Is Torture Ever Right ?

[Peterkin]

10 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

There only has to be one plausible situation where the perp is not only assumed guilty but found guilty before or after the event whether or not the outcome was/is successful or not.  If the act of torture in any attempt was found to be/is justified then the answer is = yes.  

Within that particular value system, on that particular set of assumptions, yes.

[Intoscience]

1 minute ago, Peterkin said:

Within that particular value system, on that particular set of assumptions, yes.

So, is that particular value system and set of assumptions either realistic, employed anywhere, plausible or reasonable?

Because if so, then you have answered the OP.

[dimreepr]

13 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

looks like it.

What is relevant to answering the OP is whether or not there is any plausible realistic situation where the use of torture may result in a generally preferred outcome.

Would the use of torture be justified if it resulted in preventing an atrocity worse than that of the act of the actual torture employed. 

Go ahead and continue to complicate it with if's and but's and anything else you would like to throw in the mix. If you can honestly answer with - Any and all acts of torture are as equally as atrocious as the pain/suffering resulting in the death of innocent live/s then I feel that along with my wife, I find myself kicking/banging my head against the wall. 

The death of innocent, is a different question...

[Intoscience]

7 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

The death of innocent, is a different question...

Well one could argue the innocence of a person, which is why a child was put forward as an example of a victim. One would assume that the child is innocent especially if of a young age. 

It was also raised in this thread about killing, instincts and survival. We are instinctively programmed to survive/preserve life not only our own but also our linage/species... The saving of a child/our children is the ultimate goal in this preservation.  

Edited March 24, 2022 by Intoscience

[Peterkin]

17 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

o, is that particular value system and set of assumptions either realistic, employed anywhere, plausible or reasonable?

Not to me.

[dimreepr]

5 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

Well one could argue the innocence of a person, which is why a child was put forward as an example of a victim. One would assume that the child is innocent especially if of a young age. 

It was also raised in this thread about killing, instincts and survival. We are instinctively programmed to survive/preserve life not only our own but also our linage/species... The saving of a child/our children is the ultimate goal in this preservation.  

The thing is, a child is only wise; when they grow up...

[Peterkin]

19 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

then you have answered the OP.

About 23 times, to date, on this thread alone.

[Intoscience]

2 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Not to me.

Fair enough.

1 minute ago, Peterkin said:

About 23 times, to date, on this thread alone.

Ditto 

[Peterkin]

10 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

We are instinctively programmed to survive/preserve life not only our own but also our linage/species...

No! Survive and preserve life are not a this/that. They are most frequently diametric opposites. We have an instinct to kill for food, self-defence, protection of our young, maintenance of territory, property, hierarchy and order within the group.

Are the Russians and Ukrainians really engaged in preserving the life of their lineage/species?

[Intoscience]

10 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

The thing is, a child is only wise; when they grow up...

Hmmm... not always.

Is an idiot always born? 

5 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

No! Survive and preserve life are not a this/that. They are most frequently diametric opposites. We have an instinct to kill for food, self-defence, protection of our young, maintenance of territory, property, hierarchy and order within the group.

Are the Russians and Ukrainians really engaged in preserving the life of their lineage/species?

Ok, so it should have read survive or preserve, I'm not here to argue the diametric. 

"Are the Russians and Ukrainians really engaged in preserving the life of their lineage/species?"- Peterkin

Maybe from each of their perspectives, again though its not relevant to the OP and/or the thread.  

19 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Not to me.

So you agree then that- "Any and all acts of torture are as equally as atrocious as the pain/suffering resulting in the death of innocent live/s." ?

Edited March 24, 2022 by Intoscience

[Peterkin]

32 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

Are the Russians and Ukrainians really engaged in preserving the life of their lineage/species?"- Peterkin

Maybe from each of their perspectives, again though its not relevant to the OP and/or the thread.  

POV is relevant to every decision, and to the valuation of every situation.

 

33 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

"Any and all acts of torture are as equally as atrocious as the pain/suffering resulting in the death of innocent live/s." ?

No. I won't choose from two sets of other people's assumptions; I reject both, as well as a number of others not currently in play. I already stated what I do believe.

[dimreepr]

45 minutes ago, Intoscience said:

Is an idiot always born?

Yes, in much the same way as it's right to torture them...

Edited March 24, 2022 by dimreepr

[MSC]

9 hours ago, Intoscience said:

I've tried not to invoke feelings into the discussion as they can blur the situation.

However, 

I share your sympathy and empathy, but this is my point. You are focussing too much on feelings rather than logical justification. 

I think that our emotional sentiments influence our moral reasoning more than logic does. I also believe it is impossible to separate the two. Ultimately logic is a tool that we use for justification, no matter which view we are trying to justify. There is an emotional root that motivates us to logically justify our views. 

We are fortunate enough to be able to have this discussion from a place of emotional calm. For the people within these actual situations, emotions are going to play a strong part. There is no emotional state of pure reason and rationality we can go to, because we are emotional animals. Everything we say or do, is motivated by emotion. Ethics is my vocation, and I love it and worry about it. I am motivated to try my best to remain as objective as is humanly possible, because that is what it takes to do ethics well. I want to do ethics well, because I love it. 

This is why I mentioned David Hume before;

Hume’s position in ethics, which is based on his empiricist theory of the mind, is best known for asserting four theses: (1) Reason alone cannot be a motive to the will, but rather is the “slave of the passions” (see Section 3) (2) Moral distinctions are not derived from reason (see Section 4). (3) Moral distinctions are derived from the moral sentiments: feelings of approval (esteem, praise) and disapproval (blame) felt by spectators who contemplate a character trait or action (see Section 7).

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume-moral/

9 hours ago, Intoscience said:

Again you assume that you are making the decision/doing the torturing. If you were unaware that torture was used as a method to attempt and/or save your child how would you feel about that? 

You're asking how I would feel, about something which I do not know has happened. Well they say ignorance is bliss and my child is now out of danger so I'd probably just be feeling relieved and thankful. If I was then told that torture was used... probably would still just be feeling relief. What's done is done and it isn't my place to judge the person who performed the torture. Even if it was, like I was a judge or a jury member for this, I'd have to recuse my self because of my involvement with the case itself as one of the victims of the motivating crime that apparently required torture. There would be no doubt in my mind that the torturer is causally responsible for both the perps pain and suffering, and my relief and gratitude. Whether or not they are morally responsible, hard to say. In this situation I'd be biased toward answering no, they are not morally responsible. The perp is. 

if we were to argue that the perp knew he would invoke desperation by kidnapping and hiding away my child, then in some ways his actions were what brought on the torturing. He is morally responsible for enabling the torture,  by doing something so heinous that torture crossed others minds. If the perp had any true regard for themselves and their security, they ought not to have engaged in the crime in the first place. 

in this way, I suppose I am still saying the torture is wrong, but that the moral blame for it happening, lies with the person being tortured. They are also the ones putting the torturer through the ordeal of having to hurt them in the first place. In most cases, the torturer will still have done something illegal, but depending on the circumstances they may not be morally responsible for it, even if they end up going to jail. As the father of the person they saved, I'd want to support them through whatever happens. I'd visit them in prison, help pay legal fees or find some pro-bono institution for them. Even if we say the person was morally responsible, that does not mean they cannot be forgiven. Choosing whether or not to forgive is also a moral decision I feel. The torturer is probably more deserving of forgiveness than the tortured, in this position. I feel empathy for the pain the tortured is in, mentally and physically, because we are both human and don't like pain. Kind of like how if you see someone get hit square in the balls, as a man, nomatter how you may feel about the person, you'll wince as a nearly automatic response. This is actually what we call deep empathy, which is where you feel the emotion of the person you're empathising with, vs cognitive empathy which is your conscious efforts to think about their position rather than feeling it. 

You have given me a lot to think about. Your comment inspired me to say a lot that I hadn't considered before and caused me to remember concepts from moral philosophy in general that I'd nearly forgotten about. 😅 

What did you think of Vats mental only interrogation through drugs idea? 

2 hours ago, Intoscience said:

Why should it? many people have been tortured and survived. No one ever said that the torture should last until the perp dies. 

That's just it, you cannot guarantee, even as an experienced torturer that you won't accidentally kill the perp. For example; the method I referenced earlier Involving nails, finger tips and a defibrillator, would likely kill a person very quickly if they have some kind of heart condition I don't know about. 

Ultimately my decision to not physically torture (in the improbable scenarios where I'm expected to do it) is that I don't believe it is an effective enough method with too much risk to the Intel. Pragmatic ethics dictates you do what is most likely to work based on the scientific literature/studies. As it currently stands, a mix of investigation, psychological profiling and humane interrogation techniques has the most efficacy. Even if we include torture into the mix, you can't win em all. There will always be situations where despite the best efforts of people, we will fail to save the innocent/innocents. It sucks, I wish there was an option which had a 100% success rate, but there is not. 

Physical torture to me just seems more reckless than it is worth. 

Maybe we should all start just listing the pros and cons of the choices here? Anyone else want to start?

[Peterkin]

32 minutes ago, MSC said:

Maybe we should all start just listing the pros and cons of the choices here? Anyone else want to start?

In what frame of reference, with what value system, according to what basic assumptions? As per the OP, I think they have already been exhausted. In several alternative scenarios, they have already been outlined.

Judge Posner has pronounced. The US supreme court says it's okay, for government agents, private contractors and offshore facilities in the interest of 'national security' - kidnap victims, not so much. The UK supreme court ruled against it, even by government.  The EU is flat-out against it.  Even the Vatican has renounced the inquisition. 

 

[MSC]

5 hours ago, Peterkin said:

In what frame of reference, with what value system, according to what basic assumptions? As per the OP, I think they have already been exhausted. In several alternative scenarios, they have already been outlined

Your value system of course. 

I don't think they have been exhausted and I don't think it hurts to explicitly lay it out in a clearly formatted pro's and cons list, to sum up what has been covered so far. I'm waiting until the weekend when I have the time to do my part. My daughter is a toddler now so I'm drowning in real life atm 😆 

[Peterkin]

1 minute ago, MSC said:

Your value system of course. 

OK, I'll try. (Not that I really enjoy the dunking-chair, but just so long as it's for the children....)

I tried. Looking at even a partial list of the cons, I decided not to post. Too much contention for no gain. 

Here is my list of pros :

1. It might work; the potential victim might be saved.

2. If the captive survives; if the evidence is admitted in court, and he is incarcerated, he might serve as an example to deter others from doing whatever he did. 

 

 

[TheVat]

I agree with MSC that any system of normative ethics (i.e. having moral rules that govern a society) must flow from human feelings.  We are not robotic beings without emotion that can be handled with a simple algorithm that optimizes some goal (say, making lots of paper clips).  The Benthamites openly acknowledge the emotional basis of morality by setting pleasure and happiness (for the greatest number, in an impartial fashion) as the greatest good.  JS Mill had similar views.  Hume saw right actions as coming from moral sentiments.  And so on.  We have qualia, and feelings matter.

 

The focus here, seems to me, has been on consequentialism - right actions are ones that we understand by their resulting in certain consequences.  We are somewhat less concerned with being virtuous beings than with having results that are deemed the best for everyone.  So some of the thought experiments here have been directed towards a utilitarian view.  This value system seems implicit in some posts here.  Better to hook jumper cables to one demonstrably horrible person than have great harm come to many other innocent persons.  As I hinted earlier with my truth serum suggestion, a commitment to pragmatism might lead us to assert that mental violation is better than physical torture, and would lead to a better outcome for both interrogator, and criminal, and others involved. 

I have no crystal ball on this matter.  But consequentialist approaches depend on good guesses as to outcomes.  I can guess, say, that young boys in other countries are less likely to become terrorists if Americans are known for scopolamine cocktails rather than waterboarding or drilling holes in fingers.  This might be the sort of guessing where a crack team of social scientists and intelligence operatives would be very handy! 😀

 

[Peterkin]

Oh, what the hell, I have some time to kill. Cons:

1. It's wrong.

2. It's abhorrent.

3. It's illegal.

4. Scripted fantasy notwithstanding, I cannot realistically be sure I have the right suspect.

5. There has not been time to do correct procedure or even begin. The avenues of investigation that can be exhausted in the time-frame are pathetically few and necessarily incomplete. That's where a conscientious officer would dirct his energies and resources.

6. High failure rate. If it doesn't work, I will have wasted valuable time.

7. I will feel like something less than worm-shit and might become ineffective.

8. I will lose the respect of good officers who might then also be less effective under my direction.

9. Odds are, I'll go up on charges and

9.a. possibly take other officers into trouble with me.

10. The evidence will almost certainly be inadmissible, and the perp - if guilty will go free.

11. If innocent, I will have scarred another person for life, and possibly turned him into a criminal.

12. The police force will be tainted, lose its good reputation and the trust of the populations we're meant to protect, and incidentally

12a. attract people of the wrong character as recruits and

12b. go slowly to hell in a black Maria.

12c. like the police forces of China, Turkey, Syria, et al.

13. Citizens will be too afraid to come forward with needed information.

13.a. Violent criminals will be more likely to shoot police, rather than risk arrest.

14. I may go to jail, with a lot of people I had earlier put there.

14a. I may become a prison bully; go all the way over to the dark side.

Edited March 25, 2022 by Peterkin

[Intoscience]

14 hours ago, MSC said:

You have given me a lot to think about. Your comment inspired me to say a lot that I hadn't considered before and caused me to remember concepts from moral philosophy in general that I'd nearly forgotten about. 😅 

What did you think of Vats mental only interrogation through drugs idea? 

I'm glad, at least my posts come in useful for something.

I think the idea of mental only interrogation is a good one and should be tried prior to any torture. I appreciate that you feel torture is probably a reckless approach, it may well be the case.

But again my focus is on - when all else fails - So when the clock is ticking and the situation is desperate, innocent lives on the line, their death imminent, all known methods and resources available within the time frame window of opportunity have been exhausted and there is an option to gain information that might save the victims then I feel that option should be considered and used.  This premise is based on my belief that the moral justification for the act of torture outweighs the moral justification of letting innocent people suffer and die without exhausting all possibilities to save them.    

7 hours ago, Peterkin said:

Oh, what the hell, I have some time to kill. Cons:

1. It's wrong.

2. It's abhorrent.

3. It's illegal.

4. Scripted fantasy notwithstanding, I cannot realistically be sure I have the right suspect.

5. There has not been time to do correct procedure or even begin. The avenues of investigation that can be exhausted in the time-frame are pathetically few and necessarily incomplete. That's where a conscientious officer would dirct his energies and resources.

6. High failure rate. If it doesn't work, I will have wasted valuable time.

7. I will feel like something less than worm-shit and might become ineffective.

8. I will lose the respect of good officers who might then also be less effective under my direction.

9. Odds are, I'll go up on charges and

9.a. possibly take other officers into trouble with me.

10. The evidence will almost certainly be inadmissible, and the perp - if guilty will go free.

11. If innocent, I will have scarred another person for life, and possibly turned him into a criminal.

12. The police force will be tainted, lose its good reputation and the trust of the populations we're meant to protect, and incidentally

12a. attract people of the wrong character as recruits and

12b. go slowly to hell in a black Maria.

12c. like the police forces of China, Turkey, Syria, et al.

13. Citizens will be too afraid to come forward with needed information.

13.a. Violent criminals will be more likely to shoot police, rather than risk arrest.

14. I may go to jail, with a lot of people I had earlier put there.

14a. I may become a prison bully; go all the way over to the dark side.

There are plenty of if's and but's in that list, much like if torture is used it may or may not work.

However, you can't get away from the fact that "if" you don't try you don't know. Personally when the chips are down I'd take my chance with your extensive list if it meant there's a chance of saving many innocent lives, especially so if it was one of my nearest and dearest.  

If you can guarantee/prove that torture would never ever work in any and every possible circumstance then I'd be happy to change my answer to no.  

[MSC]

5 hours ago, Intoscience said:

when all else fails - So when the clock is ticking and the situation is desperate, innocent lives on the line, their death imminent, all known methods and resources available within the time frame window of opportunity have been exhausted and there is an option to gain information that might save the victims then I feel that option should be considered and used. 

I think that is fair to say, but a bit unrealistic. Earlier, I made the point; that if you have enough time to try everything else first, chances are the situation is not as time sensitive as we make out. 

There is one other factor here that we are not mentioning; Individual skill and competency. One individual may just not be skilled or experienced enough to get the information humanely,while another person is. In the scenarios involving law enforcement being the ones to decide on torture, chances are that if the current team or individual is not getting results with the humane methods in a timely enough manner, the task will be reassigned to someone else before anyone ever brings up torture. 

So when all else fails, do we think about moving onto torture first or move onto someone else trying everything else first? From interrogation, profiling and investigation there is a lot of different methods, strategies and tactics that are involved. How long roughly do you think it would take 2-3 different individuals or teams to go through trying all of it? Hours? Days? Weeks? 

[dimreepr]

17 minutes ago, MSC said:

I think that is fair to say, but a bit unrealistic. Earlier, I made the point; that if you have enough time to try everything else first, chances are the situation is not as time sensitive as we make out. 

There is one other factor here that we are not mentioning; Individual skill and competency. One individual may just not be skilled or experienced enough to get the information humanely,while another person is. In the scenarios involving law enforcement being the ones to decide on torture, chances are that if the current team or individual is not getting results with the humane methods in a timely enough manner, the task will be reassigned to someone else before anyone ever brings up torture. 

So when all else fails, do we think about moving onto torture first or move onto someone else trying everything else first? From interrogation, profiling and investigation there is a lot of different methods, strategies and tactics that are involved. How long roughly do you think it would take 2-3 different individuals or teams to go through trying all of it? Hours? Days? Weeks? 

Indeed +1.

Just to add:

A time pressure also comes with the chance that a well directed lie would both, run out the clock and save one from further pain; because they know that "we all agree" that torture after the fact is morally wrong.

A strong motivation, to someone already radicalised, to kill two bird's with one stone...

Edited March 25, 2022 by dimreepr

[MSC]

13 hours ago, TheVat said:

The focus here, seems to me, has been on consequentialism - right actions are ones that we understand by their resulting in certain consequences.  We are somewhat less concerned with being virtuous beings than with having results that are deemed the best for everyone.  So some of the thought experiments here have been directed towards a utilitarian view.  This value system seems implicit in some posts here.  Better to hook jumper cables to one demonstrably horrible person than have great harm come to many other innocent persons.  As I hinted earlier with my truth serum suggestion, a commitment to pragmatism might lead us to assert that mental violation is better than physical torture, and would lead to a better outcome for both interrogator, and criminal, and others involved.

Here here! It also seems to be short view utilitarianism too. For some, the notion of long-term, unseen and unpredictable negative consequences that can arise out of the act of torture doesn't seem to hold much weight, for me it does. Especially in the terrorist scenarios. A terrorist organizations rhetoric of fighting against an evil tyrannical force, holds more weight if you torture them. Which can erode public support and stir up more sympathy for them in the long-run.  Recruitment would be easier and some of the public may even blame the next attack on the torturers, saying they provoked it by behaving as savagely as the terrorists claim they are. That doesn't make it right; terrorists are far more guilty of using tactics and strategies that damage any moral justification their original cause may or may not have had. It may be unfair for the public to develop more sympathy for terrorists because desperate people did a desperate thing in desperate circumstances, but it does not change the fact that this is a potential long-term consequence of the torture. 

I feel as if the whole "Try everything possible" argument implies that the ends always justifies the means. Which is not something I believe to be true. I mean, we could have this same discussion where the only difference is we all agree on the physical torture aspect but disagree on how far we should go. 

"Well, I did the finger stuff and smacked him around for awhile but it didn't work."

"Did you try threatening his genitals or mutilating them? What about taking one of his eyes and starving him? You need to try everything possible or you will have completely failed the victims and I will hold you personally responsible for their deaths!"

[Peterkin]

I seem to be the only one who presented a list for criticism.

I didn't pretend it would be objective, any more than the decision itself could be disinterested; I didn't pretend that I had fewer unknown factors to start with than I would have in real life. Indeed, I was basing my list on a possible situation, rather than a scripted formula.

5 hours ago, Intoscience said:

There are plenty of if's and but's in that list, much like if torture is used it may or may not work.

I counted two ifs and no buts. But math isn't my strong suit.

[MSC]

3 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

I seem to be the only one who presented a list for criticism.

I didn't pretend it would be objective, any more than the decision itself could be disinterested; I didn't pretend that I had fewer unknown factors to start with than I would have in real life. Indeed, I was basing my list on a possible situation, rather than a scripted formula.

Thank you for that btw! Although I do only see cons 😆 

My list will be up tomorrow. For me it requires going back and rereading everything so far, in order to build a fairly comprehensive list and it is still a work in progress. Making a rough paper copy with notes first which I'll just copy here when I'm ready. 

To be clear, I won't think anything about how long it takes you to reply or post. We all have real lives and I don't want you to feel rushed my friend. 

[dimreepr]

You can't sit on the fence on this question:

If you say yes, you have to accept that you and your loved one's might be the victim.

If you say no, you have to accept; there's a very small chance, you're wrong and an innocent dies.

If you say maybe, you have to accept  Guantanamo bay.