Merged Senate Report on CIA Torture Program

[marplots]

If anything, the more lives at stake, the more imperative it is that accurate information be acquired. Torture might get information more quickly, but if you're in such a hurry that you think you need to resort to torture, you almost certainly don't have the time to verify any of the information you'll get. And if you do have the time to verify the information, you don't need torture.

I don't see why that's so. If I ask where the bomb is and the tortured tells me, I just go an look to see if the bomb is there. That's gold-star level confirmation and it doesn't take a source other than the tortured.

Whether there is time or not depends on what we want to imagine, but fast would be generally be better than slow.

 

[Upchurch]

Upchurch, I found this paper too, which I think you would find interesting to read.

http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~chazelle/politics/torture09.html

I will need to re-read it more than just a few times. There are concepts in here that I need to become much more familiar with before I can really comment, but bright chaps like you, Anglo and Sun might absorb it more quickly.

Thank you. I'll take a read when I'm not hip deep in getting the fam up and out the door.

One thing I didn't mention about the last paper is that it rests on the same fatal flaw as most torture apologetics. It is founded on the assumption that torture is the, or one of the, most effective and efficient interrogation techniques when, in reality, there is no evidence that it is efficient at all. In fact, I think there is good reason to think it has a very low signal-to-noise ratio.

If you listen carefully, it is repeated over and over:"If torture saves lives, it's okay with me." That "if" is always there, but rarely is it examined. What if it doesn't save lives? What if another method works just as well or even better?

I know I keep coming back to this, but it is a critical point. The solution to the ticking time bomb is the one that gives you useful information quickly enough to use. Torture is not designed to get good information. Torture is designed to get information that stops the torture and is strongly influenced by the confirmation bias of the torturer.

If an apologist wants to win this debate, they have to defend this assumption on something more solid than the logical fallacy of an argument from incredulity.

eta: or, it seems, argument from tradition?

Yikes.

 

[Childlike Empress]

Recently came across this interesting cartoon.

 

[TofuFighter]

If you listen carefully, it is repeated over and over:"If torture saves lives, it's okay with me." That "if" is always there, but rarely is it examined. What if it doesn't save lives? What if another method works just as well or even better?

I know I keep coming back to this, but it is a critical point. The solution to the ticking time bomb is the one that gives you useful information quickly enough to use. Torture is not designed to get good information. Torture is designed to get information that stops the torture and is strongly influenced by the confirmation bias of the torturer.

If an apologist wants to win this debate, they have to defend this assumption on something more solid than the logical fallacy of an argument from incredulity.

eta: or, it seems, argument from tradition?

Yikes.

'As early as the third century A.D., the great Roman Jurist Ulpian noted that
information obtained through torture was not to be trusted because some people are “so susceptible to pain that they will tell any lie rather than suffer it” (Peters, 1996). '

This kind of answers the question of both tradition and incredulity.

- It's traditional knowledge that torture elicits unreliable information.
- The belief that you would tell your torturer the truth can't honestly be separated from the belief that you would tell your torturer untruths.

 

[sunmaster14]

1. I've stipulated to consequentialism for the purposes of this discussion so that's neither here nor there. The paper does not simply appeal to consequentialism as you seem to be doing.
2. The paper takes great pains to point out that morally justifiable torture is only possible in a one-off emergency scenario where there is clear and uncontroversial danger. In both cases there was already a known and identified danger. There was little doubt that failure to act would result in death.
3. By the standards of the paper they could only torture one time to avert a known threat. The paper does not make the case that it's okay to torture as part of a fishing expedition (something bad might happen if we don't torture). To make his case for the first thesis the author states explicitly "Accordingly, I am assuming that the routine use of torture is not morally justified"
4. Hence the second part of the paper. The author makes clear that the moral justification for a one-off emergency situation cannot be justification for repeated and systematic torture.
5. The paper makes no such rationalization other than to delineate between minimalist and maximamlist torture.
6. The character of the thief is not at issue. The imminent harm to the child and refusal to cooperate on the part of the thief are the only salient points.

I urge you to go back and carefully re-read the entire paper.

First, I'd like to note your dramatic shifting of the goal posts (and you're not the only one doing this). I started out this discussion trying to defend two ideas: (1) that torture is morally permissible in certain situations; and (2) that torture and the justification for it exists on a continuum. If one accepts those two ideas, then one can properly analyze the actions of the CIA and put them into the proper context. My conclusion, and I have been consistent throughout (as you can check by reading this thread in its entirety beginning one week ago and reading the Condoleezza Rice thread from 6-7 months ago) is that the CIA was wrong to use the methods it used, but it wasn't THAT wrong. I do not think it was justified, but it wasn't THAT unjustified. The events deserve some national introspection, but the moral outrage shown here and in liberal circles is over the top and I believe driven by partisanship (although perhaps unconsciously).

As for the paper, I am fully in agreement with it. I think if you took the time to reread my posts, you might suspect that I am in fact the author. However, the paper is necessarily incomplete. It didn't address other situations, particularly those analogous to what the CIA faced. The author spends a good deal of time attacking moral absolutism. Therefore, I don't think he would advocate pre-judging an act of torture as immoral just because the danger was, say 24 hours away, rather than 1 hour away, or that there was only a 50% of succeeding instead of a 99% chance of succeeding. The CIA thought it was facing imminent and severe threats. Imminence and severity lie on a continuum, just as the degree of torture does. Once we have abandoned our moral absolutism, we are free to judge each situation on its own merits. Note that this has nothing to do with what the law should be. This is about moral calculations by reasonable human beings.

As to the moral culpability of the victim of torture, the paper simply does not address that (unless I missed it). Failing to address an issue does not mean the author dismisses it as irrelevant. I do not think it is irrelevant, and I am confident that the vast majority of human beings agree with me. It is built deep into our evolved moral framework that a human being who commits evil acts has a lower moral status than an innocent human being. He has degraded himself, and his life and well-being are consequently worth less. Supporters of capital punishment, which make up the majority in the US, implicitly accept this principle.

 

[Wudang]

It is built deep into our evolved moral framework that a human being who commits evil acts has a lower moral status than an innocent human being.

Have you ever heard "innocent until proven guilty"? Those tortured were largely only suspected of involvement.

 

[tsig]

First, I'd like to note your dramatic shifting of the goal posts (and you're not the only one doing this). I started out this discussion trying to defend two ideas: (1) that torture is morally permissible in certain situations; and (2) that torture and the justification for it exists on a continuum. If one accepts those two ideas, then one can properly analyze the actions of the CIA and put them into the proper context. My conclusion, and I have been consistent throughout (as you can check by reading this thread in its entirety beginning one week ago and reading the Condoleezza Rice thread from 6-7 months ago) is that the CIA was wrong to use the methods it used, but it wasn't THAT wrong. I do not think it was justified, but it wasn't THAT unjustified. The events deserve some national introspection, but the moral outrage shown here and in liberal circles is over the top and I believe driven by partisanship (although perhaps unconsciously).

As for the paper, I am fully in agreement with it. I think if you took the time to reread my posts, you might suspect that I am in fact the author. However, the paper is necessarily incomplete. It didn't address other situations, particularly those analogous to what the CIA faced. The author spends a good deal of time attacking moral absolutism. Therefore, I don't think he would advocate pre-judging an act of torture as immoral just because the danger was, say 24 hours away, rather than 1 hour away, or that there was only a 50% of succeeding instead of a 99% chance of succeeding. The CIA thought it was facing imminent and severe threats. Imminence and severity lie on a continuum, just as the degree of torture does. Once we have abandoned our moral absolutism, we are free to judge each situation on its own merits. Note that this has nothing to do with what the law should be. This is about moral calculations by reasonable human beings.

As to the moral culpability of the victim of torture, the paper simply does not address that (unless I missed it). Failing to address an issue does not mean the author dismisses it as irrelevant. I do not think it is irrelevant, and I am confident that the vast majority of human beings agree with me. It is built deep into our evolved moral framework that a human being who commits evil acts has a lower moral status than an innocent human being. He has degraded himself, and his life and well-being are consequently worth less. Supporters of capital punishment, which make up the majority in the US, implicitly accept this principle.

In our system we're supposed to prove them guilty before we punish them.

What happens if the person you are torturing is innocent?

 

[Upchurch]

What happens if the person you are torturing is innocent?

Apparently nothing, since 26(?) of the people the US tortured were innocent.

 

[sunmaster14]

Upchurch, I found this paper too, which I think you would find interesting to read.

http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~chazelle/politics/torture09.html

I will need to re-read it more than just a few times. There are concepts in here that I need to become much more familiar with before I can really comment, but bright chaps like you, Anglo and Sun might absorb it more quickly.

It's a very interesting essay. Ultimately, his idea seems to be to limit the universe of moral decisions so as to exclude any ticking bomb scenarios where torture might be justified. Then he can say torture is always and everywhere immoral (but inside that circumscribed universe). Outside of that limited universe, the moral code on torture doesn't apply. You're on your own so to speak, and you have to decide for yourself and "own" your decisions. I'm not sure why this is helpful in any way.

I'll note that even though the author considers himself to be vehemently anti-torture, he was dismissive of the kind of rebuttals Upchurch has been presenting to my arguments.

One last thing is that I think his argument is flawed in distinguishing torture from blowing up people with a missile with the knowledge that innocent people will suffer excruciating pain and die. I believe the distinguishing feature is "out of sight, out of mind." Without somebody like Diane Feinstein around to describe in vivid detail the agony of a child slowly bleeding to death with his legs blown off and burns over 80% of his body, we cannot imagine his suffering. The reason why torture feels more immoral than drone missile strikes is because we're ignorant, not because of some profound moral truth. Admittedly, this "out of sight, out of mind" feature of humans is part of who we are, but the illogical gap between outrage over "collateral damage" in missile strikes versus the torture of terrorists could be overcome with just a modicum amount of media attention.

 

[sunmaster14]

In our system we're supposed to prove them guilty before we punish them.

Our justice system does not actually require proof. It requires roughly a 90%-95% probability of guilt, which of course implies that 5-10% of the people who are convicted are actually innocent. We appear to accept that as a reasonable cost to pay for having an effective justice system.

What happens if the person you are torturing is innocent?

It's a shame, just like it's a shame when we convict an innocent person of a crime. Mistakes happen. Accidents happen. Sometimes you mistake a wedding party for a gathering of terrorists and kill and maim a few dozen innocent people with a drone missile.

 

[Upchurch]

I'll note that even though the author considers himself to be vehemently anti-torture, he was dismissive of the kind of rebuttals Upchurch has been presenting to my arguments.

What are you referring to? From what I've read, the author doesn't even address my primary rebuttal.

(But, to be fair, neither have you.)

 

[3point14]

Apparently nothing, since 26(?) of the people the US tortured were innocent.

Does it matter? What happens when people are tortured in contravention of internation law is this:











See that? That's a big stack of nothing. The US is a law unto itself and able to commit war crimes with impunity. The US is prepared to harbour those who have undertaken internationally banned acts.

All bets are off now, the self appointed 'world police' have no more moral authority than the taliban. In fact, the only difference now is budget.

Do what you like kids, because the words on paper don't mean a damn thing and all that matters is what you can get away with.

 

[Upchurch]

All bets are off now, the self appointed 'world police' have no more moral authority than the taliban. In fact, the only difference now is budget.

There is still a bit of difference between the US and the Taliban, but there is no question that our credibility has taken a hit over this.

That Obama put a ban on torture first thing was the correct, and wise, move. That we've made this report public in an attempt to come clean helps. What really needs to happen now is the prosecution of those involved. Those prosecutions should go all the way to the top, but I have know illusions that that will happen. However, any attempt to punish those who broke the law will help to re-establish the US's credibility and repair some of the damage the Bush Administration caused with this policy.

 

[anglolawyer]

Our justice system does not actually require proof. It requires roughly a 90%-95% probability of guilt, which of course implies that 5-10% of the people who are convicted are actually innocent. We appear to accept that as a reasonable cost to pay for having an effective justice system.

Oh dear. Two fallacies here: first that proof = certainty and second that probability percentages come into it. They don't. Not at all. Anyone who wants to use percentages had better be able to say what the hell they are talking about. It's easier and more appropriate to just use words, like the law does. Guilty beyond a reasonable doubt is not expressible with any greater precision in percentages.

It's a shame, just like it's a shame when we convict an innocent person of a crime. Mistakes happen. Accidents happen. Sometimes you mistake a wedding party for a gathering of terrorists and kill and maim a few dozen innocent people with a drone missile.

I should not have thought this was your best argument for torturing people who unfortunately turn out to know nothing or to have had no connection with terrorism. There are situations, mainly in war, when the rights of others take second place to our own safety in those situations it is considered legitimate even to kill people without the lease pretence of a trial solely on the basis they are the enemy or are believed to be the enemy.

What we have is a legal lacuna somewhere between war and domestic justice. Torture American style falls between two stools.

 

[3point14]

There is still a bit of difference between the US and the Taliban, but there is no question that our credibility has taken a hit over this.

The hit happened when it was confirmed that torture happened in the name of the people of the US.

What has absolutely shattered it, in my eyes, is that there will be no consequences. This means next time it is convenient for anyone in the CIA/FBI?NSA/USMC or anyone in any position of power in Washington to disregard international law then they will do so as there are no consequences. I'll say that again, in the USA there are no consequences for confirmed, undeniable international crimes of torture.

Why on earth should any individual or agency ever deal with the US with trust and understanding that commitments will be met and restrictions will be observed when, for the entire US government and associated agencies, these things are mere inconveniences to be disregarded when it suits.

That Obama put a ban on torture first thing was the correct, and wise, move. That we've made this report public in an attempt to come clean helps. What really needs to happen now is the prosecution of those involved. Those prosecutions should go all the way to the top, but I have know illusions that that will happen. However, any attempt to punish those who broke the law will help to re-establish the US's credibility and repair some of the damage the Bush Administration caused with this policy.

I agree. it is the lack of those prosecutions that will, I'm afraid I sincerely hope, cause the rest of the world to tell the US president, the next time they issue a call to arms of any nature, to go **** him or herself as their words are simply piss in the wind.

 

[sunmaster14]

What are you referring to? From what I've read, the author doesn't even address my primary rebuttal.

(But, to be fair, neither have you.)

From the Princeton paper (TBS = ticking bomb scenario):

There are two common objections to the TBS question itself, neither of them wise. One is that it is a trap set up by torture lovers to force a small concession from their opponents, shift the debate to "settling the price," and then gloat: "See, we agree!" Of course, it's used as a trap. But the question is legitimate, in fact necessary, and the dreaded shift is easy to avoid. The second objection is that "it never happens," so why even discuss it? This collapses on three grounds. First, the claim is unprovable. Second, if it never happens, why should you care about the moral outcome? (Do you worry about my ethical take on green Martians?) Perhaps you care out of concern for torture creep: if so, address it on its own merits. Third, the philosophical value of hypotheticals is undeniable. Yes, the field of ethics has been hard on fat men being shoved in front of trolleys, but as in mathematics these "singular" points can be the lampposts that light up the dark street. Just as the corners of a triangle tell us all there is to know about its shape, so extreme cases help us read our moral compass.

 

[anglolawyer]

Defence of necessity under the English Common law

This defence has not been defined in a comprehensive way. As I said the other day, that's not how the common law works. A specific case comes along, the defence is raised and the judges have to decide whether it is made out. According to Archbold (the bible on English criminal law) the defence has these elements: the defendant may be excused from liability for an act that would otherwise be a crime if he can show:

a) it was done only to avoid consequences which could not otherwise be avoided and which, if they had been followed, would have inflicted on him or another he was bound to protect inevitable and irreparable evil
b) that no more was done than was reasonably necessary, and
c) the evil inflicted by it was not disproportionate to the evil avoided.

I fail to see why these principles cannot be applied to the two cases in the paper Sunmaster linked from which it would follow that the entire premise of that paper is simply wrong. Torture can be legal in certain cases albeit we are probably still waiting (in England) for a suitable test case.

It used to be thought that necessity could not be a defence to murder [NB - there is no murder involved in torture] but in a case concerning the separation of conjoined twins where one of them would inevitably not survive the operation but both would if it did not take place, the court doubted the correctness of Dudley -v- Stephens (the cabin boy case). See Re A (Children) (Conjoined Twins: surgical separation) [2001] Fam 147 at 224.

Another example given was that of a rock climber who had fallen and whose only chance of survival was to cut the rope from which his companion was hanging, leading to the latter's inevitable death.

 

[12AX7]

It's a shame, just like it's a shame when we convict an innocent person of a crime. Mistakes happen. Accidents happen. Sometimes you mistake a wedding party for a gathering of terrorists and kill and maim a few dozen innocent people with a drone missile.

Wow.

 

[Upchurch]

From the Princeton paper (TBS = ticking bomb scenario):

Ah, you still don't understand my argument.

And, apparently, selectively ignoring my posts.

 

[fishbob]

. .. . . . . . . I started out this discussion trying to defend two ideas: (1) that torture is morally permissible in certain situations; and (2) that torture and the justification for it exists on a continuum. If one accepts those two ideas . . . . . . . . . . . .

Neither has not been supported convincingly. The counter arguments - effectiveness, rule of law, long-term consequences - have been ignored.
I doubt there is anything else you could present in support of your position that would not be too little and too late.