Quote from: JA37 on August 27, 2011, 12:47:18 AM

Quote from: MoonShadow on August 26, 2011, 11:41:09 PM

No, he is saying that outside influences have no bearing on the morality of the choices, and thus little to no bearing on the type of response from society's justice systems. Having a mental dysfunction is already a consideration in the modern concept of justice and morality, it's just not an excuse. If you ate lead paint as a child, and then go out a do crazy things as an adult, is that cause and effect? Clearly it is not, considering the large number of people who were also exposed to lead as children who did not grow up to be clockwork orange characters. And the excuse about the kind of family one is born into is just as faulty, for all of the upstanding and generally successful people who came from broken, criminal and dysfunctional family influences.

No matter what kind of devil made you do it, you are still responsible for the consequences of your actions. That is the very definition of adulthood.

So all humans are created identical and there's no way that a certain thing can influence a person more than another?
While I agree in principle, it's still argumentation I would expect from a person with a very black and white view of the world. A young, and/or very naive person.

Fortunately for me, that isn't an argument that I made. I can't even see how you came to the conclusion above by distortions of what I said, unless you just didn't bother to read them and just jumped in. I would agree that all humans are equal under the law, but certainly not identical. Again, it's not relevant that one person can be more influenced than another. It's a prerequisite of an adult that s/he be able to rationally control their own deviant tendencies regardless of whether those tendencies are the result of nature or nurture.