The death penalty: The past and uncertain future of executions in America

C. Geidner, J. Lambert & K. Philo

Grid News

Originally posted 28 APR 22

Overview

South Carolina may soon carry out the United States’ first executions by firing squad in more than a decade. State officials have said that they plan to execute Richard Moore and Brad Sigmon using guns, the first such use of a firing squad since Ronnie Gardner was shot to death by the state of Utah on June 18, 2010.

Last week, nine days before Moore was to be executed, South Carolina’s Supreme Court put the execution on hold, but there’s no way of knowing how long that will last. Days later, the court also put Sigmon’s execution — scheduled for May — on hold. Although the court did not explain its reasoning, both men have an ongoing challenge to the state’s execution protocol, including its planned use of a firing squad.

How did we get here?

More than 45 years after the Supreme Court allowed executions to resume in the United States after a four-year hiatus, America is in a monthlong period in which five states planned to carry out six executions — the most in several years.

The situation offers a window into changing attitudes toward the death penalty and the complex brew of factors that have made these executions harder to carry out but also harder to challenge in courts. And the individual stories behind some of these current cases serve as a reminder of the well-documented racial bias in the way death sentences are handed down.

The death penalty’s popularity with the public has diminished in recent decades, and the overall number of new death sentences and executions has dropped significantly.

That’s due in part to the increased difficulty of carrying out lethal injection executions after death penalty opponents made it substantially harder for states to obtain the necessary drugs. States responded in part by adopting untried drug combinations. A series of botched executions followed — including the longest execution in U.S. history, when Arizona spent nearly two hours trying to kill Joseph Wood by using 15 doses of its execution drugs on the man before he died.

During that same time, the Supreme Court has made it more difficult to challenge any method of execution, setting a high bar for a method to be disallowed and by requiring challengers to identify an alternative method of execution.

Robert Dunham, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, a nonpartisan organization that maintains a comprehensive database of U.S. executions, told Grid that part of the current influx of execution dates is a result of most states halting executions during the first year of the pandemic, before a covid vaccine was available.

This past week, Texas carried out its first execution of the year when it executed 78-year-old Carl Buntion. Tennessee also had planned an execution for last week, but it was called off with an announcement that highlighted two key elements of the modern death penalty: secrecy and errors. Hours before the state was slated to execute Oscar Franklin Smith by lethal injection, Gov. Bill Lee (R), citing “an oversight in preparation for lethal injection,” announced a reprieve. The execution will not happen before June, but state officials have not yet said anything more about what led to the last-minute reprieve.

The info is here.

About one-fifth of lawyers and staffers considered suicide at some point in their careers, new survey says.

Debra Cassens Weiss

American Bar Association Journal

Originally posted 10 MAY 22

A new survey of lawyers and staff members hailing mostly from BigLaw has found that anxiety, depression and isolation remain at concerning levels, despite a slight decrease in the percentages since the survey last year.

The Mental Health Survey by Law.com and ALM Intelligence found that 67% of the respondents reported anxiety, 35% reported depression and 44% reported isolation, according to an article by Law.com.

The survey, conducted in March and April, asked respondents from around the world about their mental health and law firm environments in 2021.

The percentage of respondents who contemplated suicide at some point in their professional careers was 19%, the article reports.

In addition, 2.4% of the respondents said they had a drug problem, and 9.4% said they had an issue with alcoholic drinking.

About 74% of the respondents thought that their work environment contributed to their mental health issues. When asked about the factors that had a negative impact on mental health, top concerns were always being on call (72%), billable hour pressure (59%), client demands (57%), lack of sleep (55%) and lean staffing (49.5%).

The survey asked about the impact of remote work for the first time. About 59% said remote work increased their quality of life; about 62% said it increased the quality of home-based relationships; about 54% said it led to an increase in their billable hours; and 50% said it improved personal finances. But 76% said remote work hurt the quality of interpersonal relationships with colleagues.

The info is here.

A well being toolkit for lawyer and legal employers is here.

Cooperation as a signal of time preferences

Lie-Panis, J., & André, J. (2021, June 23).

https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/p6hc4

Abstract

Many evolutionary models explain why we cooperate with non kin, but few explain why cooperative behavior and trust vary. Here, we introduce a model of cooperation as a signal of time preferences, which addresses this variability. At equilibrium in our model, (i) future-oriented individuals are more motivated to cooperate, (ii) future-oriented populations have access to a wider range of cooperative opportunities, and (iii) spontaneous and inconspicuous cooperation reveal stronger preference for the future, and therefore inspire more trust. Our theory sheds light on the variability of cooperative behavior and trust. Since affluence tends to align with time preferences, results (i) and (ii) explain why cooperation is often associated with affluence, in surveys and field studies. Time preferences also explain why we trust others based on proxies for impulsivity, and, following result (iii), why uncalculating, subtle and one-shot cooperators are deemed particularly trustworthy. Time preferences provide a powerful and parsimonious explanatory lens, through which we can better understand the variability of trust and cooperation.

From the Discussion Section

Trust depends on revealed time preferences

Result (iii) helps explain why we infer trustworthiness from traits which appear unrelated  to cooperation,  but  happen  to  predict  time  preferences.   We  trust known partners and strangers based on how impulsive we perceive them to be (Peetz & Kammrath, 2013; Righetti & Finkenauer, 2011); impulsivity being associated to both time preferences and cooperativeness in laboratory experiments (Aguilar-Pardo et al., 2013; Burks et al., 2009; Cohen et al., 2014; Martinsson et al., 2014; Myrseth et al., 2015; Restubog et al., 2010).  Other studies show we infer cooperative motivation from a wide variety of proxies for partner self-control, including indicators of their indulgence in harmless sensual pleasures (for a review see  Fitouchi et al.,  2021),  as well as proxies for environmental affluence (Moon et al., 2018; Williams et al., 2016).

Time preferences further offer a parsimonious explanation for why different forms of cooperation inspire more trust than others.  When probability of observation p or cost-benefit ratio r/c are small in our model, helpful behavior reveals large time horizon- and cooperators may be perceived as relatively genuine or disinterested.  We derive two different types of conclusion from this principle.  (Inconspicuous and/or spontaneous cooperation)

The research is here.

How Plain Talk Helps You "Walk the Walk"

Brett Beasley

Notre Dame Center for Ethical Leadership

Originally posted April 2022

Here is an excerpt:

How Unclear Values Cloud Our Moral Vision

Was Orwell right? Some may disagree with his take on the link between bad writing and bad politics. But it appears that Orwell's theory applies well to something he never considered: Corporate values statements. A new study shows that unclear writing in values statements matters. Unclarity sends a signal that a corporation can't be trusted. And, according to the study's authors, it's a reliable signal, too. They find that corporations that hide behind fuzzy, unclear values often do have something to hide.

The team of researchers behind the study, led by David Markowitz (Oregon), considered the values statements of 188 S&P 500 manufacturing companies. Markowitz was joined by Maryam Kouchaki (Northwestern), Jeffrey T. Hancock (Stanford), and Francesca Gino (Harvard).

They drew inspiration from earlier studies that had shown that companies with negative annual earnings write in a less clear manner in their reports to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). They reasoned that a similar process might occur with ethics as well.

Together the team was able to chronicle which companies had ethics infractions (like environmental violations, fraud, and anticompetitive activity). They also determined which codes of conduct were "linguistically obfuscated." These codes were full of abstraction, jargon, and long, overly complex explanations.

The results of the study proved their hypothesis correct: Companies with ethics infractions did resort to unclear language in order to hide them.

The researchers began to ask additional questions. They wanted to know if unclear language actually works. Does it effectively hide a company's problems? They showed corporate values statements to study participants and asked about their perceptions of the companies behind them. The participants saw the companies with clearly-written values statements as more moral, warmer, and more trustworthy, compared to those with jargon-laden values statements.

The Deception Spiral

Then the researchers decided to go a step further. They had shown that unclear language is often a consequence of unethical behavior. Now they wanted to see if it could cause unethical behavior as well. This would help them determine if something like the vicious cycle Orwell theorized really could exist.

This time, they took their work to the lab. They showed study participants values statements and then handed participants a list with scrambled words like “TTISRA” and “LONSEM.” They asked participants to unscramble the words and gave them opportunities to earn money. They introduced an element of competition as well. They could earn bonuses for unscrambling a greater number of words than 80% of the participants in their group.

At the same time, the researchers laid a trap. “TTISRA,” could be unscrambled to spell “ARTIST.” “LONSEM” could become “LEMONS.” But they included some words like OPOER, ALVNO, and ANHDU, which do not spell a word no matter how participants rearranged the letters. This trap enabled them to measure whether people cheated during the activity. If the participants said they unscramble the words without solutions, the researchers concluded they must have cheated in reporting their score.

The participants who had seen the unclear statements were more likely to cave to the temptation. Those who had seen the clear statement tended to stay on the moral path. Most importantly, this meant that the researchers had found clear support for a cycle similar to the one Orwell had described. This "deception spiral" as they call it, meant that unethical behavior can lead to unclear statements about values. And unclear statements about values can, in turn, contribute even more to unethical behavior.

The info is here.

The ConTraSt database for analysing and comparing empirical studies of consciousness theories

Yaron, I., Melloni, L., Pitts, M. et al.

Nat Hum Behav (2022).

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-021-01284-5

Abstract

Understanding how consciousness arises from neural activity remains one of the biggest challenges for neuroscience. Numerous theories have been proposed in recent years, each gaining independent empirical support. Currently, there is no comprehensive, quantitative and theory-neutral overview of the field that enables an evaluation of how theoretical frameworks interact with empirical research. We provide a bird’s eye view of studies that interpreted their findings in light of at least one of four leading neuroscientific theories of consciousness (N = 412 experiments), asking how methodological choices of the researchers might affect the final conclusions. We found that supporting a specific theory can be predicted solely from methodological choices, irrespective of findings. Furthermore, most studies interpret their findings post hoc, rather than a priori testing critical predictions of the theories. Our results highlight challenges for the field and provide researchers with an open-access website (https://ContrastDB.tau.ac.il) to further analyse trends in the neuroscience of consciousness.

Discussion

Several key conclusions can be drawn from our analyses of these 412 experiments: First, the field seems highly skewed towards confirmatory, as opposed to disconfirmatory, evidence which might explain the failure to exclude theories and converge on an accepted, or at least widely favored, account. This effect is relatively stable over time. Second, theory-driven studies, aimed at testing the predictions of the theories, are rather scarce, and even rarer are studies testing more than one theory, or pitting theories against each other – only 7% of the experiments directly compared two or more theories’ predictions. Though there seems to be an increasing number of experiments that test predictions a-priori in recent years, a large number of studies continue to interpret their findings post-hoc in light of the theories. Third, a close

relation was found between methodological choices made by researchers and the theoretical interpretations of their findings. That is, based only on some methodological choices of the researchers (e.g., using report vs. no-report paradigms, or studying content vs. state consciousness), we could predict if the experiment will end up supporting each of the theories.

A pdf is here.

Editor's note: Consistent with other forms of confirmation bias: the design of the experiment largely determines its result.  Consciousness remains a mystery, and in the eye of the scientific beholder.

Artificial Intelligence, Humanistic Ethics

John Tasioulas

AI & Society

Spring 2022

Abstract

Ethics is concerned with what it is to live a flourishing life and what it is we morally owe to others. The optimizing mindset prevalent among computer scientists and economists, among other powerful actors, has led to an approach focused on maximizing the fulfillment of human preferences, an approach that has acquired considerable influence in the ethics of AI. But this preference-based utilitarianism is open to serious objections. This essay sketches an alternative, “humanistic” ethics for AI that is sensitive to aspects of human engagement with the ethical often missed by the dominant approach. Three elements of this humanistic approach are outlined: its commitment to a plurality of values, its stress on the importance of the procedures we adopt, not just the outcomes they yield, and the centrality it accords to individual and collective participation in our understanding of human well-being and morality. The essay concludes with thoughts on how the prospect of artificial general intelligence bears on this humanistic outlook.

(cut)

I have mainly focused on narrow AI, conceived as AI-powered technology that can perform limited tasks (such as facial recognition or medical diagnosis) that typically require intelligence when performed by humans. This is partly because serious doubt surrounds the likelihood of artificial general intelligence emerging within any realistically foreseeable time frame, partly because the operative notion of “intelligence” in discussions of AGI (artificial general intelligence) is problematic, and partly because a focus on AGI often distracts us from the more immediate questions of narrow AI.

With these caveats in place, however, one can admit that thought experiments about AGI can help bring into focus two questions fundamental to any humanistic ethic: What is the ultimate source of human dignity, understood as the inherent value attaching to each and every human being? And how can we relate human dignity to the value inhering in nonhuman beings? Toward the end of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel Klara and the Sun, the eponymous narrator, an “Artificial Friend,” speculates that human dignity–the “human heart” that “makes each of us special and individual”–has its source not in something within us, but in the love of others for us. But a threat of circularity looms for this boot-strapping humanism, for how can the love of others endow us with value unless those others already have value? Moreover, if the source of human dignity is contingent on the varying attitudes of others, how can it apply equally to every human being? Are the unloved bereft of the “human heart”?

The info is here.

Free will without consciousness?

L. Mudrik, I. G. Arie, et al.

Trends in Cognitive Sciences

Available online 12 April 2022

Abstract

Findings demonstrating decision-related neural activity preceding volitional actions have dominated the discussion about how science can inform the free will debate. These discussions have largely ignored studies suggesting that decisions might be influenced or biased by various unconscious processes. If these effects are indeed real, do they render subjects’ decisions less free or even unfree? Here, we argue that, while unconscious influences on decision-making do not threaten the existence of free will in general, they provide important information about limitations on freedom in specific circumstances. We demonstrate that aspects of this long-lasting controversy are empirically testable and provide insight into their bearing on degrees of freedom, laying the groundwork for future scientific-philosophical approaches.

Highlights

• A growing body of literature argues for unconscious effects on decision-making.

• We review a body of such studies while acknowledging methodological limitations, and categorize the types of unconscious influence reported.

• These effects intuitively challenge free will, despite being generally overlooked in the free will literature. To what extent can decisions be free if they are affected by unconscious factors?

• Our analysis suggests that unconscious influences on behavior affect degrees of control or reasons-responsiveness. We argue that they do not threaten the existence of free will in general, but only the degree to which we can be free in specific circumstances.

Concluding remarks

Current findings of unconscious effects on decision-making do not threaten the existence of free will in general. Yet, the results still show ways in which our freedom can be compromised under specific circumstances. More experimental and philosophical work is needed to delineate the limits and scope of these effects on our freedom (see Outstanding questions). We have evolved to be the decision-makers that we are; thus, our decisions are affected by biases, internal states, and external contexts. However, we can at least sometimes resist those, if we want, and this ability to resist influences contrary to our preferences and reasons is considered a central feature of freedom. As long as this ability is preserved, and the reviewed findings do not suggest otherwise, we are still free, at least usually and to a significant degree.

The info is here.

Unemployment, Behavioral Health, And Suicide

R. Ramchand, L. Ayer, & S. O'Connor

Health Affairs

Originally posted 7 APR 22

Key Points:

• A large body of research, most of which is ecological, has investigated the relationship between job loss or unemployment rates and mental health, substance use, and suicide.

• Groups historically experiencing health disparities (for example, Black and Hispanic populations and those without a high school or college degree) have been differently affected by unemployment during the COVID-19 pandemic. Similarly, preliminary evidence from three states suggests that suicide has disproportionately affected Americans who are members of racial and ethnic minority groups over the course of the pandemic.

• COVID-19 has affected the workforce in unique ways that differentiate the pandemic from previous economic downturns. However, previous research indicates that increases in suicide rates associated with economic downturns were driven by regional variation in unemployment, availability of unemployment benefits, and duration and magnitude of changes in unemployment.

• Policy mitigation strategies may have offset the potential impact of unemployment fluctuations on suicide rates during the pandemic. Policies include expanded unemployment benefits and food assistance, as well as tax credits and subsidies that reduced child care and health care costs.

• Research is needed to disentangle which populations experienced the most benefit when these strategies were present and which had the greatest risk when they were discontinued.

• Evidence-based strategies that expand the mental health workforce and integrate mental health supports into employment and training settings may be promising ways to help workers as they navigate persistent changes to workforce demands.

Suicide In The United States

A recent Health Affairs Health Policy Brief provides an overview of suicide in the United States. In 2019, 47,511 Americans intentionally ended their lives, making suicide the tenth leading cause of death. This is likely an underestimate—in 2019, 75,795 Americans died of poisonings, the majority of which were drug poisonings categorized as unintentional, although some were likely suicide overdoses that were misclassified.

Suicide is a growing national concern despite the fact that the national suicide rate decreased between 2018 and 2019 and again in 2020. This decrease comes after nearly twenty years of the national suicide rate increasing annually, and it was not observed in some minority racial and ethnic groups. In addition, although suicide rates decreased between 2018 and 2020, the drug overdose death rate increased.

The info is here.

The “Equal-Opportunity Jerk” Defense: Rudeness Can Obfuscate Gender Bias

Belmi, P., Jun, S., & Adams, G. S. (2022). 

Psychological Science, 33(3), 397–411.

https://doi.org/10.1177/09567976211040495

Abstract

To address sexism, people must first recognize it. In this research, we identified a barrier that makes sexism hard to recognize: rudeness toward men. We found that observers judge a sexist perpetrator as less sexist if he is rude toward men. This occurs because rudeness toward men creates the illusion of gender blindness. We documented this phenomenon in five preregistered studies consisting of online adult participants and adult students from professional schools (total N = 4,663). These attributions are problematic because sexism and rudeness are not mutually exclusive. Men who hold sexist beliefs about women can be—and often are—rude toward other men. These attributions also discourage observers from holding perpetrators accountable for gender bias. Thus, rudeness toward men gives sexist perpetrators plausible deniability. It protects them and prevents the first perceptual step necessary to address sexism.

Statement of Relevance

Sexism can be challenging to identify and eventually root out. However, we contend that even blatant forms of sexism are sometimes difficult to recognize. In this research, we demonstrated how rudeness can makes blatant forms of sexism harder to identify. We found that a man does not seem sexist if he treats everyone—both men and women—poorly. This is problematic because sexism and rudeness are not mutually exclusive.  Men who are sexist can be—and often are—rude toward other men. We found that rudeness obscures the recognition of sexism by creating the perception that the sexist perpetrator does not

notice or pay attention to gender when dealing with other people. This misleads observers into thinking that an intervention such as gender-bias training is less necessary. Rudeness can therefore protect sexist perpetrators, making their prejudice harder to recognize and correct.

From the Discussion

It has been noted that overtly discriminatory conduct—characterized by blatant antipathy, antiquated

beliefs about women, and endorsement of pejorative stereotypes—is becoming less common because of

sweeping changes in antidiscrimination laws, practices, and ideologies in the United States (Brief et al., 1997; Dovidio & Gaertner, 1998; Swim et al., 1995). However, blatant, unambiguous, and obvious forms of sexist conduct continue to exist in society (Dovidio & Gaertner, 1998) and within organizations in particular (e.g., Cortina, 2008). Our findings suggest that one reason for their persistence is that observers may not recognize that everyday acts of rudeness can serve as a convenient mask for bias against women (Cortina, 2008). This has an important practical implication: When a sexist manager is rude toward men, it may appear as though he is not sexist. Thus, women victimized by his behavior will have a more difficult time proving that he is sexist. Rudeness can therefore protect perpetrators.

The research is here.