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"The Principle Of Punishment Is A Categorical Imperative", Nelson T. Potter Jr.

Department of Philosophy: Faculty Publications

There has been a considerable renaissance in retributivism as a theory of the justification of punishment in the second half of this century. Retributivism is often defended as if it were a particularly hardy moral intuition, a basic free-standing moral principle that is underivable from any broader theory or set of principles. In this vein it is often "supported" through the presentation of outrageous and horribly cruel crimes, especially against persons, particularly murder, in order to elicit what may be thought to be the natural and appropriate emotional response, a response of anger, indignation, and desire for retribution. Under such …