Causal chains and culpability.

Benj96

Person A doesn't pay another - Person B for their service/goods. Person B takes legal action against person A and their finances are restored on court order.

This is a circular cause and effect scenario. Or karmic retribution. The wrong doer is punished for their wrong doing. Directly. Justice is restored. Simple right?

However, let's take the same scenario where person B doesn't take person A to court for whatever reason - be it finances, lack of motivation or inadequate insight/ability. And thus is financially disadvantaged.

Person B normally pays for their grandmother's medications (Person C). Now they cannot afford those medicines. Person C thus comes to harm/suffers.

Is Person B more culpable now? For allowing the extent of the causal chain of person As crime to propagate and influence more people?

Is person A responsible for the poor health outcome of person C? If person C died because of lack of adequate treatment is person A a "murderer" or at least a cause of "manslaughter" for not paying say 200 dollars when they should have?
Or does person Bs individual choices play a part in the responsibility for person Cs outcome?

How far does the causal chain run and who is culpable?
Can one person be the cause of all the problems in the world - the original "sinner" or source of all total shit/catastrophe - as in the person who presses the nuke button, is the best liar/manipulator or propaganda (from latin "to propagate") generator?

Or are we only cheaping out - assigning a scapegoat for our problems if we ever assume one person can have such causal influence? Does scapegoating allow us to shy away or hide from our own failings?

Finally, as for the existence of such dynamics like wealth and poverty: are the wealthy solely responsible for the suffering of the poor? Due to their ability/means to resolve it but lack of will to do so - are they the cause of poverty?

Or are there intermediaries that also have culpability - others in power - namely regulators/policy makers that continously defer from their duty to ensure providence and basic resource acquisition for all citizens?

Or is it us - "the system" itself that generates both wealth and poverty (due to our collective obsession with and high regard for wealth/material/asset gain) that naturally empowers those that have it and disempowers those that don't. Is the system itself the flaw?

Who is to blame? Or are we all equally to blame for different or specific reasons in each individual case - as unique instruments in the chain that lead to the whole/total outcome?

Vera Mont

Or is it us - "the system" itself that generates both wealth and poverty (due to our collective obsession with and high regard for wealth/material/asset gain) that naturally empowers those that have it and disempowers those that don't. Is the system itself the flaw? — Benj96

Bullseye!
We were never told why A failed or refused to pay B, so we can't really say to what degree each of those persons is guilty and of what. I might mention, though, that this:

Person B takes legal action against person A and their finances are restored on court order. — Benj96

is not necessarily justice, because the court operates on a monetarist civil law, rather than karmic principle. And it is certainly not restorative, because now we have other persons involved, who need to be paid for their time and effort, and both litigants have spent extra money, time and effort on the court case. What began as a simple one-to-one transaction has snowballed into a societal issue.

Who is to blame? — Benj96

Why is it necessary to blame? What purpose does it serve?

Ciceronianus

Who is to blame? Or are we all equally to blame for different or specific reasons in each individual case - as unique instruments in the chain that lead to the whole/total outcome? — Benj96

The law is the law, and nothing more (or less) than that. It imposes no moral obligations. B is under no moral (or legal, for that matter) obligation to bring legal action. There is no "causal chain."

Benj96

is not necessarily justice, because the court operates on a monetarist civil law, rather than karmic principle. And it is certainly not restorative, because now we have other persons involved, who need to be paid for their time and effort, and both litigants have spent extra money, time and effort on the court case. What began as a simple one-to-one transaction has snowballed into a societal issue. — Vera Mont

Very true. Excellent elaboration and identification of the flaw in my logic. It can never be identical (justice) to simply playing the amount owed in the first place. Other people with their own needs require compensation also. So if anything the matter is inflated by mere conflict of interest.

Why is it necessary to blame? What purpose does it serve? — Vera Mont

For me it's somewhat rhetorical. Everyone has their own reasons and justifications for doing soemthing. Be it paying or not paying.

In a monetary sense it's mathematical. And blame is based on simply satisfying equations. But human experience and thus adversity and justification is never as reductive as "I owe you". It is a complex interplay between attitudes, previous experience and personal struggle.

Perhaps person A is ordered to pay the 200 dollars and is disproportionately financially ruined. Is that justice? Depends on who's perspective one takes. It can be re-written a million times with a million different justifications for the outcome between the 2 individuals

Benj96

B is under no moral (or legal, for that matter) obligation to bring legal action — Ciceronianus

It's an interesting dynamic in that while B is under no moral/legal obligation to press charges, pressing charges obliges them on a legal/moral incentive to collect what is owed to them.

They are pretty much guarenteed a win in the eyes of the law, but are not obligated to agree with the law and pursue such charges.

Causal chains and culpability.

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Categories

More Discussions