"Darryl L. Pierce" wrote:

> > Also, I can offer numerous counterexanples to your thesis. Here are just
> > two:
> >
> > 1) I am sometimes in situations where I could drive 90 MPH with perfect
> > safety yet I do not for fear of getting caught.
>
> Solely for fear of getting caught, or is there also the personal safety
> factor and other elements involved? IOW, is your not breaking the law
> *solely* based on your fear of punishment or is it influenced by other,
> possibly more important concerns, such as physical safety?
>
> > 2) I have known several people who believed that using recreational drugs
> > was perfectly moral but did not do so for fear of imprisonment.
>
> Then in those cases they have been generally deterred. But, you're talking
> on a very localized, anecdotal scale. *Generally* the fear of prison is not
> a deterrent and the proof of that is the growing prison population and the
> lack of decrease in crime rates. How can you say something is a general
> deterrent when nothing is generally being deterred?
>
> > You are certainly right to claim that fear of punishment *sometimes* does
> > not act as a deterrent, but to claim it *never* does is just plain silly.
>
> I never said it *never* does. I said it general *does not* work as a
> deterrent.

I have to admit that you never said it in exactly those words and with that
emphasis. Never the less, that has been your frequently repeated claim. I have
looked through you comments on this thread and cut and pasted the following
comments on jail and deterrence.

- The problem you're having is thinking that punishment *is* a deterrent.

- Prison is *not* a deterrent, even though you and others are arguing that is
is.

- These two factors *alone* show prison to *not* be a deterrent in
any real sense of the word since it does *not* deter the criminals.

- Jail was never meant to be a deterrent

- It's not a deterrent, since people commit crimes thinking
they will not get *caught*.

You have constantly and repeatedly stressed that jail is not a deterrent. You
never failed to acknowledge that it can be or that it often is. Instead, you
constantly denied that it is a deterrent and never allowed for the possibility
that it is. In effect, you were indeed saying that it is never a deterrent.



> You're talking on a small scale where yes, you *can* find people
> who were deterred. But, what is the percentage of the population that *is*
> deterred? It's nowhere near large enough for one to claim that the fear of
> prison is a general deterrent. And, point out one person who was deterred
> does not make it generally a deterrent.

Let me guess..... this "paper" that you are working on is high school level?