Comment by pjungwir
13 years ago
The Chinese experimented with strict enforcement in the Qin Dynasty, following the philosophy of Han Feizi (Legalism). It sounds like it was a big failure. I'm sure there have been other such experiments. The Law is not a computer program.
The Law is full of legacy cruft, and is based on philosophies that largely predate empiricism. Has there ever been an attempt to design a legal system based on modern engineering principles? Laws are as much about systems as about people. When you want to understand people you might rely on a politician, but to understand systems you should rely on engineers.
The engineers that designed the RBMK reactor used for Chernobyl, the ones that designed the USS Thresher which was crushed with all hands after a combined failure of its emergency ballast tank blow and steam propulsion system, or the ones who designed the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia?
This is not to say that we can't improve the legal system. But if engineering has taught me anything, it's that it will always be prudent to design a relief/safety valve into the system.
Chernobyl, Challenger, and Columbia are examples of systems where engineers were constrained by politicians.
I hadn't heard of the USS Thresher before today, but I did just read a bit of the Wikipedia article.
When a disaster occurs in engineering, the lessons learned are applied to the next design. When a disaster occurs in politics, the other party gets its turn to cause the next disaster.
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This. I've been thinking a lot about this (not particularly hard, admittedly) lately. I suppose the main problem would be that those in power, i.e. politicians, will mostly be out of a job once such a task were to be undertaken.