Should civilized nations use "Enhanced Interrogation" techni

[Jester]

Quibbling, here, but I'm going to disagree. Consider an interrogator backhanding a suspect across the face, once. Torture? I don't think so.

Well, there's a line there somewhere, but striking someone you're interrogating is getting pretty close to it. If someone did it only once during an interrogation, I'd hardly have them hauled before a war crimes tribunal, but if hitting people was just a regular part of interrogation, I'd say that's torture.

In general, I agree. However, consider incarcerating a claustrophobic. Here we need the 'intent' aspect from the UN guidelines.

We are agreed there. Intent is critical.

Humiliation is very culture dependent. In a culture where the only recourse from humiliation is death, physical pain may be less torture than is humiliation. Examples would be feudal Japan and many of the American native tribes.

This point is a difficult one, and goes to the heart of the interaction between culture and psychology, which we really haven't figured out to anyone's satisfaction. However, I think I would still err on the side of making physical pain more strictly banned than humiliation; at a certain point, some degree of psychological twisting is simply necessary for any interrogation, however high-minded. A Japanese soldier (or an American one, really) would no doubt be shamed by revealing secret information, but that would be the whole point of interrogating him!

The oft repeated notion that torture is an inefficient way to obtain information is false. In almost every case it will generate a lot of information. What is in doubt is the accuracy of that information. A confession generated by torture is useless in determining if the accused is guilty, since an innocent person is just as likely to confess as is a guilty just to stop the pain. General information is equally suspect. But for cases where the information is specific and testable (e.g., a safe combo, the location of an accomplice or of a hostage, etc.), torture is very efficient.

The reason not to use torture is thus not a pragmatic one, but a moral one.

I don't think any credible opponent of torture would claim that torture does not yield lots of information. At least in the critiques I've read, they emphasize that point, that a tortured prisoner yields far too much information, but you no longer have any reliable way of gauging its accuracy. In extreme cases, the prisoner themselves may no longer have a way of gauging its accuracy, since they've come to believe their desperate lies.

But yes, the strongest argument is the moral one. It is just extra disappointing to hear people eagerly advocate its use when it is known to yield such problematic information. We must always remember that people like "Blowtorch Bob" are waiting in every society, no matter how civilized.

-Jester