If the death penalty is wrong because "what if the convicted was innocent", then isn't any punishment wrong? [closed]

In the case of other punishments, we can release them from prison if the wrongful conviction is discovered. And after releasing the prisoner, we might even pay reparations to make up for the time they served. While this may not completely make up for the harm that has been done, it's better than nothing.

If the punishment was merely a fine, the government can repay them with interest.

But once an innocent person is put to death, there's no possible restitution. The government could pay reparations to the convict's heirs, but the convict themself is still irreparably harmed.

So it's the finality of capital punishment that makes the difference from other punishments.

It's true that if the mistaken conviction is never discovered (or the court refuses to reopen the case), any punishment is unfair. Nothing is perfect. But this is why most modern societies require a high standard of proof ("beyond a reasonable doubt" in many countries) in criminal cases. Mistakes happen, but we hope that these standards hold them to a minimum.

There are two competing philosophies in play here:

• "It is better that ten guilty individuals escape, than that one innocent suffer."
• "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good."

One explanation is to view the expected cost being the (risk of error × cost of error).

In the case of the death penalty, the cost of error is so high, that for even for the lowest values to which we can practically lower the risk of error, the product is still too high for many people.

One possibly cynical way to look at this is that the optimization function for the justice system isn't to maximize total well-being (max utility) or even justice (lowest MSE between actions and outcome), but to minimize the society's collective guilt.

This is a sum of guilt for letting the crime happen, a reduction to it from punishing the crime, the guilt for punishments themselves, and specifically guilt for wrongful punishments.

The guilt felt for wrongful killing is extremely high, skewing the equation. Meanwhile, the difference in guilt between letting a murderer live and avenging them with death is relatively small, and in low-violence societies can even favor the former. The collective guilt felt for wrongful imprisonment is much lower.

Some things can be more wrong than others. It’s very simple: Life in prison can be ended the moment innocence is found. Execution can not. Therefore execution worse than life in prison if falsely convicted.

So you misunderstood the argument. It’s not that we shouldn’t punish people because there’s a chance they are innocent, it’s that we shouldn’t apply an punishment that can’t be stopped if later found out to be innocent.

That’s what people mean, and most people understand that’s what they mean when they engage in good faith in the argument.

The wrongness is in a matter of degrees and balancing that against the harm to society to let all crimes go unpunished. That's kind of just what the justice system is and how it has to cope with reality. We don't generally debate the necessity of punishing any crime though but rather how much punishment should be assigned to each crime.

Once you kill someone though you don't get to take it back. The necessity of the death penalty as a matter of deterrence is debatable. You can free someone wrongfully imprisoned and compensate them at least in part.

It is not merely a matter of probability of a honest (judicial) error.

Politically motivated trials are (partly) intended to silence and disempower their victims; they also antagonize the victims and their supporters. The true facts behind the trial may become public knowledge only much later. Knowing that the victims are likely to survive the punishment, end up compensated, be able to tell their story and possibly fight back disincentivizes some types of politically motivated trials.

Lesser punishments, or even lengthy trials ending in acquitals are still powerful weapons against political enemies, but these smear the opponent more efficiently if the accusations are not completely fabricated.

Not having capital punishment on the penal menu thus cultivates politics as well as the penal system itself.

If the death penalty is wrong because "what if the convicted was innocent", then isn't any punishment wrong?

Seems pretty straight forward.

If we suppose

[In death penalty]
If A + B -> C
If False accusation + Punishment -> Wrong

And

[In death penalty]
D + B -> C
If Risk of False Accusation + Punishment -> Wrong

So

A ~ D in regards to X + B -> C

And we could apply this to any crime & punishment:

[In [X] punishment]
If A + B -> C
If False accusation + Punishment -> Wrong

D ~ A

If Risk of False accusation + Punishment -> Wrong

So through your example with death penalty, we see False accusation & Risk of False Accusation is equivalent for determining wrongness.

This, as stated, could give reason to see all punishments being equally wrong as the death penalty, given these assumptions.

So, one could, from the above, assume you are correct. The logic is sound.

That said, there's also a counter point:

The argument requires

Question:
Is D ~ A regardless of X

Considering the difference in D vs A is absolutism vs risk, Does X have an absolutism vs risk spectrum as well?

Most punishments can be ended if found they are wrong, and then the falsely accused can sue, get their record wiped clean, and sue for recompense for the false accusation. So the risk of an incorrect ruling is able to be mitigated. Does this apply universally? No. This is not the case with the death penalty. The Death penalty is an absolute punishment, there is no going back on it.

In other words, "An absolute punishment needs absolute accuracy". And since the legal system never has absolute accuracy, death penalty will remain wrong in this framework.

By that logic continuing, SOME punishments are also inherently wrong due to the lack of ability for 'take backs'. For example, cutting off hands of accused thieves would also fall in this category as people don't grow back hands, but other punishments, if reversible, remain valid...

... assuming that there isn't ANOTHER valid argument for all punishments to be wrong, as this proof against the argument doesn't include any proof against the conclusion of the argument either, just the middle steps.

In other words, it's a return to not-knowing the answer, not an inversion of the attempted answer.

The core ethical argument against the death penalty due to the possibility of wrongful conviction is distinct from concerns about other forms of punishment. While all punishments risk being applied to innocent individuals, the irreversibility of the death penalty is what makes it uniquely problematic. Here’s why:

Key Differences Between the Death Penalty and Other Punishments: Irreversibility:

If someone is sentenced to life in prison and later proven innocent, they can be released and possibly compensated.

If someone is executed and later proven innocent, no correction is possible.

Severity and Moral Weight:

Life imprisonment, while harsh, still preserves the person’s ability to be exonerated and restored to some degree.

Death is final, eliminating all future possibilities for justice.

The Principle of Risk Tolerance:

Society accepts some risk of wrongful punishment for practical reasons.

However, irreversible punishments demand a higher standard of certainty because mistakes cannot be undone.

Does This Mean All Punishment Is Wrong? Not necessarily. The argument against the death penalty is not simply "any risk of punishing the innocent is unacceptable." Instead, it emphasizes that some risks are more justifiable than others based on the consequences:

Lesser punishments (fines, probation, even prison) allow for correction and compensation if wrongful conviction occurs.

The death penalty does not allow for correction—once carried out, the harm is absolute and cannot be undone.

A Practical vs. Absolute Ethical Argument If one believes that any risk of wrongful punishment is unacceptable, then yes, all punishments would be ethically questionable.

However, most opponents of the death penalty argue not that all punishment is unjust, but that the level of risk must be proportional to the consequences—and execution is uniquely irreversible.

Conclusion The argument against the death penalty due to wrongful convictions does not necessarily invalidate all punishment. It highlights a key moral distinction:

Justice systems make mistakes, but some mistakes are irreversible and more severe than others.

The greater the consequence, the higher the burden of proof and justification should be.

Would you like a response addressing a particular angle (e.g., utilitarian, retributive justice, or legal perspectives)?

A common argument against the death penalty* is that the person sentenced to death could be innocent. Of course this probability P is (hopefully) small, but not zero.

Not the question, but this pretty seems naive. There are many reasons someone may be sentenced for death for a crime they didn't commit. This could be as simple as pressure on the police and justice to close a big case. I am sure wrongful convictions are far more common than statistics suggest. There are too many incentives to hide mistakes here.

Therefore, we cannot kill the person, because there's a probability P that we're killing an innocent person. Okay, but then by that argument, isn't any punishment wrong?

In an ideal world, perhaps any punishment is wrong. Crime could be seen as a reflection of society's flaws instead of the individual who carried out the crime. Perhaps that person should have been helped before things got that bad. Poverty, education, opportunity, mental health...

Ultimately I think this proves that the whole "death is wrong since you might kill an innocent" is ultimately a bad faith argument, since you are pretending to care about the innocent to make the argument, the very same innocent you happily throw under the bus when it comes to other kinds of punishments.

I think you are jumping to your own conclusion without any evidence here. Who is pretending?

So to answer the question, I think it could be logically answered that any punishment is wrong in a perfect society.

In the real world, we need punishments and deterrents. A SAFE and humane prison environment focusing on rehabilitation for those who cam be saved seems like a rational solution. Those affected by the crime might seek retribution, but that seems like another question.

If you happened to be wrongly convicted and put on death row, despite the lottery winning odds, with your execution date swift approaching and evidence proving you innocent a little too far out, I think you would find it very hard not to see the philosophical flaw in the death penalty. A life sentence, and getting released early from a humane prison environment with a large payday to get your life back on track might seem a far fairer solution.

A common argument against the death [penalty] is that the person sentenced to death could be innocent. Of course this probability P is (hopefully) small, but not zero. Therefore, we cannot kill the person, because there's a probability P that we're killing an innocent person.

If the position one is trying to argue is "punishing the guilty with death morally wrong" then the argument presented is a straw man argument. It is not addressed to that proposition, but instead to the proposition "the death penalty should not be applied". Although these may seem similar, they are in fact orthogonal. We could, in principle, accept using the death penalty despite it being morally wrong, and we could refuse to use the death penalty despite denying that it is morally wrong.

Okay, but then by that argument, isn't any punishment wrong?

No and yes.

No, the argument is not about any punishment being inherently wrong in the first place. Not even death.

But yes, the same argument can be applied to other forms of punishment.

However, it is important to recognize that the argument is based on risk assessment, and the conclusions drawn from a risk assessment vary with the risks and with individuals' personal priorities. It is not inconsistent to be unwilling to accept any risk of subjecting an innocent person to capital punishment, yet be willing to accept a risk of subjecting that same person to a 50- (or 25- or 10- or 1-)year imprisonment.

I think this proves that the whole "death is wrong since you might kill an innocent" is ultimately a bad faith argument, since you are pretending to care about the innocent to make the argument, the very same innocent you happily throw under the bus when it comes to other kinds of punishments.

Not at all. No one is being thrown under the bus here. No one is falsely pretending to care about the innocent. It is a balancing of competing priorities -- on one hand to deter crime, protect society, and deliver justice to criminals, and on the other hand to avoid unjustly punishing the innocent. As a general rule, we are prepared to accept some risk of punishing the innocent, especially with weaker punishments, in exchange for the perceived benefits to society from punishing the guilty.

The key difference is reversibility. While all punishments carry some risk of error, most such as imprisonment can be corrected if new evidence proves the person innocent. The death penalty, however, is irreversible. Once carried out, there’s no way to undo the mistake. That’s why many argue that the stakes are too high to justify capital punishment, while other forms of punishment, allow for appeals, exonerations, and adjustments if errors are discovered. The debate isn’t just about mistakes but also about whether the risk of irreversible harm outweighs the intended justice.

The 'death penalty' implies 'capital punishment' , which is a 'one form of punishment', but not 'any form of punishment'.

So, the OP stating:

if the death penalty is wrong [innocence probability here] then isn't any punishment wrong?

doesn't stand to reason, regardless of the innocence probability.

One swallow doesn't make a summer - Aristotle.

Likewise, a false negative doesn't necessarily imply a trend overall.

The first difference you can notice between death penalty and any kind of punishment concerns the duration. Meanwhile a death sentence is just the act of killing the convicted, whose life is ended in a split time, by punishing him for example with life in prison, the investigations may still be on and try to figure out whether the prisoner is an innocent or not. If he is a prisoner he will be released and paid for what he had to go through, but if the same happens after a death sentence the victim will gain nothing. However, it is also true that an innocent man in prison will probably be morally influenced by the negativity of the place he has to be unfairly locked up in. But I believe that giving the suspected man a punishment is still better than killing him. I can also mention what the Italian father of criminology, Cesare Beccaria, who lived in the 1700s said about death penalty on his treatise On Crimes and Punishments. About death penalty he says: " Thus, the death penalty is not a matter of right, as I have just shown, but is an act of war on the part of society against the citizen that comes about when it is deemed necessary or useful to destroy his existence." Then, to support my idea of how punishment is better than death sentence I will mention this Beccaria's statement: "It is not the intenseness of the pain that has the greatest effect on the mind, but its continuance; for our sensibility is more easily and more powerfully affected by weak but repeated impressions, than by a violent but momentary impulse." So man generally tolerates better the persistance of a punishment, for example with life imprisonment rather than the single moment of the death sentence that takes your life.