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At what point, or under what conditions, should "torture" be allowed, or, perhaps more to the point, under what conditions would the moral restraints and normative civilizational principles that, under most conditions, would prohibit enhanced interrogation be forced to confront a moral conflict in which not to torture becomes, when contrasted to the moral implications of torture, the morally indefensible position?

Are there any conditions whatever, under which torture should be administered for the purpose of stopping violence, and especially, mass violence, including large scale atrocities such as the 9/11 attacks, the Bali bombings etc.

As the scale of the atrocity increases, does the moral demarcation line for torture recede? In other words, in the context of WMD attacks, in which tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands could be killed/injured, is the moral weight increased in favor of torture, or does the number of lives lost have little to do with the moral questions involved?

It would seem that their are roughly two fundamental positions one could take on this issue.

1. Torture is justifiable in some circumstances, but not in others. Further, such interrogation would be limited in its severity.

2. Under no circumstances whatever should torture be used.

If one takes position 2, as do many liberals/leftists in North America, one is obliged to justify that position morally (as it is claimed to be a position grounded in moral concerns).

To do so, one would, at a minimum, I would think, have to show:

a. Upon what basis the physical, emotional, and psychological well being of a single individual (with, we will assume, murderous, violent intent on a mass scale against innocents) can be morally contrasted with the lives and suffering of thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands and found to be in fundamental balance, such that the death/suffering of these thousands can be morally traded for the well being of the terrorist?

b. How, if the torture of a single individual, wholly dedicated to terrorism and mass murder to achieve his ends is understood to be morally indefensible, it follows that allowing the death and torture (through maiming, mutilation, and intense suffering due to wounds sustained in a terrorist attack) of many times this number of innocent human beings, by choosing, of our own free will, not to extract the information from him by any means necessary, can be, at the same time, defended as morally legitimate.

c. As I've asked time and again on MAD in several threads on this subject, and to which I have received as yet, no philosophical engagement, If you knew that a prisoner in your custody had information that could be used to thwart a terrorist attack and save thousands of lives, and you chose not to extract that information by whatever means were necessary to do so, and then the attack occurred, how would you explain your actions to:

1. Your fellow citizens, should this knowledge become public, and

2. God (if you are a theist).


Question: If there are no circumstances under which waterboarding, for our major example, should be used (and hence, by definition, nothing beyond it), then this would seem to imply that there are no greater principles or values worth defending in comparison and contrast to the avoidance of causing pain and suffering to another human being. This would include allowing , when we could have prevented, the terrorist to inflict far greater suffering on others.

For example, if you are a British or O.S.S. operative in WWII, and you have a German officer who has knowledge of a secret weapon (let's say the Germans, for the purpose of this thought experiment, had perfected the atom bomb before we did), you have a conflict of relative moral imperatives: not to torture, can be thought of as the overriding imperative or as a relative one. To act to avoid the destruction of many more lives, if torture is required, could also be the prime imperative. The second assumes that there are greater values and core principles at stake (the millions being tortured in the death camps, as contrasted against the torture of a single perpetrator of those camps, or the loss of the war, which would mean loss of national sovereignty and the destruction of our own democratic system and the imposition of the Nazi system of values upon our civilization) than those at stake in the torture of one human being, who, by definition, is not innocent but morally culpable in both the destruction and suffering already caused by WWII as well as in the situation in which he finds himself).

The ethical question now becomes, to what degree can inaction that allows the horrible death and suffering of many be morally distinguished from simple acquiescence to the death and suffering of the terrorist act you failed to prevent?

Are not those who refuse to torture, under any circumstance, in essence complicit in the terrorism they recuse themselves from preventing?

Droopy---

This is a nice stab at substance on your part, but, on the other hand, it underscores what is so problematic about your endless bleating about "philosophical depth" and whatnot. Your little essay here might have earned you an 'A' in your freshman philosophy class, but it also reveals what is so endlessly problematic about your endless insistence on "philosophical seriousness." It never ceases with you that you want to push practical issues into the realm of the philosophically abstract, so that your dumb arguments and conspiracy theories (virtually all of which you've just cribbed off of FrontPage.org) make a wee bit of sense, "philosophically" speaking. Let me show you what I mean:

Droopy wrote:At what point, or under what conditions, should "torture" be allowed, or, perhaps more to the point, under what conditions would the moral restraints and normative civilizational principles that, under most conditions, would prohibit enhanced interrogation be forced to confront a moral conflict in which not to torture becomes, when contrasted to the moral implications of torture, the morally indefensible position?

First of all, Kishkumen (as far as I know) did not ask you to provide a philosophical justification for torture. He asked you if you had one specifically for waterboarding. Given your usual ham-fisted, overly abstracted method of argument and analysis, I'm assuming that you're incapable of doing that.

You know what? I'm going to have to reconsider that 'A'---at best, you'd only get a 'B,' since you failed to address the topic.

Are there any conditions whatever, under which torture should be administered for the purpose of stopping violence, and especially, mass violence, including large scale atrocities such as the 9/11 attacks, the Bali bombings etc.

As the scale of the atrocity increases, does the moral demarcation line for torture recede? In other words, in the context of WMD attacks, in which tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands could be killed/injured, is the moral weight increased in favor of torture, or does the number of lives lost have little to do with the moral questions involved?

It would seem that their are roughly two fundamental positions one could take on this issue.

1. Torture is justifiable in some circumstances, but not in others. Further, such interrogation would be limited in its severity.

2. Under no circumstances whatever should torture be used.

If one takes position 2, as do many liberals/leftists in North America, one is obliged to justify that position morally (as it is claimed to be a position grounded in moral concerns).

Here is where you apply abstraction---this "some circumstances" thing. (En passant, where have "many liberals/leftists" argued that "under no circumstances whatever should torture be used"?) I'm sure that most people would sign off on "enhanced interrogation" if there was very good reason to believe that it would prevent a 9/11-type attack, but how often is this the case, Loran? Interrogators will tell you that most intel is maddeningly vague and lacking in specifics. The type of scenario necessary for your basic argument only ever turns up in episodes of 24, which ought to tell you something about the type of thinking you're applying to this issue.

To do so, one would, at a minimum, I would think, have to show:

a. Upon what basis the physical, emotional, and psychological well being of a single individual (with, we will assume, murderous, violent intent on a mass scale against innocents) can be morally contrasted with the lives and suffering of thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands and found to be in fundamental balance, such that the death/suffering of these thousands can be morally traded for the well being of the terrorist?

b. How, if the torture of a single individual, wholly dedicated to terrorism and mass murder to achieve his ends is understood to be morally indefensible, it follows that allowing the death and torture (through maiming, mutilation, and intense suffering due to wounds sustained in a terrorist attack) of many times this number of innocent human beings, by choosing, of our own free will, not to extract the information from him by any means necessary, can be, at the same time, defended as morally legitimate.

c. As I've asked time and again on MAD in several threads on this subject, and to which I have received as yet, no philosophical engagement, If you knew that a prisoner in your custody had information that could be used to thwart a terrorist attack and save thousands of lives, and you chose not to extract that information by whatever means were necessary to do so, and then the attack occurred, how would you explain your actions to:

See what I mean? You are imagining a world that exists in the mind of a 15-year-old boy. When has there ever been, and when will there ever exist the kind of scenario you're describing, Loran? As I said: this is why you perpetually fall back on this "philosophical seriousness" nonsense, because you are incapable of apply logic to real-world, pragmatic scenarios.

Sure: probably most of us would be fine with waterboarding if we knew "that a prisoner in your custody had information that could be used to thwart a terrorist attack and save thousands of lives", but under what circumstances is it ever possible to "know" this? What things would have to be in place for you to be certain that you "knew" that the prisoner had such information? As usual, you are grossly oversimplifying how the real world works.

Question: If there are no circumstances under which waterboarding, for our major example, should be used (and hence, by definition, nothing beyond it), then this would seem to imply that there are no greater principles or values worth defending in comparison and contrast to the avoidance of causing pain and suffering to another human being. This would include allowing , when we could have prevented, the terrorist to inflict far greater suffering on others.

Another dumb argument. Really, Loran. What is "enhanced interrogation" supposed to accomplish? It's supposed to extract information, right? You are basically arguing for the freedom to do whatever you want, as an interrogator. There are lots of ways to hurt people, and to break them down. (Haven't you read Solzhenitsyn?) and I fail to see why anyone---yourself included---would need to argue in favor of being able to perform every imaginable form of torture on a suspect, simply on the basis of principle. You really ought to be making a case for how and why torture is the best means of getting information from terrorist suspects.

For example, if you are a British or O.S.S. operative in WWII, and you have a German officer who has knowledge of a secret weapon (let's say the Germans, for the purpose of this thought experiment, had perfected the atom bomb before we did), you have a conflict of relative moral imperatives: not to torture, can be thought of as the overriding imperative or as a relative one.

You haven't established that torturing him would be the more effective means of extracting information. If your ultimate goal is to save lives, then you're going to need to reconsider your position. But, at heart, you aren't really arguing in favor of saving lives, and that's what's so odd about your argument. At base, you are really arguing in favor of being able to torture whomever you want, whenever you want, by whatever means you want.

To act to avoid the destruction of many more lives, if torture is required,

Again: are you capable of defining what you mean when you say "torture is required"? Or is this--as I suspect--one of those things that only exists in Loran's Philosophically Serious Universe?

could also be the prime imperative. The second assumes that there are greater values and core principles at stake (the millions being tortured in the death camps, as contrasted against the torture of a single perpetrator of those camps, or the loss of the war, which would mean loss of national sovereignty and the destruction of our own democratic system and the imposition of the Nazi system of values upon our civilization) than those at stake in the torture of one human being, who, by definition, is not innocent but morally culpable in both the destruction and suffering already caused by WWII as well as in the situation in which he finds himself).

It is an awfully big leap to say that torturing this one guy is going to somehow level out the balance of "values" vis-a-vis "the millions being tortured." Now, oddly enough, you are trying to defend torture on the basis of revenge.

Really, the only way to defend it is by arguing that it can extract information that will save lives. But, of course, you have not demonstrated---not by a long shot!---that torture is effective at all, let alone the best method for getting intel.

The ethical question now becomes, to what degree can inaction that allows the horrible death and suffering of many be morally distinguished from simple acquiescence to the death and suffering of the terrorist act you failed to prevent?

Again, you are totally altering the terms of the discussion, and yanking this out into some black hole on philosophical nonsense. "Inaction that allows the horrible death and suffering"? Your solution is to torture one lone guy?

Are not those who refuse to torture, under any circumstance, in essence complicit in the terrorism they recuse themselves from preventing?

Well, I guess we had better knock that "B" down to a "C+". Unless you can show that torture produces legitimate results, intelligence-wise, and that it is *the most* effective means of stopping large-scale attacks, then your argument is dead in the water. So far, you haven't done that, and have instead fallen back on this baloney about how we need to torture, since "inaction" would make us complicit. Come on now, Loran. There are other ways of "taking action" besides torturing people.

Doctor Scratch wrote:Unless you can show that torture produces legitimate results, intelligence-wise, and that it is *the most* effective means of stopping large-scale attacks, then your argument is dead in the water. So far, you haven't done that, and have instead fallen back on this baloney about how we need to torture, since "inaction" would make us complicit. Come on now, Loran. There are other ways of "taking action" besides torturing people.

If Drippy were honest with himself or anyone else, he would be posting this: "Why should I care whether torture is effective or not when it is just so damned pleasurable to carry out! I love personally maiming someone when I am threatened. It makes me feel like I am doing something about the problem. What a surge of endorphins! Ahhhhh."

Droopy wrote:At what point, or under what conditions, should "torture" be allowed...

How about simple revenge? You kill my cow and eat it -- so I skin
you alive -- rubbing salt into all the cuts -- over 40 days and nights.

If terrorist airline hijackers knew in advance, that they would receive
THAT treatment from me, perhaps they would think twice about it.

Or, at a more "enhanced" level; how about to prevent future crime?
You say you are going to kill my cow -- so I skin you alive -- but only
for 20 days, and turn you over to a hospital, so that you'll have a
chance to live. Maybe that would slow up hijackers flying into buildings.

Or, at the most "enhanced" level -- I strongly suspect that your friends
are going to kill my cow. So I begin to skin you alive -- offering to stop
the process, when and if you sign a statement identifying your friends
and the time and place they intend to kill my cow.

If we are only talking about cows -- perhaps my methods will work.

If we are talking about dedicated jihad warriors -- willing to commit
mass-suicide -- I'm not certain that any of my methods will work.

Maybe they will -- maybe they won't.

Just tell me how I can be certain that my torture will have its intended
effect, and I'll listen more to your ideas on the subject.

Tell me that -- and then we can talk about how to back out of all of the
international treaties and USA laws pertaining to the subject.

Deal?

Uncle Dale

Uncle Dale wrote:Just tell me how I can be certain that my torture will have its intended
effect, and I'll listen more to your ideas on the subject.

Tell me that -- and then we can talk about how to back out of all of the
international treaties and USA laws pertaining to the subject.

Deal?

Remind me not to f**k with this dude. He scares me.

a. Upon what basis the physical, emotional, and psychological well being of a single individual (with, we will assume, murderous, violent intent on a mass scale against innocents) can be morally contrasted with the lives and suffering of thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands and found to be in fundamental balance

Let's say that an innocent person who happened to be in proximity of the terrorists overheard part of their conversation, the person for whatever reason though, be it fear or just not wanting to get involved, refused to divulge anything learned. The authorities have good reason to believe that this information will be enough to prevent an attack that will lead to the suffering or death of hundreds of thousands of people. Should they proceed with torture?

Is the physical an psychological well-being of a single innocent person comparable to the needs of millions?

Gadianton wrote:...
Is the physical an psychological well-being of a single innocent person comparable to the needs of millions?

There have probably been times during our past evolution, where the survival
and "well-being"of a single individual was more important than the well-being
of most of the rest of the species. But, I'd guess that such instances are very
rare. Generally speaking, the well-being of the social group outweighs the
well-being of any particular individual.

However, there may be unforeseen consequences in any drastic actions.

Let's say that the "innocent" person with "critical information" was tortured
to death, without having revealed any useful intelligence. The torture-death
of that particular individual (if made widely known) could result in various
bad consequences for the torturing society -- aside form the fate of the
"millions" whose well-being was originally at stake.

Whether or not we choose to believe in God, or karma, or the simple notion
that every action generates a reaction -- the possibility of unforeseen
negative consequences remains.

Let's say that I have definite knowledge that a terrorist A-bomb will be set
off at noon tomorrow in Washington, D.C. -- and that millions of people will
die and/or suffer terrible effects, if that bomb is not located and defused.

So, you have me tortured in terrible ways, until I finally shout out "Joe Jones
will set off the A-bomb in St. Louis, tomorrow at noon!"

Upon your applying more torture, I provide even more made-up details.
You hastily evacuate St. Louis, causing mass panic and many deaths,
but ---- by noon, about half of the residents there are deemed "safe."

At which time, the actual A-bomb goes off in Washington, D. C.

Years later, when some semblance of national recovery has taken place,
your torturing me to death, and my false confession are made public --
resulting in further mental agony and pain for the survivors; who fantasize
that your simply using "truth serum" on me would have elicited the real
plan to blow up Washington, D.C.

In other words -- all of these help "the needs of millions" plans only
work if truth results. Absent the elucidation of truth, they only make
the situation worse.

UD

You are truly the fourth reich.

Loran, so how would you as a member of the LDS Church reply to the questions and issues you have proposed? Would moral relativism tend to be the deciding factor?

If we are talking about dedicated jihad warriors -- willing to commit
mass-suicide -- I'm not certain that any of my methods will work.

Maybe they will -- maybe they won't.

Just tell me how I can be certain that my torture will have its intended
effect, and I'll listen more to your ideas on the subject.

I think you answered your own question of certainty with your simplest answer, that of simple revenge or in other words, justice. You are talking about known and dedicated jihad warriors (some of whom have caved to "torture" and provided answers) who by definition, deserve such treatment simply because it's part of their own philosophy on how to treat others.

On another question, does God cause famines to occur? Is he not therefore a "torturer"? Isn't starving someone to death torture?