VOICE: Probably? Well, that’s a very cavalier answer. You don’t seem to care about the implications here. Well, Mr. Bauer?
BAUER: I’m sorry, Senator. I didn’t hear a question.
VOICE: All right then. Did you torture Mr. Haddad?
BAUER: According to the definitions set forth by the Geneva Convention, yes, I did. Senator, why don’t I save you some time. It’s obvious that your agenda is to discredit and generate a series of —
VOICE: My only agenda is to get to the truth.
BAUER: I don’t think it is, sir.
VOICE: Excuse me.
BAUER: Abraham Haddad had targeted a bus train of 45 people, 10 of which were children. The truth, Senator, is I stopped that attack from happening.
VOICE: By torturing Mr. Haddad.
BAUER: By doing what I deemed necessary to protect innocent lives.
VOICE: So basically what you’re saying, Mr. Bauer, is that the ends justify the means and that you are above the law.
BAUER: When I am activated, when I am brought into a situation, there is a reason and that reason is to complete the objectives of my mission at all costs.
VOICE: Even if it means breaking the law?
BAUER: For a combat soldier the difference between success and failure is your ability to adapt to your enemy. The people that I deal with, they don’t care about your rules. All they care about is a result. My job is to stop them from accomplishing their objectives. I simply adapt it. In answer to your question, am I above the law? No, sir. I am more than willing to be judged by the people you claim to represent. I will let them decide what price I should pay. Now please do not sit there with that smug look on your face and expect me to regret the decisions that I have made because, sir, the truth is I don’t.
-From the season opener of “24”
It seems to be a slow weekend at FA; so, I thought I’d put this up as an exercise for readers.
One of the most interesting classes I took in college, was an upper division course on Morals and Ethics.
Here are some interesting moral dilemmas. Pick a situation and please explain, how you would deal with it, if you were the one put in the hot seat to make the tough decision. And please explain your line of reasoning. There aren’t really supposed to be any right or wrong answers.
Do the variables and stakes matter, in how you decide? Are you consistent? Do you deal in absolutes? Or are there gray areas and situational nuances, where two seemingly similar problems causes you to respond differently to each.
If you answer some of the problems, I may tweak the situation around, to see if the specific variables may cause you to change your answer (readers are welcomed to offer similar challenges).
(a few of these comes from Moral Reasoning, by Victor Grassian).
1. The Overcrowded Lifeboat
In 1842, a ship struck an iceberg and more than 30 survivors were crowded into a lifeboat intended to hold 7. As a storm threatened, it became obvious that the lifeboat would have to be lightened if anyone were to survive. The captain reasoned that the right thing to do in this situation was to force some individuals to go over the side and drown. Such an action, he reasoned, was not unjust to those thrown overboard, for they would have drowned anyway. If he did nothing, however, he would be responsible for the deaths of those whom he could have saved. Some people opposed the captain’s decision. They claimed that if nothing were done and everyone died as a result, no one would be responsible for these deaths. On the other hand, if the captain attempted to save some, he could do so only by killing others and their deaths would be his responsibility; this would be worse than doing nothing and letting all die. The captain rejected this reasoning. Since the only possibility for rescue required great efforts of rowing, the captain decided that the weakest would have to be sacrificed. In this situation it would be absurd, he thought, to decide by drawing lots who should be thrown overboard. As it turned out, after days of hard rowing, the survivors were rescued and the captain was tried for his action. If you had been on the jury, how would you have decided?
2. A Father’s Agonizing Choice
You are an inmate in a concentration camp. A sadistic guard is about to hang your son who tried to escape and wants you to pull the chair from underneath him. He says that if you don’t he will not only kill your son but some other innocent inmate as well. You don’t have any doubt that he means what he says. What should you do?
3. Sophie’s Choice, not in Grassian.
In the novel Sophie’s Choice, by William Styron (Vintage Books, 1976 — the 1982 movie starred Meryl Streep & Kevin Kline), a Polish woman, Sophie Zawistowska, is arrested by the Nazis and sent to the Auschwitz death camp. On arrival, she is “honored” for not being a Jew by being allowed a choice: One of her children will be spared the gas chamber if she chooses which one. In an agony of indecision, as both children are being taken away, she suddenly does choose. They can take her daughter, who is younger and smaller. Sophie hopes that her older and stronger son will be better able to survive, but she loses track of him and never does learn of his fate. Did she do the right thing? Years later, haunted by the guilt of having chosen between her children, Sophie commits suicide. Should she have felt guilty?
4. The Fat Man and the Impending Doom, with parts cut out in the 2nd edition; they seem to have gotten removed to avoid unintentionally humorous overtones.
A fat man leading a group of people out of a cave on a coast is stuck in the mouth of that cave. In a short time high tide will be upon them, and unless he is unstuck, they will all be drowned except the fat man, whose head is out of the cave. [But, fortunately, or unfortunately, someone has with him a stick of dynamite.] There seems no way to get the fat man loose without using [that] dynamite which will inevitably kill him; but if they do not use it everyone will drown. What should they do?
5. A Callous Passerby
Roger Smith, a quite competent swimmer, is out for a leisurely stroll. During the course of his walk he passes by a deserted pier from which a teenage boy who apparently cannot swim has fallen into the water. The boy is screaming for help. Smith recognizes that there is absolutely no danger to himself if he jumps in to save the boy; he could easily succeed if he tried. Nevertheless, he chooses to ignore the boy’s cries. The water is cold and he is afraid of catching a cold — he doesn’t want to get his good clothes wet either. “Why should I inconvenience myself for this kid,” Smith says to himself, and passes on. Does Smith have a moral obligation to save the boy? If so, should he have a legal obligation [“Good Samaritan” laws] as well?
6. A train is barrelling down the tracks, and if it continues on its natural course, all 3 passengers aboard will die, as the bridge up ahead has given out. You have the ability to save the 3 passengers by pulling a lever that will switch the tracks. If you do this, however, the train will end up hitting a person sitting on the tracks and who will not be able to move out of the way in time. This person’s life is in no danger, unless YOU take action and change the tracks, to save the 3.
7. A madman who has threatened to explode several bombs in crowded areas has been apprehended. Unfortunately, he has already planted the bombs and they are scheduled to go off in a short time. It is possible that hundreds of people may die. The authorities cannot make him divulge the location of the bombs by conventional methods. He refuses to say anything and requests a lawyer to protect his fifth amendment right against self-incrimination. In exasperation, some high level official suggests torture. This would be illegal, of course, but the official thinks that it is nevertheless the right thing to do in this desperate situation. Do you agree? If you do, would it also be morally justifiable to torture the mad bomber’s innocent wife if that is the only way to make him talk? Why?
8. The Principle of Psychiatric Confidentiality, cf. the 1997 movie, Devil’s Advocate, and the 1993 movie, The Firm, on confidentiality between lawyers and clients.
You are a psychiatrist and your patient has just confided to you that he intends to kill a woman. You’re inclined to dismiss the threat as idle, but you aren’t sure. Should you report the threat to the police and the woman or should you remain silent as the principle of confidentiality between psychiatrist and patient demands? Should there be a law that compels you to report such threats?
9. The Partiality of Friendship
Jim has the responsibility of filling a position in his firm. His friend Paul has applied and is qualified, but someone else seems even more qualified. Jim wants to give the job to Paul, but he feels guilty, believing that he ought to be impartial. That’s the essence of morality, he initially tells himself. This belief is, however, rejected, as Jim resolves that friendship has a moral importance that permits, and perhaps even requires, partiality in some circumstances. So he gives the job to Paul. Was he right?
10. The Value of a Promise, Compare with the role of David Cash in the murder of Sherrice Iverson by Jeremy Strohmeyer.
A friend confides to you that he has committed a particular crime and you promise never to tell. Discovering that an innocent person has been accused of the crime, you plead with your friend to give himself up. He refuses and reminds you of your promise. What should you do? In general, under what conditions should promises be broken?
A former fetus, the “wordsmith from nantucket” was born in Phoenix, Arizona in 1968. Adopted at birth, wordsmith grew up a military brat. He achieved his B.A. in English from the University of California, Los Angeles (graduating in the top 97% of his class), where he also competed rings for the UCLA mens gymnastics team. The events of 9/11 woke him from his political slumber and malaise. Currently a personal trainer and gymnastics coach.
The wordsmith has never been to Nantucket.
Well why not produce the evidence that I am wrong? The legal definition of torture does not allow for your goofy notion that somehow if “they were no bound by an oath to a legal sitting government and the information was not pertaining to a pending military attack being conducted according to the proper laws of war.” they can be tortured.
ummm… how can one “not notice” something that is not there. And to the parts about combatants using civilians and civilian areas… what is your point? Because they violate international law we should too?
Blast:
I see your malfunction of logic. You presume that just because a body of people declare a thing to be so, then that is evidence that is so. You completely miss that this is a discussion between people about what is or is not moral. And being that morality is the basis of law, not visa versa, law is no justification for moralitly. The questions here are not about what is legal, they are baout what is moral, and thus should potentually be law.
But then since ‘law’ is your only moral compass, you must have been perfectly at ease with the mass extermination of ‘unwanted’ peoples during WWII. After all, Jews had been declared as “illegal”. You must also be prefectly at ease with Islamist intention to murder every Jew they can. After all, these things are codified by sitting bodies of authorities. Hey man,,, it’s the law!
Perhaps you should get some towels to mop up all the stupid that is dripping off you.
I guess you missed the part about “Well why not produce the evidence that I am wrong?”
Oh, you don’t have any so you resort to bogus personal attacks. Oh, now I understand.
So where is it written that torture is moral? Are you harkening back to “Ad Exstirpanda” the papal bull where Pope granted authority to the Inquisition (back in the 12th Century) for torture?
Blast; Perhaps you missed the part about “this is a discussion between people about what is or is not moral. And being that morality is the basis of law, not visa versa, law is no justification for morality.”
Now I am sorry for the personal attack, but it was illustrative. You have no legal basis to say it is wrong to attack your intellect, or lack therein, do you? Can you cite UN law that says I can’t infer, or declare out right, that you are a drolling imbecile? Can’t? Well then it must be perfectly alright, and so you should shut up about it. What? But it isn’t right? Well funny thing, that is the intent of this thread. Not what some collective of asshats in the UN says, but what the people here reading this blog see as right or wrong, and *their* logical basis for saying so. Arguments to the effect that “it’s wrong because Xxxx says it’s wrong are not germane nor welcome.
So either speak for yourself, or shut the F up. Oops, there, I did it again. But that’s cool with the UN, right?
I blast,
That’s exactly right…the definition you posted does not contain any language to describe what we did after 9/11 as torture. Nor does Geneva. Non-state militia such as Alqueda and other salfi/religious based groups seeking to undermine or overthrow govs, etc., are not covered by Geneva and never were. Nor will the UN ever clearly get involved because its members include the states, etc., who sponsor and use terrorists for their own subversive means as well as because it is the preferred tactic of militias in the Palestinian conflict with Israel. I assumed you didn’t know it was there in the definition you posted, since you didn’t get that point to start with.
Listen, as I said, I happen to agree with you that the “tactic” of waterboarding is “torture”. Regardless of how or the context it is used. In the same way that blowing someone up, is blowing them up, regardless of who does it or how it happens. We agree on that. Where we disagree is whether or not there can only be one context to that as a “war crime” (ie..the same as Japanese or AlQueda, or etc.) Or that all such things are done for the same reasons. They clearly are not. And it’s also clear to most people that this context is what determines the difference between a “crime” or criminal act…and something is not. Again, the context in which it is used is what determines that.
The reason I suggested you read more is because it provides some “context” which you seem to be sorely missing. I say that with all the best regards, as someone who also believes dripping water down someones throat and nose to make them think they are drowning is torture.
DC
Would you consider shooting a soldier manning a machine gun and firing on you to be murder?
The word ‘torture’ is similar to my thinking as ‘murder’. It means unjustified use of force. I suggest that we should not use the same term for legal activities as illegal activities as it will only foment and sustain the confusion. The debate is crippled by the unwillingness to delineate the differences.
Even as described by the the likes of I Blast, current interrogation and detention can be argued as ‘torture’ under the UN crap writ. Keeping someone apart from their family, refusing them unlimited contact with the outside world, fack, just taking away my GF’s Iphone, can all be argued to cause extreme mental and emotional injury. So what, now we call that torture for the simple lack of a acceptable term for that kind of discomfort? It is insanity brought about by the well intentioned refusal to properly define torture as the unwarranted and illegal act of intentionally creating physical emotional or mental injury or duress. And then going on to define what would be warranted and legal and to what extent such duress could be exacted.
Currently the debate is stifled because those on our side are split in the notion that they are somehow helpful by ‘calling a spade a spade’. This is not so.
But I am comfortable that time and certain predictable events shall fix that misbegotten notion. Once Terror takes on it’s full and final blossoming, people will clearly understand that it is not something you can deal with using high moral ground, and therefore the world will finally recognize the imperative of defining succinctly what is and what is not terrorist activities and a whole new level of what is or is not moral and legal to do when fighting terrorist.
It’s coming. The only question really is, how many people will need to die before people take off the blinders. and deal with reality. And is the point of this exercise. What is law and moral in the perfect world falls away when reality sets impossible contradictions in front of you. You have to have some sort of compass to know what to do, So far the UN and those who love that notion have refused to acknowledge that reality is very different than their optimal view. And any organism that refuses to see reality for what it is, is doomed to fail and perish.
Bill C, whatever dood, you made your point, go watch 24 and understand how the world “really” works.
we agree.
Looking back over our thread, I am not trying to conflate the legal issues with the actual description or its application. To serve a point of how we defined waterboarding (and its other names) as a form of torture. Now if we want to debate torture as a method of protecting the USA, have at it. It is resonable to have that debate, but what most of the argument on this subject has been (from other quarters) had been whether or not waterboarding is torture.
I don’t watch 24, but I did go through SERE*, and so I do have first hand real life experience on what I’m talking about.
Which is notably different from what is coming from your blow hole.
*Which begs the question. Was I tortured, or was I trained?
Oh, that changes everything. Oh so sorry I did not realize that I was speaking with someone who was of such great distinction and expertise. I just thought all along you were another looser who tends to toss out insults and boasts about themselves.
Bill. I do get it. I understand. I have no problem reconciling the difference. There is no other context for waterboarding. It’s not something used on the battlefield against an enemy like a rifle or artillery, bombs, etc. Its sole purpose is to inflict extreme discomfort/duress on someone you have already detained. Now, I agree with you that there is context to that to be determined. I have no problem reconciling those things myself. There are legal arguments as well. But, lets not try and pretend that it’s not what it is. Shooting someone can happen under many different contexts..even accidents. Waterboarding someone….not so much.
That’s why they train you for it. Because it’s something they use on “captives” (ie..torture). They also teach you that everybody has their breaking point….and it’s unreasonable to think you will hold out for ever (ie…torture works)
DC, yes Torture does work. Everyone will break in time, unless they die. They will even break in time, if nothing is done to them at all. But time is not always a quantity that can be spent.
My point remains. Words have meaning and the meaning of the word ‘torture’ is exactly what is in question, not the effect. Morality is inveloped in the meanings of some words, and torture certainly is one of those words.
So would you say we were tortured or trained when we were waterboarded in SERE?
Yes, harsh interrogation practices, and even torture, do indeed work.
They produce information that the subject in question would not otherwise be willing to divulge.
What is important to remember is that the information that is produced is not, in any case. relied upon on its own. The information that is produced is then checked and crosschecked to determine its value and accuracy.
OK, here are my answers. I don’t claim they are the right answers, they are just my answers.
1. The Overcrowded Lifeboat
If I were on the jury I would find him not guilty. As Capitan he has a duty to protect the lives of his ship to the best of his ability. And sometimes that means at the expense of others in his charge. This really is no different than sealing a flooding chamber before everyone can escape in order to save the ship and everyone else. And as Capitan, it may seem as proper that he should throw himself overboard, but that would be the cowards way out and an abandonment of his responsibility to the survivors, unless he were certain that there were someone ready willing and able to assume his role.
Questions about how they came to this situation are really just dodges of the real issue. We can presume that the Capitan had no culpability whatsoever with being found in this situation. So then re-examine and answer.
2. A Father’s Agonizing Choice
The father has no choice in the life or death of his son. He really has no choice in the life or death of the other inmate. His only choice is whether or not to be a participant. I would refuse to participate and leave the responsibility for the murders to the murderers. Yes, even if the other inmate were switched with my son and I had to pull the chair to save my son, or even myself.
3. Sophie’s Choice,
Sophies choice is defensible. I would not disparage her for it. But I would also not make that choice. Again, I would leave the blood on the hands of those to whom it belongs. If at all possible I would joint my children in the chamber. Where this question gets interesting is when it changes from passive to active. So say now you are placed in a situation where you will be tormented. If you scream your son lives, if you don’t your daughter lives. Now the choice can not be refused. What do you do?
4. The Fat Man and the Impending Doom
The logical solution to me is to blast the fat man out. As the leader he made the fatal mistake of trying to be the first one out, and as the leader his responsibility is foremost, to save everyone else. If he was not the leader, then who ever was is culpable, but the answer to this is the same as to the lifeboat question. The leader has the responsibility to save the maximum number of lives, even at the expense of others lives. Where this question becomes squeamish is when the fat man is switched to a pregnant lady who was being lifted through first because of her pregnancy making it impossible to climb without help from below. Now what? Same answer?
5. A Callous Passerby
Roger Smith has a moral obligation to render aid. The only real question here is, should it be legally mandated. I don’t think it should, but only because it is impossible to establish the facts of such an event. Perhaps Roger didn’t notice the situation. Perhaps he wasn’t sure he could survive the attempt. Perhaps Roger thought the kids was fine and needed no aid and was just being a rude ass, as some kids are want to do (and as recently happened to me Downtown Portland). Crimes of conscience should not be crimes. But everyone should have a right to question him on his motives.
6. A train is barreling down the tracks,
This is a reversal of the life boat and fat man question. Here inaction results in the maximum loss again, but this time the choice is to sentence someone not apparently involved or at risk. And, I must ad, based on the analysis and understanding drawn in a very limited perspective. There is much that is not known. Perhaps the one person on the tracks is performing maintenance and had intentionally set the track that way as per their job. Perhaps they are wearing hearing protection and can’t be alerted. Or maybe it’s simply a child playing on tracks they know are never used. The person in this dilemma is being asked not to just make a decision about saving three lives for one, but they are also being asked to make the determination that their actions would indeed save those lives. Imagine that after throwing the switch it is determined that the three would not have died, or that they were actually terrorist attempting to capture the train and the single person you just killed had just set the tracks to stop them, and you undid that killing the real hero. I would not be able to act based on the limited information available, so the three would probably die.
7. A madman who has threatened to explode several bombs
If I believe the threat is real, then he gets water boarded and breaks in under 3 minutes. The information is corroborated and if he lied we do it again. The fact is folks, water boarding really works and it don’t take long at all, so there is plenty of time to check the accuracy of the information you get. No one resists it successfully. Ever. And knowing they have plenty of time to confirm and do it again, means you don’t try BS’ing the interrogators more than once.
8. The Principle of Psychiatric Confidentiality,
If you believe someone is a real threat, you have a moral obligation to stop them, no matter how you discover it. You don’t necessarily have to reveal *what kind of threat* they are. The real question here is in the follow up, What sort of evidence should be required from the Doc to prevent just any Doc from having a rival committed.
9. The Partiality of Friendship
Jim has the responsibility and the right to pick whomever he believes he will best be able to work with. It isn’t always about the ‘best qualifications’ as much as ‘the best fit’.
10. The Value of a Promise,
A real friend would not leave you in this dilemma. I would give him the option to reveal the truth on his own, and thus recover some honor. If he failed to do so, then he would forfeit his honor and my loyalty in the matter.
Yes Bill…they were training you for torture…if you were captured.
Which is why you should NOT be captured! Hence the name of the course. Capice?
Ok…..my eyes are glazed over from all the serious debate, and the burial of responses to the actual post; it seems, anyway, that Wisdom was the only one that returned to address the new challenges.
The bottomline is, does your response to each dilemma change, dependent upon variables, such as the number of victims weighed or who the victims are? If the choice is 1 vs. 10….it might be easier to stick to one’s principles and to absolutes; far harder if it’s one life vs. a million or the whole of civilization; do your compromise your principles, then? Do you put more weight into the value of a human life if you have a personal connection? Does age factor into a decision (an old person in the twilight of his years vs. a newborn)? The level of import to society of the person (the man who discovers cancer vs. a drug addict)?
Those are the kind of things I was trying to insert into the original moral conundrums, to see if you’re consistent in your reasoning; to see if the different levels in numbers affect one’s decision.
Don’t know if I have the time or energy to address each person’s answers, anymore, but I do appreciate those who stuck to the “game” (thanks Bill C for #64), as well as enjoyed the torture debate.
Since I sort of left off at comment #25, I’ll pick up from there. It would have been nice if others could have seized upon the new versions (ex: 2b, 2c, 3b, etc), since many responses have been similar.
@bbartlog #25:
I find that understandable. It’s like being blackmailed; capitulation only incurs more of the same (think terrorism). But consider the alternate scenarios:
@Wordsmith #12:
Wordsmith #15:
Another scenario
Wordsmith #23:
bbartlog:
This is one of the ones I didn’t write. I’ll skip answering….my brain’s too lazy to get the wheels turning, anew.
@Wordsmith #18:
Or
(4c)Let’s say the group of people trapped with you are people you have a relationship with….your entire family and known relatives- perhaps numbering as high as 80; or maybe soldiers under your command. Do you still allow everyone to drown because “the fat man is not going to die if we do nothing”? Isn’t inaction, in this case, the same as action (i.e., non-action in itself is a decision)
6) In reality we rarely have such certainty as is expressed in this dilemma: how do we know that this person will not see the train and get out of the way? Accepting it as given, though – no, I’m not allowed to kill one innocent to save three. This is very similar to 4).
(6d) : the innocent on the train tracks is your fiancee. Same decision?
Alternate scenarios from previous responses:
@Wordsmith #21:
bbartlog:
From Wordsmith #21:
Wordsmith,
I did include some variables along with the answers. I really like and apprecieate your discussion BTW.
DC,
Yes they were *training* me. They were not torturing me. They only difference was the intent, and that means changing the name of what they did. Ergo, Water boarding is not always torture. It is dependent on the intent, the context, the motive, the rational.
@Bill C:
I appreciate it, Bill; and will look over your responses in the morning.
That reminds me of this passage from the Robert Kaplan article (which I linked to in comment #6):
Could tickling be considered “torture”?
According to the UN description, absolutely, tickling is torture.
I vaguely remember a case in California back in the 80’s were someone was actually prosecuted for assault for tickling and in the article they mentioned how someone else temporarily lost custody of their child for tickling too much.
I would disagree with Kaplan that we were trained to perfection beforehand. We were selected down to the type of folk who would do best, but that was more a matter of personal will, something terrorist do not lack. We were also pretty damn well beaten down by the time that part came around. The only reason it didn’t last long is because it doesn’t take long. And as for the onerous circumstances, dood (to Kaplan), that is really what it is all about. Done right, they piss themselves and chatter like a magpie just by being walked into the room. If not, then they aren’t so untrained and unprepared after all, now are they. ;~)
Wordsmith, what you have presented is not a discussion on moral/ethics…but a psych profile test…which is why there are only 2 choices and you must pick and explain yourself. It’s used to gather information about a persons personality type, tendency, etc. Which you have just suggested was your goal in the first place. To present the circumstances, and then say what would you do and why is one thing. To present the circumstances and 2 outcomes and ask people to choose and explain why they chose A or B, is not the same thing nor will it garner the same sort of discussion.
Bill…they were “training you” for the fact that you most likely would be “tortured” if you were captured. The fact that they were training you for it, does not change the fact that it is a method of torture to extract information. Nor would you call the very same procedure “training” if it was done to you by an enemy. And more to your larger point….we weren’t “training” KSM when we waterboarded him either. We were extracting information from him using the water treatment which has been known as a torture method for centuries. *in all it’s various forms.
Two people training, wearing gloves sparring is called “boxing” and is a sport. Tieing someone to a chair and hitting them in the face if they don’t answer questions is not boxing nor a sport.
You could be training/ “waterboarding” (the sport) on a wake board, and get a lung full of water on a wave coming in while vacationing in Hawaii. Or, you could tie someone to the board…and pour water down their throat if they don’t give you information. I think most reasonable people understand the difference.
According to what I saw…most countries opted out or modified the 1st clause of the UN human rights commission treaty on torture which was the definition of torture, and the fact that it could never been legal even to protect against disaster or attack. What the UN itself thinks is irrelevant and has been for a long time.
They don’t pour water down anyone’s throat.
Water Boarding: The prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet. Cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner’s face and water is poured over him. Unavoidably, the gag reflex kicks in and a terrifying fear of drowning leads to almost instant pleas to bring the treatment to a halt.
“You could be training/ “waterboarding” (the sport) on a wake board, and get a lung full of water on a wave coming in while vacationing in Hawaii. Or, you could tie someone to the board…and pour water down their throat if they don’t give you information. I think most reasonable people understand the difference.”
This is baloney. Information on what? Information that would save thousands of lives? Something conducted under supervision at the highest levels and done rarely? *Reasonable* people would understand. They should have waterboarded Moussaoui.
DC you can rationalize all you want but we’ve settled on one piece of common ground. The proper term for what was done is “training” not ‘torture’. Therefore, intent does make all the difference, and so it should when speaking about interrogating vs actual torture. You know things like drilling holes into people, cutting off pieces of their body, burning them with acid, breaking their bones, gouging out their eyes, starving them, intensionally infecting them with illness,,,, for the purpose of punishing them, intimidating them or for coercion of the person or their comrades by unlawful actors for the purpose of unlawful acts.
You make the two equivalent and thusly diminish the true horror of real torture while disparaging those who take extraordinary care to protect their prisoners from real harm while trying to save unknown numbers of innocent lives.
You should consider that.
You make a good point, but I assume you were volunteering?
Not that this is the untimate on the subject, I did find the Hitchens article interesting
I Blast, Not really no.
Cetainly no more than someone who refuses to answer lawful questions is “volunterring” to be questioned more vigorusly. They could opt out far more easily than I could have by simply answering the questions.
That is assuming they actually know something of value and are being candid before or after such activities. Lots of assumptions.
“Blast: That is assuming they actually know something of value and are being candid before or after such activities. Lots of assumptions. “
It is indeed. But that is the subject for a whole new moral dilemma isn’t it. So far the US has used aggresive interrogation on only three people, and in those three cases they recovered critical information that stopped attacks that were in play as well as killed or captured more key terrorist and disrupted their organizations. I know that the interrogators are extrememly good an determining when and if what you are telling them is true. I know some of their techniques and some of them are beyond me. But they are good at what they do. If they determine that Ahmed isn’t being honest and Ahmed knows something he is really trying to keep from them, I would bet they were right.
But as you say, they could be wrong. Now would that make a good discussion? I guess so, but it is similar to firing on a group of men advancing on your position under cover of darkness only to find they weren’t armed. War is cruel even to the kind. You can only do your best to survive and to know what is needed to survive.
There is much we don’t really know outside of some anecdotal information and much of it released in a way to support the effort. Thus, I cannot say since this is all secret information if it is correct or not, and unless you were participating, you don’t have much more then I.
You know that in the area of public debate, people like John McCain have said that the results are dubious and false information received is often given to stop the torture.
True, but of course that probably could be a violation of the ROE, or fog of war at least. We are talking about setting a specific policy of government that would allow torture to obtain information. I realize you like the semantic game of not defining it as such, but it honestly is forcing someone with pain to give testimony of some sort, relevant or false information may or may not come out.
Bill (and fyi Missy),
One the instructors at the very “training” facility you keep citing is on record in regards to this subject.
According to his testimony before House Judiciary Subcommittee Malcolm Wrightson Nance served as an instructor at the U.S. Navy Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) school in North Island Naval Air Station, California.
At SERE, one of (his) most serious responsibilities was to employ, supervise or witness dramatic and highly kinetic coercive interrogation methods, through hands-on, live demonstrations in a simulated captive environment which inoculated our student to the experience of high intensity stress and duress. Some of these coercive physical techniques have been identified in the media as Enhanced Interrogation Techniques. The most severe of those employed by SERE was waterboarding.
The SERE community was designed over 50 years ago to show that, as a “torture” instrument, waterboarding is a terrifying, painful and humiliating tool that leaves no physical scars and which can be repeatedly used as an intimidation tool. SERE trained tens of thousands of service members of its historical use by the Nazis, the Japanese, North Korea, Iraq, the Soviet Union, the Khmer Rouge and the North Vietnamese.
Most media representations or recreations of the waterboarding are inaccurate, amateurish and dangerous improvisations, which do not capture the true intensity of the act. Contrary to popular opinion, it is not a simulation of drowning — it is drowning. In my case, the technique was so fast and professional that I didn’t know what was happening until the “water entered my nose and throat” (for missy). It then pushes down into the trachea and starts the process of respiratory degradation.
It is an overwhelming experience that induces horror and triggers frantic survival instincts. As the event unfolded, I was fully conscious of what was happening — I was being tortured.
___________________
As I said before…despite having a full understanding of what it “is”, I still believe in situations such as 9/11, etc. or terrorist attack…that you do what you have to do and use it. I’m not one to co-mingle…constitutional rights of US civilians and try to extrapolate that to “terrorists”. I believe you do what you have to do…as we always “have” done in such situations. It doesn’t have to be “legal” to do that…nor should it be least you run the risk of it being used in a routine manner. That never changed what it is though. It’s not dancing, it’s not swimming, it’s not training. Its torture. Period. Me and your instructor will just have to agree to disagree with you on that particular point.
DC, the instructor said he train the students for the eventuality of torture, not that he tortured them. So even your quote undoes your argument.
And stop with the gruesome details. It’s childish to think that grusome equates torture. I could post the details of a cesarian birth, then call that torture too.
Bill,
Those words were his…not mine. He said, when it was done to him, he understood it to be torture. That it “was” torture. That he taught it as a torture method, including the history of it as a torture method. That’s a SERE instructor saying that. If you can’t understand that from his words, I don’t know what to say.
Again: “It is an overwhelming experience that induces horror and triggers frantic survival instincts. As the event unfolded, I was fully conscious of what was happening — I was being tortured.”
@Dc #70:
Dc, I fail to understand your need to make a distinction. These (and variations of them) are conundrums that were presented to an upper division class I took on morals and ethics. You can perceive it as a psych profile test, but how is that unrelated to making moral decisions/judgments? Are moral decisions made in the absence of having a psychological make-up? Here’s another puzzle that is used in moral and ethics classes, and this suggestion applies to the conundrums presented to you in my post:
These puzzles are an exercise in “moral reasoning”; and moral reasoning is a study in psychology that overlaps with moral philosophy.
@Bill C #64:
Then:
Or:
Bill C:
Interesting that your take is that it is similar to problem #1, rather than the other problems where inaction leaves the person alive; taking action means more lives will be saved, but at the expense of the one who’s not in danger.
Well, sticking to the puzzle at face value, it basically tells us what his state of mind is- which is knowing that the kid is in trouble, but choosing not to help.
Yes, the details make an important determining factor in how one might respond. So let’s fill them in with the following:
6c) Instead of 3 people, let’s say there are a hundred lives aboard that train.
6e) Your wife and 2 kids are the three aboard the train who will surely die unless you switch the tracks, killing the one who otherwise is in no danger.
6f) The person on the tracks is an old homeless guy; there’s just no way he can move out of the way in time to avoid the train, should you switch the tracks; if you don’t switch the tracks, there’s only one life aboard the train- not three: but that person is someone of great importance to society- say it’s a popular/good world leader who’s definitely made life better for people; or a researcher who is said to be weeks away from discovering the cure for cancer.
Does the same hold true, then, if it was about skin-color? What if Jim chose the least qualified but the “best fit”, because of the skin color of the applicants?