Ranting to /dev/null

you say, "it's a largely empty argument that consists of posturing more than argument." what do you mean by 'posturing more than argument'? is it because his opinion seems more intuitive than reasonable, and comes down to "it just doesn't make me feel good"?

Basically. Personal convictions and opinions are good and all, but there's a huge missing step between "I don't like it" and "We should change our foreign/domestic policy".

Hey, couple of thoughts:

1) historically, torture is not designed to arrive at the truth -- it's designed to arrive at a confession. If I were making policy and reading the lessons of the Spanish Inquisition, I wouldn't use torture because it's inaccurate. The entire historical description of devil worship is most likey made up of the accumulated desperate inventions of men trying to keep the rest of their skin.

2) One of the primary moral issues is the issue of innocence. If you've established beyond a doubt that someone is a terrorist (lets say criminal, since it avoids the definition de jour problem) you could torture them with a pretty clear conscience in the "ticking bomb" senario. The leakage is that you end up torturing people to find out if they're terrorists, and then you lose your soul.

When one premise is "this man is a terrorist", you need to have a way to establish that. If the other premise is "terrorists do not have the same rights as human beings" (I don't think I'm reading too much into you there, but correct me if I am) then you'd better be dadgum sure about premise #1.

Sorry about the spelling. I don't spell.

Also, I realize that I'm talking about torture, and not about your post. I sort of went on the obvious rabbit trail.

I think you're being a bit harsh on Sullivan regarding torture... while almost all his posts on the subject contain a "Torture... Ick" reaction (which I think is entirely warranted but probably not a good way to make policy), he's also brought up the two issues that Lang mentioned (1. questionable value of information, because aimed at obtaining confession and 2. issue of innocence), plus a third that he's been harping on for weeks now, negative impact on how America is viewed (in Europe, in the Islamic world, etc.).

I agree with you more in what you said about his line of argumentation on homosexuality. But you're right that there's some similar argument from him on both torture issues and homosexual issues -- what I'd say is not that he hasn't presented any good pragmatic arguments, (and perhaps this is what you meant to criticize him for all along) but that he's picked pragmatic arguments that supported positions he arrived at based on his neo-enlightenment tale of human rights (which he articulates to varying degrees at varying times). I think there's probably some degree to which such a conception of morality is descended from an innate moral sense gifted to us by our creator, but that's not something I'm going to bother to spell out now.

Lang: I'd say that if you're found in civilian clothes bearing arms against US soldiers then you're automatically an illegal combatant and your Genevan rights are immediately forfeit. The question isn't whether you were plotting a terrorist attack, it's whether or not you're obeying the laws of civilized warfare. This is really easy to determine: if you're shooting at me, you're a dead man.

I'd agree with you that torture isn't the most reliable way of generating information, but information isn't the only goal. There's also deterrance. Medieval towns would frequently have the rotting corpses of several recently apprehended criminals staked outside the gates as a warning to would-be ne'er-do-wells. As the Islamic world seems to be essentially medieval in its worldview, I'd say a few heads-on-a-stick might communicate a message that we want to send: don't mess with us.

Rob: I think a lot of the negativity in global perceptions of US policy is caused by two things: asinine lefties and a failure of will on the part of the administration. Instead of denying that we torture illegal combatants and terrorists, we should brag about it.

Secondly, though I'd agree that the "torture...ick" sentiment is probably based on some kind of common grace, I'm unwilling to allow anyone but the church to use that as a guiding principle for policy. As only the church submits itself to the work of the Spirit - and only sometimes at that - only the church can reference the work of the Spirit as its foundation. Sullivan himself is adamant about the separation of church and state, and so should really not be allowed to get away with that.

I agree with you that many of Sullivan's comments on torture simply exploit the instinctive Western squeamishness about torture without providing substantive arguments as to why its use is always wrong.

However, it seems increasingly clear that the Bush administration has tacitly established a presumption of legality to the use of torture in the "War on Terror." I find it difficult to see this as an improvement on what in effect used to be the U.S. military's torture standard: "It's illegal, but in extreme circumstances we'll discreetly grant exceptions."

On pragmatic grounds, it's hard to argue that the Bush torture doctrine has been anything but harmful: the dubiety of information obtained through torture is well-known, and it is also generally accepted that where time constraints aren't operative the most effective means of learning about terrorist intentions is usually to befriend rather than antagonize captives. The notorious "ticking time-bomb" hypothetical was easily accommodated under the old rule; the tacit new rule is a particularly egregious example of that notoriously unwise practice, legislating by exceptions.

It is of course wholly impracticable ever to do an empirical study of the deterrance value of torture. However:

I recognize the disparity between the American and Middle Eastern mindset; I think most commentators underestimate the extent to which the use of the word "medieval" is in many ways not pejorative but purely descriptive in relation to the Middle Eastern "man in the street." But it seems to me that for this very reason the American military must be as scrupulous in its regard for human rights as is reasonably possible - it's too easy for the average Iraqi to see the conflict in his country as simply another of the perennial squabbles for land and power that have riven the area for millennia. Unless it can be made to see the terrorists as vicious, troglodytic, and oppressive as contrasted with the values and actions of the United States, the Iraqi populace will easily fall prey to spurious appeals to nationalism, race, and religion.

Finally, I'd be interested in knowing how you derive a Biblical license for torture. I'm not aware of any text speaking directly on this question, and it seems that a Christian understanding of this "legislative gap" should be created in the same manner as Just War Theory: by looking at the grand principles of Christian ethics - a concern for the value of human life, a resistance to needless destruction {cf. the Old Testament prohibition against "slash-and-burn" military campaigns}, a preference that only the minimally necessary measure of violence be used, etc. I find it difficult to see how, in this context, you can justify the use of torture as a matter of policy rather than a rare exception.

One final point: I think you assume too much in re: the reliability of U.S. capture and detention practices. Many of the captured "combantants" are not taken during or subsequent to actual battles, but on the basis of notoriously unreliable intelligence which may be motivated by resentment or greed. A tangential point, but surely one that encourages additional circumspection in applying torture even under your system.

Sorry for the length. I'm procrastinating on my CivPro reading.

Exactly what Julian said.

Let me just say that I'm not really defending this administration's use of torture as much as I am defending the idea that torture does indeed serve a useful purpose. I'm feeling the same way about the war in general: a good idea, but carried of with spectacular incompetence.

I suppose it's also useful to define exactly what we mean by "torture", as I think we may be starting to equivocate. If by "torture" we mean the use of deliberately measured pain with the goal of extracting information/confession, then I'd agree with all that this is a dicey proposition, as pretty much anyone will tell you pretty much anything if you hurt them badly enough. But if we simply mean the deliberate ill-treatment and painful execution (crucifixion can be considered torture, but the goal is rarely to get anything more than a corpse), then I'd say that it does have a proper place in any political system.

If punishment is neither cruel nor unusual, than it serves no real purpose either in admonishing the offender or deterring his fellows. You can train a dog to behave a certain way if you provide a painful stimulus at rare but readily identifiable times. If you never stimulate it this way, you'll never get results, and if you simply stimlate it all the time, it'll go nuts. Individuals and, I would argue, populations follow the same pattern. If you always punish certain behaviors with grisly punishments, then people will learn "hey, that's a bad idea".

The problem now is probably that the use is not subject to any kind of discrimination. But like the prosecution of the war itself, this is simply bad execution of a fundamentally sound idea. So yes, we need to rationalize (as in, "to make rational") the use of torture in Iraq and we need to have some kind of procedure for what goes on there, but I'm uncomfortable with simply saying that this is something we should never do. If you deliberately target civilians with bombs, you deserve to be tortured to death, and the state is entirely righteous in doing that.

I think you're rather clouding the issue by saying that "if punishment is neither cruel nor unusual, than it serves no real purpose either in admonishing the offendor or deterring his fellows." The American legal prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment is a ban on malicious or capricious treatment of convicts in a manner that is incommensurate with their crime. *All punishment* - injunctive restraint on movement, imprisonment, enforcement of damages rulings, etc. - is cruel and unusual in the sense that it both inflicts some form of pain and is something that, absent judicial enforcement, would not normally occur.

I recognize that we may have to make some adjustments in our judicial procedures in re: treating terrorists, since for various reasons terrorists don't comfortably fit into any of the traditional categories of offendors, whether military or civil. But Burkean conservatism would argue that we should be extremely cautious in altering methods and structures which have served reasonably well in some form for decades if not centuries. The "War on Terror" is only several years old, and it seems a little early to be altering policy with respect to something as radically foreign to the mainstream American tradition as torture.

And I continue to disagree with your insistence on the deterrent force of torture in the Middle Eastern context. *Torture and execution are consequences that any Middle Eastern paramilitary has already taken into account when making his decision to enter combat*: characters like the Ayatollah Khomeini and Saddam Hussein - neither of them shrinking violets when it comes to the infliction of pain - are commonplace over there, and terrorists know that even if the Geneva Convention had legal effect in this conflict, it's rather unlikely to prevent their being brutalized by citizens they have just unsuccessfully tried to destroy with a nail bomb.

I believe that execution is a sufficient deterrent for any sensible person. Any infliction of pain prior to death is thus gratuitous in the sense that it is required by neither justice nor pragmatism. The decision whether to use torture should not be made with reference to the terrorists: they will continue fighting regardless of our decision. The decision should instead be made with reference to reactions of the average non-combatant Iraqi, who simply wants to engage in business and enjoy life with his family but could be spurred to radicalism but tabloid tales of American violence.

As I mentioned before, this is a largely pragmatic disagreement and your viewpoint has merit. If it should become empirically evident that our current judicial methods are a crippling weakness in the Middle Eastern context, I will not be intrinsically opposed to any and all alterations. But until and unless that burden of evidence is met, I'll persist in believing that the PR gain to be had by refraining from torture is immeasurably more valuable than the benefit to be had from engaging in it.

Again, I think we're arguing for two different things. I'll agree with you that the use of torture in these circumstances has been counter-productive and that it is entirely plausible that prisoner mistreatment is a hindering factor in the war in Iraq. I don't think I ever argued to the contrary. My initial argument had to do with the fact that Sullivan and others are arguing from an implicit and unstated moral basis that torture is not a legitimate tool of statecraft, and that I do not believe that they have made that case, nor, Julian, do I believe that you have, not that you've spent much time trying. The argument from Sullivan et al seems to be "torture is always wrong", and I would simply disagree. It isn't always wrong.

But the pragmatic argument is a largely empirical concern, and I'll go with whatever works. If you want to argue that torture is an ineffective method of attaining our goals, I'd probably agree. It certainly doesn't seem to be helping. But if you want to argue that torture is inherently unjustified, I'd object.

Sullivan's argument is very much situated within the current context, which is why I assumed that most of your arguments were oriented toward the Iraq conflict. Sorry about that.

We're in fundamental agreement that the criteria for deciding whether to use torture are primarily pragmatic ones, and that there is no absolute moral bar to its exercise.

But I think we do disagree about the probable efficicacy of torture. I'm inclined to think that almost the only situations where it will be useful are those that precisely mirror the "ticking time-bomb" hypothetical: everywhere else it's going to cause more harm than good.

Unlike Sullivan, then, I don't believe that torture is always wrong. But given the fact that the propriety of its use is a contextual judgment, and that there are few contexts in which it makes pragmatic sense, I am comfortable saying that it is *almost always wrong*, though for extrinsic rather than intrinsic reasons.

Thus we're in agreement in principle, but as a temperamental matter I find that your statements veer uncomfortably close to the Bush administration's tacit "presumption of legality" rule, which is developing a culture within the military which has and will cause us little but harm both within Iraq and abroad.