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Comment by cmsonger | Hacker News Reader

I think there are two issues you don't address. Death is final. There's no later exoneration if you've killed someone and it seems pretty clear that this has happened. State and federal governments have executed innocent people.

The second is that content of this article itself. The author does not sound thrilled to be in solitary; but the author also seems to have found meaning in life. Do you think that the author would choose death over the life he has forged for himself? I don't think so.

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I can’t speak for the author, but I would absolutely choose death over life imprisonment if given the choice (assuming a painless method of execution)

Some people live most of their lives "imprisoned": maybe they're blind, deaf, paralyzed, have birth defects, chronic pain/illness. But even they value life within limitations. There is always a reason to keep going. Perspective is everything.

I don’t think it’s reasonable to assume that everyone will have the same perspective on this.

I think It’s one thing to be born blind/deaf and never experience life without it, but it’s another when you were free and then went to prison for life/got blind/paralyzed

You sound like the banker in "The Bet" by Chekhov. I hope nobody makes a bet in this thread. :D

I'd take the pain anyway.

Oh agreed. Death is not a good option. I'm mostly saying that life in prison, especially in American prisons, is not a good one either.

Agreed. The US has some weird priorities in my estimation.

> Death is final.

Years in prison can't be undone any more than death can.

Would you in principle call torturing someone for years on end but eventually letting them go free, a lesser crime than a quick death?

> State and federal governments have executed innocent people.

Very, very few in modern US history, thanks to years of appeals and reviews. Meanwhile, a tremendous number of innocent people serve a large number of years of their life in prison.

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