smyjpmu

If you relied on the promise (went to great lengths to invite family, friends, and coworkers to a party and paid $1000 to an entertainer to host the party), then yes, for the same reason as any other breach of contract.

That's not really a duel to the death, then. And it also raises the question of why such a rule can morally be in place. Assisted suicide can continue even after the person being killed goes unconscious, can't it?

Okay, I know my resignation has been accepted, so this is just out of curiosity. If a clown doesn't show up for my kid's birthday party, are there any actual damages?

What if one party goes unconscious and therefore cannot halt the process? Would a finishing kill shot be murder?

"I, S, agree to meet at OK Corral at high noon on October 26, 2010, for the purpose of engaging in a duel. In consideration for this promise, you, DO, also agree to meet at OK Corral at high noon on October 26, 2010, for the same purpose. The duel shall be conducted according to Roberts Rules of Dueling Volume 17. Both parties promise not to back out of said duel until at least one shot has been fired. Both parties have gone to great lengths to invite family, friends, and coworkers to attend this momentous event, all of whom will be most disappointed if the event does not occur. As such, parties agree that damages for breach are difficult or impossible to determine. Therefore parties agree to liquidated damages, which they acknowledge and agree are reasonable estimates of actual damages, as set forth as follows: Should a party fail to show up for the duel, and not reschedule within 5 business days, breaching party shall pay a lump sum of $1000 to other party as liquidated damages." If you don't agree, this is in the form of a contract (albeit a very poorly and hastily written one), which would be valid were dueling legal (and Roberts Rules of Dueling Volume 17 not something I just made up), and that it is in the nature of a "contract to duel", then I resign. It's really not that important to me, because after hearing this latest explanation I think we're in substantial agreement on what is/is not a contract (though perhaps not on what is/is not a "contract to duel").

Because rights are principles. They are moral concepts. Trading rights would be like trading math equations. Great. A right is a freedom of action. "It means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men." If you want to die, and someone helps you, there is no compulsion, coercion, or interference by other men. Whether or not that applies to a duel, I don't know. The difference between a duel and assisted suicide is obvious. In assisted suicide, the person wants to die. In a duel, they don't. Giving permission to take one's life is not equivalent to giving the other person a right to your life, no. Giving the other person a right to your life would be closer to slavery. You mean equivalent? I'm not convinced either. Depends on the duel. A duel can also be "one shot each". It need not be to the death. Should a duel not to the death be treated like a boxing match?

Doesn't that depend on the details of the contract? How can you say there is no consideration without even seeing the contract itself?

That's gotta be a strawman or something. What is the actual "scheme" being put in place?

I wouldn't characterize it that way. You can't trade rights, can you? You can trade covenants not to sue, but that only covers civil law, not criminal law. I think David has a great point that a contract is not what would make a duel legal, even if I do disagree with him that a contract to duel would, were duels legal, be possible. Think of a contract to engage in a boxing match. The contract doesn't say "I give you permission to punch me in exchange for you giving me permission to punch you". The details of the contract state that so-and-so will show up at whatever location, engage in a boxing match under certain rules, etc. There are surely waivers of liability, but that is a matter of civil law, not criminal law. The contract is not what creates the exemption under criminal law for battery. The permission is what creates it. However, there generally is a contract, and I see no reason there couldn't be such a contract for a duel, if duels were legal. If duels are legal and you contract to duel, then you don't show up to the duel, the other party to the contract can sue for damages, not kill you. The agreement is "I'll show up at X location and engage in a duel", not "I'll let you try to kill me". If duels were legal, in all probability there would be a market for television events covering the duel. Surely there would be contracts involved, if not between the two participants then between the participants and the producer of the event.

But you have promised to explain why an agreement to duel is not a contract, and you have so far failed to do so. Is an agreement to fight a boxing match a contract? If so, why not an agreement to duel?

Is it obvious to you that recognizing humans rights is in our own self-interest as individuals? Is it obvious to you that recognizing chimps rights is not in our own self-interest as individuals?

Necessity is a defense under common law, which is to say nothing of whether or not it ought to be. I'm not sure, but it's possibly only a defense under criminal law, so there would still be a civil case for damages.

Yes, there is. But your hypothetical seems to be more of the former scenario than the latter. I honestly can't figure out what you mean by that. Okay but you ignored all the other bits of required omniscience required to make your scenario realistic. It may be the case that the only way I can get the water is by killing the man, but how am I supposed to *know* that the only way I can get the water is by killing the man?

In principle? Again, are you talking about what the law is, or what the law should be? I know you didn't say courts always force specific performance. But you said they always can force specific performance (by the definition of "contract"), and I assume you mean they always have the legal ability to force specific performance. Specific performance is extremely rare. In the vast majority of cases, courts will not impose an order of specific performance. If dueling were legal, a court could certainly award damages for breach of contract. Just like they can award damages for any other breach of contract. Yes, they wouldn't order specific performance, but they almost never award specific performance. If you enter into a contract to fight a boxing match, and you don't show up for the match, is the court going to order you into the ring? No? Well does that mean it's not a contract? On the other hand, the contract is not what would, under your argument, create the permission to kill the other person. If I understand your argument correctly, it would be perfectly legal to get into an argument, call the other person out, and go into the (privately owned) alleyway in the back and shoot it up. No contract would be necessary, but if dueling is legal, of course a contract to duel must be. Nanite1018 gives sex as an example of a non-contractual agreement where either party has the right to back out at any time. Should a contract for sex be invalid? Should it be unenforceable? Are contracts to participate in a hard-core porno unenforceable today? "Specific performance is ordered by courts only in rare cases in which the subject matter of the contract is unique, making it difficult to put a monetary amount on the damage incurred as a result of the breach. Specific performance is not awarded in personal service contracts. In the previous example, the court would not order the original roofer to complete the job." http://www.weblocator.com/attorney/fl/law/contbus.html If you want to argue that courts *should* be able to award specific performance for any and all contracts, that's one thing. But saying that, by definition, "a contract must be something that a court can force either party to live up to", is just plain wrong. In "rare cases in which the subject matter of the contract is unique, making it difficult to put a monetary amount on the damage incurred as a result of the breach", courts can force either party to live up to the contract. But in the vast majority of cases, all they can do is award damages for breach (and only actual damages at that).

Wait a second. What? I thought before you were talking about what you think the law ought to be. You actually believe this is a description of what the law is? Ever hear of "efficient breach"? The concept of efficient breach wouldn't exist if courts could force specific performance of any contract (by definition).

Keep begging? Maybe you should try using reason. Tell the man why it's to his advantage to let you have some water. While you're at it, tell yourself why it's to your advantage not to kill the man. One common flaw with these sorts of scenarios is that they're told from a perspective of omniscience. "Your death is certain unless you drink within X hours". "You know the man will not listen to reason." "There is no one around and no water for miles in any direction." But in reality, you just know you're really really thirsty. And you know there's a man who has access to water. And you know that when you ask him for water he says "no". So what do you do? Most likely, you ask again. You continue to try to negotiate because you believe that men are rational beings and that if the old man weren't capable of reason he wouldn't have managed to make such a nice life for himself in the first place. You figure the old man must value your life, because even though he's got a bow and arrow in his hand and you're a sitting duck, he hasn't threatened you with it. You assume it's in your best interest as well as his that the two of you cooperate rather that battle to the death. Even if this hypothetical situation does occur in a malevolent universe where all these assumptions are false, you don't know this, so you keep trying to use reason.

Every man's death is metaphysically inevitable. No ethical code can allow you to live forever. So every ethical code requires the ethical man's death.

Quite true. Additionally, the dual participant is showing himself to be a person with the desire and the willingness to kill an innocent person, if only he thinks he can get away with it legally. Is it rational for us to allow such a person to live free in our society? Boxing and other sports are not analogous, because harming the other person is not the intent, it is a known side-effect. Even in most cases of assisted suicide the intent is not really to harm the other person - the intent is to relieve suffering. Yes, you could contrive a case of assisted suicide where there is no suffering involved, one person whimsically decides to kill himself "for the lulz" and another buys the bullets and loads the gun for him, but again I'd ask whether or not it is rational for us to allow such a person to live free in our society. This may seem like a rhetorical question, but really it isn't. I haven't yet decided how I feel about the matter.

I think before this issue can be addressed it needs to be examined what is the purpose of criminal law, and how does that tie in to the the justified use of retaliatory force.

Ignoring the fact that this is not exactly accurate, I still don't agree with that analysis. There is an intervening cause between your filing of the claim and the government collection of unemployment taxes. Do you deny that there is an intervening cause, or do you claim that an intervening cause does not relieve one of responsibility?

Depends on the state. New Jersey and California at least have state unemployment insurance contributions taken out of employee paychecks. Unemployment programs are run by the individual states. In addition, the federal government has a fund which the states can access if their state unemployment trust fund goes bust. This happened to New York back in the early 2000s (dot com bust and 9/11 being the major factors), and New York businesses paid a higher federal unemployment rate for the next few years as a result. The federal program is a flat rate for every business in a state. Google "Form 940" if you want to see how it's calculated.

Here in Florida there's a minimum rate (currently 0.0036 or 0.36%), a maximum rate (currently 0.0540 or 5.4%) and an initial rate (currently 0.0270 or 2.7%). After 10 quarters your rate is determined (between the minimum and maximum) by a formula which takes into account how much has been paid out in claims to employees you've laid off. I think the idea is that between the min and the max you wind up paying back what was paid out in claims, but I'm not sure of the exact details of the formula. Federally, there's a flat minimum rate, unless you're in a certain state whose unemployment fund was insolvent, which is 0.0080 or 0.8%. In both cases the rate is only charged on the first $7000 of annual wages per employee. Personally, my employer is most likely at the 5.4% rate, so making a claim would actually not cause their rate to go up (it would instead, in aggregate with everyone else's claims, cause the minimum rate to go up). Not that I think that makes a difference from a moral perspective. I am not the one imposing the unemployment tax, the State of Florida is.

Okay, so a thief robs you of $1000. That thief later offers you $100 back, but tells you that if you take the money, he will rob your employer of $100. Do you accept the $100?

He seems to falter a bit? The solution he comes up with is "jobless claim benefits" and "a way to securitize to the public a portion of their house, or a portion of their bill". Santelli makes a lot of good points, but he's no hero. As for Chris Matthews, I was especially angered by his refusal to accept that *both* the person who bought a house they couldn't afford *and* the person who (often fraudulently) sold them the mortgage they couldn't pay back, are morally responsible for the ensuing default. Of course, that doesn't get to the heart of why these people were able to affect the lives of the innocent victims who neither bought a house they couldn't afford nor gave a mortgage to someone who couldn't afford to pay it back. I believe the responsibility for that lies in collectivist government interventions. But that's not an argument I can make in the space of a single forum post.

For what it's worth, I believe that is a misquote of what Greenspan actually said. I listened to the testimony, and while he admitted a flaw in his ideology, he claimed to not yet have figured out exactly what that flaw was.