Key points

A person who punishes a social defector is a third-party punisher.

Fourth parties are often ready to punish a third party who fails to punish.

The captivity tale of Cervantes, the author of "Don Quixote," involves a third-party punishment dilemma.

In order to attain the impossible, one must attempt the absurd . ―Cervantes

The recent Spanish–Italian movie El Cautivo (The Captive) tells the tale of Miguel de Cervantes’s five-year captivity in Algiers in the 1580s. Cervantes had been captured at sea, and he was held for ransom with other Spanish nobles and men of means. His captors fail to realize that no one would put up the ransom they ask, and so Cervantes languishes in the Qasbah— with a view of the Mediterranean Sea but no freedom. His attempts to escape fail.

Gra

See Full Page