Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh, 4200 Fifth Avenue, 15260 Pittsburgh, United States.
Department of Economics, Université Panthéon-Assas, 12 place du Panthéon, 75005 Paris, France.
Cognition. 2017 Dec;169:139-146. doi: 10.1016/j.cognition.2017.08.008. Epub 2017 Sep 8.
A coherent practice of mens rea ('guilty mind') ascription in criminal law presupposes a concept of mens rea which is insensitive to the moral valence of an action's outcome. For instance, an assessment of whether an agent harmed another person intentionally should be unaffected by the severity of harm done. Ascriptions of intentionality made by laypeople, however, are subject to a strong outcome bias. As demonstrated by the Knobe effect, a knowingly incurred negative side effect is standardly judged intentional, whereas a positive side effect is not. We report the first empirical investigation into intentionality ascriptions made by professional judges, which finds (i) that professionals are sensitive to the moral valence of outcome type, and (ii) that the worse the outcome, the higher the propensity to ascribe intentionality. The data shows the intentionality ascriptions of professional judges to be inconsistent with the concept of mens rea supposedly at the foundation of criminal law.
在刑法中，连贯地进行犯罪意图（“犯罪心理”）归属假设，需要有一个对行为结果的道德价值不敏感的犯罪意图概念。例如，对代理人是否故意伤害他人的评估，不应受到所造成伤害严重程度的影响。然而，外行人的故意归属受到强烈的结果偏见的影响。正如诺布效应所证明的那样，明知会产生负面副作用通常被判定为故意，而正面副作用则不是。我们报告了对专业法官所作的故意归属的首次实证调查，结果发现：（i）专业人士对结果类型的道德价值敏感，（ii）结果越糟糕，将其归因于故意的倾向就越高。这些数据表明，专业法官的故意归属与刑法基础上假定的犯罪意图概念不一致。
