interesting stat I just heard - the us has 5% of the world population, and 25% of the world prison population.

lol

more jails is obv the solution

So, I came up with this idea about how to make the prison system better.

First, you have prison levels. The lowest level is pretty laid back. Just a fenced in area. Beds but no cells. Maybe even a day work release. Each level has progressively tighter security. The highest level is on an island somewhere that no one can leave. We'll air drop food in occasionally.

So, when you get sentenced, you go to the appropriate level. No one goes to the highest level immediately, though. You wouldn't sentence a murderer to the lowest level. You get the idea.

Each level is it's own democracy with periodic voting. You have two votes. The first vote is for people you think have been good citizens in your prison. The second vote is for people you think haven't been good citizens. The winner(s) of the good citizen vote go down a prison level (or to freedom if on the lowest level). The winner(s) of the bad citizen vote go up a prison level.

This way, good behavior is rewarded and ultimately leads to freedom. Horrendous behavior eventually leads to the island of no return.

I have a solution for bad drivers too if anyone is interested.

except that the biggest baddest guy there will just intimidate people and manipulate the vote so that he gets sent down enough for him to escape.

And the fish are all going to have to give enough dome so that they aren't the ones voted up to the higher level.

This is prison we're talking about - not generally functioning members of society (this is not to say that many of those in prison aren't capable of being functioning members of society)

I would very much like to hear this. Odds are I will think you are being too nice to them.*

* Although my idea of "bad drivers" is probably not the general public's idea.

only sucks if you're the fish.

K. Every car has a bar code on their front and back bumpers. Everyone is equipped with a scanner. When someone else does something bad, you scan them.

You have a limited number of scans per (month/year/whatever), so you can't just go around scanning people.

If you have been scanned x amount of times by others, the next time you stop your car, it won't start again.

There's obviously a lot of details to work out, but this is the basic concept.

I have a solution to the prison problem:

Stop putting so many people in jail for stupid reasons (zomg he smoked pot!!!)
Stop putting people in jail for things like manslaughter/negligence. Make them pay a (big) fine to the victims instead

That should make things much easier

Yay for vigilante justice

guy I used to work with had a similar idea re: bad driving

everybody had like these paintball type guns attached to their cars, and if somebody engaged in some bad driving you shot them-- too many splatter marks on your car meant you were off the road

i'm quite certain that he was high when he came up with this idea

Yeah, I was thinking more along the lines of lasers/machine guns.

And "person x was driving 5 mph below the speed limit in the fast lane" is a completely reasonable and legal justification for using them.

LDO on the drug thing.

The second idea sounds perfect for poor people who may be ethically challenged.

Speaking of being in jail for ridiculous reasons

how about having a swat team from the Fish & Wildlife service raid your house over orchids

and then spend 2 years in jail

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...k/6659417.html

10,000 Apply for 90 factory jobs in Louisville, KY

economy is going strong

Garnish wages, ldo

Louisville != economy

FYP

I recently saw an episode of Babylon 5 where some interesting alien device was introduced. If something like this existed it would pretty much solve the prison issue. It sucked life energy out of one person and transfered it to the other.
So death penalty actually benefits someone as well and smaller penalties could all be run through this thing on appropriate settings (an eye for an eye, get rid of "victimless crimes" of course). If you have someone who signs off on the punishment and he's liable to the same punishment if he was wrong we have a pretty perfect justice system from the punishment POV imo.
Monetary punishments for crimes not damaging the body/mind of someone (theft etc) I like the suggestion of about 2x the value + interest

The victim can of course always chose to settle for a deifferent punishment with the offender if they so chose.

More moon bombing pls we need to find this thingy :P

Horrible invasion of privacy.

biggerboat, your idea would be great except half the drivers on the road wouldn't know bad driving if it smacked them across the face.

Most drivers think their driving ability is above average.

I just watched a Mythbusters episode that absolutely crushed the Moon Landing hoax conspiracy theories. Definitely my favourite Mythbusters, and they didn't even blow anything up.

Zurvan,

Did they talk about Stanley Kubrick?

No, they looked at actual verifiable claims, and tested them.

- Whether a photo with a single light source could have non-parallel shadows. Hoaxers claim no, but it can with different elevations
- A certain picture of Armstrong in the shadow of the lander where he shows up bright. The reflective quality of the moon dust was enough to show him
- Whether they could leave footprints in moon dust without moisture - it works, because moon dust isn't smooth like Earth sand, it's jagged, which allows it to keep its shape without moisture
- Whether the flag could move as if there were a breeze in a vaccuum - that was shown to be caused by the momentum from planting the flag
- Testing whether they could reproduce the movements of the astronauts using film tricks - they could not

I can't either, doesn't prove anything. Not that I think the moon landing was a hoax. At least, not in the usual sense. It was a total ****ing hoax in terms of being valuable.

But the only thing I can still stomach on mythbusters is Kari.