The 'Ticking Bomb' scenario

[Nessa]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/torture/eth ... mb_1.shtml

Thoughts?

[RickD]

I agree with what the scenario lays out.

It's a similar scenario to the people who lied to the nazis when they were hiding Jews.

[Nessa]

What about different methods of torture? e.g physical verses psychological? I have heard the latter is far worse.

Is that how Mrs tricky ricky works? Deprives you of sammiches until she gets what she wants

[RickD]

What about different methods of torture? e.g physical verses psychological? I have heard the latter is far worse.

Is that how Mrs tricky ricky works? Deprives you of sammiches until she gets what she wants

Sammiches? Yes, something like that.

[Nessa]

What about different methods of torture? e.g physical verses psychological? I have heard the latter is far worse.

Is that how Mrs tricky ricky works? Deprives you of sammiches until she gets what she wants

Sammiches? Yes, something like that.

Oh it's all beginning to make sense now...

[Hortator]

Here's the problem with the scenario....

"Torture is guaranteed to produce the information needed to ensure the authorities find and make the bomb safe"

Torture is never ever a guarantee to produce useful information. You are going to get a forced confession, and forced confessions are highly suspect.

Even if torture is a "truth serum", the logic goes, we hurt people to keep other people from being hurt. But where does it end?

I mean, if it was more simple an ethical problem, like say, press button #1, and 1 person is maimed, press button #2, and 100 people are maimed, but press no button and both buttons are pressed, then I would woefully, but willingly, press the 1st button.

As for the biblical angle on torture....it's quite clear God frowns on it. Saul of Tarsus was once a torturer, but he threw that life away in favor of Christ, to highlight the positive transformative powers of God. All of the apostles save for 1 was either executed heinously or tortured to death as well, making some of the first martyrs.

A lot of torture used today is considered "soft" torture, where they put the inmate in a cell that is overly heated, or under heated. Too much light exposure, or pitch darkness. Blasting loud music for hours, or solitary confinement without a single soul 23 hours a day, indefinitely. I believe these are all the same as physical torture, because psychological torture can manifest symptoms in physical ways. The results of solitary confinement, which is under review currently as an Eighth Amendment violation, has many affects mentally as concussions or head traumas.

IMO Hopefully torture goes the way of other barbaric practices: into the dustbin of history.

[Jac3510]

This actually isn't an ethical problem just because it involves a question couched in terms of right any wrong any more than astrology questions are scientific problems just because they concern stars. The question is attempting to set a principle based approach to ethics (called deontology) against a consequence based approach to ethics (called utilitarianism). Both are wrong approaches and miss what ethics is really about.

We can conceive of each act of torture in terms of a legal and due punishment. The severity of that legal and due punishment must fit the crime. Therefore, if the crime is great (e.g., a nuclear device is hidden in the city), the punishment is great. If the person stops breaking the law and reveals the location of the bomb, they are no longer punished (tortured). They will, of course, be punished on other grounds later (i.e., for planting the bomb in the first place, which is against the law). If the device goes off, of course, then the person is now guilty of another crime and will must stand for justice accordingly, as would all accomplices (be they individual or national).