences on inmates compared to what the inmates were accustomed to before they were arrested, but otherwise didn’t punish inmates, then might that be enough to deter people from committing crimes?

If it would be enough, and if the end doesn’t justify the means, then deterrence doesn’t justify punishment that goes beyond significant, daily, unpredictable inconveniences.

Would inconveniencing prisoners impede rehabilitation of them?

I don’t know about rehabilitating criminals, but suspect they mostly commit crimes in the hope of not getting caught.

In utilitarianism the end can justify the means, since the morality depends entirely on the outcome. For instance, there’s the well-known dilemma of four famously good people who are all dying due to various organs failing. A healthy thief walks in. The doctor can harvest the thief’s organs to save the four. A strict utilitarian might say kill him since it produces the best consequences overall - the end justifies the means, four good lives saved for the price of one bad life ended.

But of course most people disagree.