I Now Nominate Ms. Cleo for Pre-crime Division

    I would like to first state that if the Precognitives are to be deemed in any society as the “Know all’s”, along with being the predictors of major crimes such as murder, at minimum they should all have to reach a 100% consensus before any actions are taken upon citizens. In the film Minority Report, Agatha, Arthur, and Dasher, along with their visions, singlehandedly had the power to cause a person within the D.C. Metropolitan area to be locked away, for crimes such as murder, or even premeditated murder, based off a future prediction in time. Now, I call these visions predictions because as I already stated, the visions were not all reached by consensus, and therefore these visions essentially could be labeled as guesses. This concept of stopping major crimes before they happen doesn’t quite sound realistic to me, simply for the fact that it was pointed out in the movie that the three Precognitives didn’t always share the same vision(s) in regards to murders taking place. Also, since this system of predicting murders can be finagled by corruption, would someone really be okay with the fact that their freedom may be taken away for life because of a fluke prediction?

     With this concept of predicting people’s future holding as the law of the land, couldn’t any prediction be just as good as the next? If this is the case, I certainly nominate Ms. Cleo to join the precognitive initiatives, since there was once a time when her predictions would taken as “Law” by many believers of her future visions, only to be debunked after finding out that it was all just a money scam, that was essentially altering many peoples lives for the worst. I don’t truly feel that one individual who knows nothing about you can “See” your future, and even furthermore, I don’t think that the words coming out of those same people’s mouths should be taken seriously, but, “To each his own”.

     Now let’s examine what these types and kinds of powers would mean in 2013. Personally I feel that in today’s society; too many people are locked up without a fair conviction and trial, and sometimes with no evidence against them at all! This generally happens due to profiling, and I would have to wonder realistically how many more jails and prisons would have to be constructed to house all those who would be convicted on the word of these kinds of future predictions. Even worst, this system of prediction in the movie was shown to be flawed in the sense that it could be manipulated. In a sense, I do see some correlations to our justice system in America, it just goes by another name.

     Since the rate of murders in the film was at an eye raising low, I can see some beneficial aspects of precognitive predictions, but if this film was taking place in this day and time, I surely hope that I would never have a false future prediction placed against me, especially knowing that it was essentially just based off of a guess.

  If future telling is the way to go, Ms. Cleo, along with any Tarot card reader would probably be some of the most powerful, and influential people within our society, let’s just hope that doesn’t happen.

       

Why do they need to be arrested?

After watching Minority Report the whole big moral argument seems to be that arresting the potential murders is wrong because they haven't committed a crime and it is possible they wouldn't. But we already know that the future can change. The precrime unit stops EVERY murder. But the movie seems to think physical force can stop crime but mental influences can't? The only people we have seen who have been able to change their future and not commit a murder are those who already know that the murder will occur.
But beyond this the ethical dilemma is dumb.
It seems to be:
Either arrest people who haven't actually committed a crime or allow people to commit murders.

The flaw is the human side of it. No murder is being committed. The system is perfect. The problem, the flaw is what is being done with the potential murderers.
 How about instead we simply stop the people from committing the murder (as we saw in the first scene where they stopped the man from stabbing his wife), put them in counselling or something, give them a fine (which would help keep precrime funded) and let them go on their way. The entire MORAL DILEMMA of the film is based mostly on the imprisonment of the criminals. and that imprisonment is totally unnecessary. The precrime unit has proven they are already capable of stopping the crime.

If you take out the imprisonment of the potential murderers there really isn't much of an ethical dilemma. The most that could be argued is for that of the 3 precogs. And then 3 peoples happiness to prevent all murders? This seems like a good trade

I do not like the moral choice being presented as only two options. There is more depth to it and the fact that the system prevented all murders shows how effective it actually is.

The Future of Thinking

It’s a scary thought to consider the possibility of someone knowing the inner workings of your mind before they manifest into reality. In fact, many things about this future are intimidating and cause one to be fearful. Imagine “driving” home in your car and being re-routed to an alternate destination based on wherever those in charge want or need you to be. And there is no off switch; you have no control over the situation. Unless of course you want to pull a Tom Cruise and bust out of the window and risk your life in oncoming traffic. Or imagine walking into a store where there is a scanner that detects your identity and immediately begins to speak to you personally about your purchasing history. It’s creepy, and an invasion of privacy. Not to mention the invasion of privacy that occurs when tiny electronic spiders enter your home and interrupt your daily life in order to scan your eyes to ensure your identity. But, is it all in part to keep the people safe? And if it is, does that make it okay?

 The most promising argument that I found in the film for the implementation of the pre-crime initiative was this basic conversation: “Why did you catch that ball? … Because it was going to fall.” Basically, if you know something is going to happen, and you can prevent it then why wouldn’t you? But, the problem here is how do you know for certain that it will happen? We realize in the movie that it comes down to the split second and people have free will and the ability to choose differently and to not commit an act that they may have thought about. It goes back to people being in charge of their own destiny. People are capable of making the right decision in the end despite previous negative or violent thoughts. The pre-cog tells the chief, “You know your own future, which means you can change it if you want to.” In a world where people with good intentions attempt to rid the smaller society of DC from murder, there is the ever-present reality that the system is flawed because it is human. This reminds us that although we are prone to be flawed and we don’t always make the right choices, that there is always the possibility of the opposite. In this movie they allow that possibility to outweigh the risk. We are left with a remotely uplifting ending for a change. 

Image #1: http://www.tomcruise.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/tom-cruise-minority-report-leap.jpg

Image #2: http://3dguy.tv/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/billboard500.jpg

Image #3: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikAxOpiUmu_dsIOAv-xaSeHi-H9dmVncxOc2LmSGxikUlQyiieTThOc9BaXr98h8nipmhJsawyvn75OXc211rcsB2x_Ke3ru2tN34dq3mS2TJwL2YTeekeF4uSaNL_tINVos4iL7GL_wDY/s1600/minority_report.jpg

Image #4: http://www.blogcdn.com/www.switched.com/media/2011/03/precogbooks.jpg

A City Without Crime

Precrime, arresting people before they have actually committed a crime. Does this make sense? Does this protect the people, protect their rights? Does this make for a utopia?

My answer to all of these questions is a big, fat NO.

I'm sorry, but the whole idea of triplets being able to predict when, how, and who for murders that will take place four days from the present is far fetched. Not only that, but the inhumane treatment of these three people, or at least that is what they would have been if they were not kept in that electrolyte bath and shot up with drugs, is morally wrong. Along with immoral actions, the officers arresting people for actions they have not yet committed completely against constitutional rights. According to Agatha, these people still had a choice...yes they dreamed it would happen, but the individual still had a choice to complete the action, such as with John. So these people may have never even completed the crime, and yet they are arrested for an indefinite amount of time for thinking about it.

Does a world without crime lead to utopia?

In utopia, people tend to be generally happy, suffer little, and put the many before the one. In Minority Report, while there was no murder, there were still other crimes, people turned to drugs, and protected themselves. The people still had to cautious, they were not completely safe – a major part of utopia. John and Lara suffered terribly with the loss of their child, Sean. In the first scene, the woman was committing adultery, which may have meant that she was not happy or satisfied in her marriage. John had to get drugs off the street. Lamar set up John to save his own butt. Precrime does not seem to make a utopic society. Yes it brings down the murders, one less way for people to suffer, but they have other things that happen that show that the people in this society do suffer.

I would rather continue living life in this society, with murder, than a world with precrime. First, they treated the triplets inhumanely, they also ignored our constitutional rights, and finally people still are not exceptionally happy.

It was a good movie, but nowhere near utopia...or dystopia...it was just there.

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