Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin.

 

The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene I

The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. 

Mercy is given to the sinner, not the sin. 

In my last blog post, https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2022/01/fools.html, I argued that the penalty for “Trying to fool” and failing should not exceed the reward for “Trying to fool” and succeeding.  If the penalty exceeds the reward, then a cycle of vengeance, e. g a feud, can be started.  

However it is not merely necessary that the penalty be equal or less than the reward.  It has to be exactly equal to the reward. The penalty applies to the sin, not to the sinner.  Whether that penalty is applied, is the mercy that is applied to the sinner.  That is why verdict and sentencing are separate parts of a trial.  The verdict is a finding that a "sin" has been committed.  The sentencing is whether the penalty for that "sin" should be imposed on the "sinner". 

Society has a role in the game of “Trying to fool”.  Society needs to know, but has no knowledge of, the reward that is applied for "Trying to fool" and succeeding.  If the penalty equals the reward, then it does have this information.  But if the penalty for “Trying to fool” and failing is zero, society does not have any information.  If Player Two agrees that that the penalty is zero, then society has no information.  People who are fooled probably do not know what reward they gave.  This includes people who are fooled less than 100% of the time as well as people who are fooled all of the time.  If the penalty for “Trying to fool” is zero, then by agreeing to those rules Player Two is confusing the penalty with mercy and is harming society, and himself, since “Trying to fool” is no longer a zero-sum game. 

For the good of society and all future players, society needs to know the reward for “Trying to fool” and succeeding .  But it only receives information on the penalty imposed on Player One for “Trying to fool” and failing.  Society needs to know the reward for the sin, if it is to establish the penalty for the sin.  It does not to need to know the penalty unless some of the people are fooled all of the time. But because some of the people are fooled all of the time, it needs to know the reward to apply its penalty.  If that penalty for Player One is zero in this case, then society can not ensure that the game is fair.  Applying mercy to the sinner is different than establishing that a sin was committed.