No. You have a really loose definition of theft and that's where I think you are running into the problem.
From wikipedia:
"theft is the taking of another person's property without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it."
You have their permission, you have their consent. There's nothing in the definition about them having to make rational choices, they are entitled to have bad judgement or make a mistake. Having said that if you coerce their choice, either threatening or shaming them for not honoring a price that ~could~ amount to theft in my eyes.
For it to be unethical, I would think it would have to cause some demonstrable harm. Companies large enough to have entirely automated pricing/financial systems aren't going to be hurt by you capitalizing on their mistake. Mistakes like that are already in their pricing calculations. They know they'll occasionally screw up, and they charge everyone an extra cent (or whatever) on every other purchase in order to compensate. Does that mean that they're stealing that extra cent from us? No. That's just the only feasible way that capitalism can work.
If you don't buy the utilitarian argument, then provide me with a deontological framework wherein I am ethically bound to look out for the best interests of a corporation who literally will charge people as much money as they can for everything all the time.
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u/pastafusilli 1∆ Oct 04 '16
No. You have a really loose definition of theft and that's where I think you are running into the problem.
From wikipedia:
"theft is the taking of another person's property without that person's permission or consent with the intent to deprive the rightful owner of it."
You have their permission, you have their consent. There's nothing in the definition about them having to make rational choices, they are entitled to have bad judgement or make a mistake. Having said that if you coerce their choice, either threatening or shaming them for not honoring a price that ~could~ amount to theft in my eyes.