Deontic Grice

by J. L. Speranza
for the Grice Club.

KRAMER WAS SUGGESTING THAT SPERANZA (i.e. _me_) would enjoy this American jurisprudential philosopher. I did!

I also enjoy Grice! Kramer refers to 'ex post facto' and 'principle', etc. For the record, this in wiki's entry under 'ex post facto': It has the 1 and 2 sub-clause type of thing that should appeal Kramer (and Grice):


"Nuremberg Principles I & II state:"

"1. Any person who commits an act which
constitutes a crime under international law
is responsible therefore and liable to
punishment."

"2. The fact that internal law does
not impose a penalty for an act which
constitutes a crime under international law
does not relieve the person who
committed the act from
responsibility under international law".

--- This should be clear enough. But try to formalise it deontically. Plus, we need chrnological indexes, methinks. It seems that

the national-international distinction

confuses things, theoretically.

It would seem enough, from a conceptual point of view, to consider time variants. I.e.

law L1 at time t1

law L2 at time t2.

-----

Thus, from the same wiki entry, vis a vis:

Feuerbach, Bayern, 1813:

Nullum crimen, nulla poena sine praevia
lege poenali

("No crime, no punishment without a previous penal law")

"In the legal systems of ... Europe where the maxim was
first developed, "penal law" was taken to
mean statutory penal law, so as to create
a guarantee to the individual, considered as
a fundamental right, that he would not
be prosecuted for an action (or omission) that
was not considered a crime according to
the statutes passed by the legislators
in force at the time of the action (or
omission), and that only those penalties
that were in place when the infringement took
place would be applied."

Now, try to formalise the thing using explicit chronological operators. Do not forget to bring in psychological attitudes: what agent THINKS is unlawful (as in 'manifestedly' unlawful, etc.).

Refs.
-- The abduction of Eichmann from Argentina.
-- The abduction of Figaro, by Bach.