I don't know, on one hand, theoretically at least, the person who gets life imprisonment always has the option of killing themselves, so life imprisonment is better because you're giving them the choice. Also like I said in another answer on retrospring, I think on a fundamental level a being chooses to exist from one moment to the next, so on a fundamental level if it didn't really want to exist it wouldn't. On the other hand though, I believe in life after death, and I think it's much better than this world--let alone prison. Though I don't think the death penalty was better back when they were killing people with the electric chair (and some places still have it as an option), because the electricity wrecks their etheric body and gives them a hell of a time getting reoriented in the afterlife. I read once that the person who invented the electric chair was a sick bastard who knew this.