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by blowski 3707 days ago
In a "24" like scenario, if you knew that torturing 100 people, all of whom you believe to be terrorists, was 50% likely to yield useful information would you do it?

For me personally, the effectiveness of torture is irrelevant. Maybe it is for you as well, I don't know from your comment. It's something we should not do, full stop.
1 comments
zyxley 3707 days ago
I believe torture is morally wrong, but it's easier to point out the practicalities of coercive interrogation (even of a nontorturous kind) producing useless bullshit most of the time.

Also, your hypothetical is absurdly biased in favor of torture, given that any real information retrieved would be a needle in the haystack of the aforementioned useless bullshit.

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blowski 3707 days ago
The problem with debating it on a practical level is that it sounds like you're haggling over what kind of ends are required to justify the means.

Even if it were 100% effective - every person tortured did exactly what the torturer wanted - it would still be unjustifiable because it is so morally repugnant.

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zyxley 3707 days ago
Part of my point is that there will literally never be an end that justifies the means with torture, because torture factually does not and will never return any kind of reliable information.

Trying to stress the point with weird hypotheticals just emphasizes that the weird hypotheticals don't reflect the facts of what results torture gives.

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blowski 3707 days ago
I imagine that if you torture 1000 of your enemies you will get at least some useful information from them. Sure, they will also give you a lot of rubbish and you'll struggle to know what's true and what's made up. But that 1% nugget of truth is what the Donald Trumps of this world use to justify torture.

I imagine for the head of the CIA or Mossad or MI5, these aren't weird hypotheticals but real decisions. We need to tell them as a society that we do not accept torture, whatever results it would bring.

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zyxley 3706 days ago
> Sure, they will also give you a lot of rubbish and you'll struggle to know what's true and what's made up.

If you had any ability to distinguish the truth involved from the bullshit, you wouldn't need to waste time torturing anyone in the first place.

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