In another thread, one of our members made the following statement:

This surely deserves a full-blown debate. The question at hand is:

Can torture of one person be justified, for example to save the life of another, or for any other reason (national security, etc.)?

Be careful in your answer. There are many traps in such a debate, not least of which is the lack of certainty that death would occur without the torture, or that the torture will in fact prevent the death.

No. Not even to save the life of another. The life of the potential torture victim is just as sacrosanct as the life in danger.

I can't come up with any reason to torture anyone; even if someone else's life is in danger. I don't think torture is good for anyone, the goverment, the person doing the torturing, and certainly not the person being tortured.

To torture another, even with the best of motivations, is to give up your own humanity; to countenance torture at the hands of another is even more evil.

Do you know for certain that you have the right person? Even the courts, after long and exhaustive trials, sometimes convict the wrong person, and it should go without saying that many accused are acquitted after trial, in spite of the certainty of police and prosecutors that they've got the guilty party.

Do you know for certain that the person, under torture, will tell you the truth, and not a lie designed to give them some possibility of escape, or of eventually winning the situation? After all, throughout history torturers have been told by their victims precisely what the torturer wanted to hear. And it very frequently was not the truth.

Do you know for certain that the child is alive? You've said so, but how can that be, if you have no access?

Do you know for certain that the person you think is a "serial killer" will, in fact, kill the child? How can you know such a thing, without actually predicting the future?

You may, of course, assume all of these things are true in the way that you describe them, but I would be hard-pressed to discover how you arrived at your certainty. And if you were wrong about any of them, I would certainly hold you accountable for the damage you did to another human being based on nothing more than your suppositions.

No.

That doesn't mean I might not do it. Desperate people take desperate measures. I can't vouch that I would always live up to my own standards under extreme pressure.

But it would still not be justified.

Also, note that you are presenting a rare and extreme case confronting an individual with no external supports available.

But for the most part, torture does not occur in such an environment. For the most part torture occurs as tacit or explicit policy on the part of a government/policing authority.

The fact that torture in such cases is even debatable today is utterly shameful and puts the lie to any pretensions that we are morally any better than our ancestors.

And how do I know any of these things? A missing child is, not neccessarily, suffering etc. And if the abductor has posted such images on the web, what makes me think the child is possibly alive?

What ytou are suggesting is just revenge...to make another (whether guilty or not) suffer because you or someone you care about has suffered...or just for the sake of making someone suffer.

It has nothing to do with justice, nothing to do with the likelihood of solving the case. It is an extreme example for the sake of posing and extreme example, and like most such examples it isn't even slightly illuminating.

Terrible things happen in the world; should I, therefore, as a matter of ethics, or a matter of public policy, propose that we should do MORE terrible things?

...such extreme examples provide really, really poor guides to human conduct.

The point of taking an ethical position, and holding it, is that it is what one believes to be right in ordinary, everyday and commonplace situations. Those are the situations which are most likely to arise, not absurd hypothetical scenarios.

Should one torture people? No, one should not; nor should one countenance other people torturing people for you.

Never...ever.

Are there individuals who deserve torture? Maybe...but who am I, who are you (and, for that matter, who is George Bush) to make that sort of decision? When did I get the right to decide which life should be "protected" and which cast onto the dung-heap as expendable? (Let me point out, to the Christains on the board, that someone once asked "Isn't it preferrable that one man should perish rather than the whole nation?" and the burden of Christian ethics ever since has been that it is NOT preferable. (I am no Christian, but the point is well taken and, thoroughly, part of Western culture.))

If I abrogate an ethical principle, merely because it is conventient for me to do so, merely because it serves my momentary self-interest, then my claim (or your claim, or anyone's claim) to be a ethical being is, equally, abrogated. I cannot claim to be ethical if the way I treat others is as means and not ends-in-themselves.

And, if I give up my claim to being an ethical being, then I also give up my right to demand ethical treatment from others. (How can I claim what I do not extend to others?) Should you -- or anyone -- want to do that, as free agents you have a right to do so; and I have a right to tell you it is a bankrupt course.

You, torturing an alleged serial killer who might (but, also, might not) have a connection to the disappearance of your child, may fulfill your desire for revenge but it is useless as public policy.... everyone the police question in connection with a crime is not guilty of that crime, but your scenario would, inevitably, leade to the innocent being tortured MORE often than the possibly guilty.

And, in that case, why bother with concepts of justice at all? Let each person appoint themselves judge, jury and executioner of such matters as they decide concern them. Let them torture and kill with impunity, and face the same in return. That, at least, makes some claim to being equitable.

People who want to torture ignore the entire history of torture; they ignore too, the salient reason it was abandonned as an instrument of the legal system. It simply isn't reliable. People being tortured will say anything to make the torture stop...even if only temporarily. The information provided is useless; it always what the torturer wants to hear, and not the truth.

And, if you have any doubts about that, read through some of the transcripts of the witch trials and any doubts you have will, quickly, be banished.

I do not think torture is, at all, extreme. It is the normative way in which states throughout history have dealt with their people. For 200 years or so, the Americans eschewed the use of torture, but it is now normative conduct on the part of the American state as well.

Once one allows torture for "extreme" situations, de facto, it is allowed for all situations. Today it will "only" be to prevent terrorism, but tomorrow it will be for causing "disturbances" and then for "disrupting public order", and then for failing to file your tax return on time. When does a "perceived threat" merely become an expedient excuse?...and once you allow an expedient excuse once, what ethical grounds can you oppose it on, next time? States have shown, time and time again, that they will enlarge their powers, and their incursions on human life and liberty. I do not expect that will change.

Yes, it is No. I advance that as an absolute position. I think that to torture another is a worse thing than to murder them; if I would not do the latter (under any normal circumstances), then I certainly must no do the former. If no good can come from murder (whether it is judicially sanctioned or not) then what good can proceed from that which is worse than murder?

I have, consciously, taken a position where I will not murder, no matter how advantageous or pleasurable that might be. If I eschew that, then I must eschew that which is worse....and I do so. I will go further; I would not countenance the states murder of an innocent person, but would frustrate that by any and all means I might possess. Similarly, I would frustrate the state's desire to torture another human being...even if that human being was the most repugnant of individuals.

Better I help someone like Osama bin Laden to escape than, by active assistance or passive acceptance I become party to a crime worse than murder.

And that is why you must not try to reach reasoned ethical judgment based on extreme examples. We must guide our future actions by what we reasonably expect to face day-to-day, not hypotheses and wild conjectures. A lifetime of following and holding to an ethical course will allow one to sort through the extremes when the extremes prevent themselves.

I can say, with absolute certainty, that no allegation of murder, no allegation of child abuse, nor any common crime would, in my mind, justify the use of torture on a suspect. And that allows me to reject its use for any crime of terrorism or selfish response to a perceived threat to my family.

I do not know what you mean. Saying that judgment "A" is more sound than judgment "B" has nothing to do with inherent worth or value of the people holding those opinions.

I think that "no" is an infinitely wiser and more ethical answer than yes. I have explained why in a couple of posts, now. I think those reasons are good, and compelling. I have heard no argument seriously advanced to counter any point I have made, so I assume (for the time being and the time being only) that my negative response is better than the affirmative.


And you do realize that this question takes the form of a well-known logical fallacy, I assume? (The Loaded Question)

And, no, you may not ask it. I refuse to be drawn...the current debate is more than sufficient for the present moment.

And it is precisely because life is sacrosanct that torture is indefensible. To go ahead with the torture says that one life is sacrosanct and the other is not.

One cannot have it both ways. If it is permissible to torture anyone, then no life, including the one you want to save is sacrosanct. If life is sacrosanct then no torture is permissible.

The first sentence is misleading. It says "I am willing to allow any amount of suffering" when it really means "I am willing to inflict any amount of suffering".