Torture/Interrogation

I read a lot of comments about the fact that torture isn't a reliable form of intelligence gathering, but I think we're ignoring elements about torturing and deceit in general. Well it's obvious that the tortured will say whatever to stop the torture, but most "good" lies have some truth to them. Any lie that is able to pass the intuition of the torturer (assuming he's a capable one) should have some truth/merit to the statement. That's at least what I think from my leisure research :/

Still I don't think that it should be a primary method of intelligence gathering...

It's what I've been saying this entire fucking thread.

In my opinion: torture merely gets you the quickest answer to make the pain go away. That doesn't necessarily mean you get the truth. And torture is really messy and a pain in the ass to clean up after. Interrogation is similar: you never really know if what they tell you is the truth or some made up lie to get out of that situation.

Flaser and others have pretty much said all I had to say on the subject but, I feel the need to add in a couple studies to further aid the argument.

Study 1

Study 2

Just a couple of studies that show that torture as a method of gathering information is pretty much a waste of time. An article a couple years back from Newsweek has stated that torture can actually hinder the subjects ability to tell the truth.

Torture is simply a way to obtain the partial truth out of people. There are many ways better or worse compared to this method, but usually it depends on the time given. Either way, if one method is justified, so is another, I don't care about the morality topics so if 'nice guy' method is ok, so is torture.

What use is a "partial" truth? There is a high probability that the subject is just telling you what you want to hear, or he's been driven insane by what you've been doing to him. Furthermore, if you spent more time torturing would that not decrees the value of the information? More time spent might increase the likelihood of information being given, but the value of said information would be spotty at best.




So, you're perfectly cool with water-boarding, Psychological torture, the rack, etc, to get faulty information? Also, if one method is ok, that means every method is ok? I have no clue as to how you could logically explain that reasoning.

I disagree with @wayne. If you are going to single out an individual and decide whether or not you are justified in tortureing him based on the situation is bull. Then again I live in the US. Still, unless you live in a 3rd world country where laws are practially just for show, it is still bull: Regardless of the situation torturing another human being is messy and downright cruel. Not to mention as I stated before: inaccurate at best since you get the fastest answer to make the pain go away.

I see everybody saying that torture is unreliable, while i agree with this mostly you cant rule out people who are very good at torture techniques. Not all toture is physical pain only, there are other ways to torture someone such as psycologically and emotionally. Don't get me wrong i don't think torture is the best way. I would rather find a more guarenteed way to get the info truthfully, but sometimes you cant get someone to defect or unknowingly give up info in any other way.

Also to the guy who listed agencies that didnt use torture there really is no way of truly knowing weather they did or not. not every action finds its way into a file.

"If you have money, you live until you pay"
"If you have information, you live until you tell"
Most soldiers go into battle knowing a situation like this might arise. Therefore they all go in preparing to die. However, most soldiers aren't in a Special Force, so that kind of training was never presented.

I think extracting information from torture depends on who the interrogated is. Some will break, some are trained not to break. Either way you're kept alive until the information is proved valid. After that you're disposable.

There are no whole truths in this world. Whatever way you use to extract information, it will always be flawed and partial. It is up to the extractor to authenticate the information and decide whether to act upon it.

I should have put it this way: Remove the humanity part from the discussion, and yes, torture is just another word in the book of extracting information. An option as considerable as the other methods.

However you might try to justify it, torture or no, the subject's privacy, freedom and mind's integrity will be violated in order to extract the information you need. Sweet talking a person instead of torturing him does not make your sins any lighter. If that is the case, if torture was the better way under certain circumstances, might as well do it. Since you do have a million lives to save after all, no?

Most torture has little to do with getting information, even if that's the excusse used. it's about revenge and punishing people you don't like, or that are just different from you. in some cases it's just sadism.

I don't think torture should be allowed. You're treating your captive as something less than human, punishing them in ways both physical and psychological to extract information. The problem with this scenario is that people will say whatever they think you want to hear in order to get it to stop. Note that that doesn't mean it will be correct information, once you break someone they will say anything to please you. A controlled interrogation is fine, like how the police do things, but anything beyond that isn't right. They might be your enemy for whatever reason, but they're still human, everyone has basic human rights that should be respected.

Very true, torture is a completely unreliable method of information gathering... Unless of course you apply the torture to the criminals family. Saying torture is unreliable is false. You just need to know how to torture a specific person and who the torture should be applied to. In reference to torturing prisoners, no it should not be permitted because criminals in prison generally are there for minor crimes no worse than murder. Torture should only be used in the event of a serious national security threat. The ethical points of torture and whether it is allowable should not be taken lightly as torture will generally result in serious scarring of the person it is inflicted upon.

Someone who knows many different torture methods and the weak points of the specific victim doesn't have to worry about breaking the will of the victim. There are more tortures that are not physical or that aren't even applied directly to the criminal out there than there are physical ones most likely. Using torture to extract information isn't about the actual torture method, it's about the scene you implace in the victims mind before the torture is applied. You dont walk up to a terrorist and say you're gonna destroy my city and I cant do anything to prevent it other than hope for the informationm You tell them that regardless of whether they tell you you're going to find out anyway, and you reassure them of this point by displaying your knowledge of their operations to them. Torture on its own is useless but together with knowledge or mind games it can be very powerful.

Well i think torturing for the gain of information is a thing only a pussy/fool would do because they dont know any other way of gaining information. Torturing in case of revenge is another issue.

Well, I think that the traditional means of torture are ineffective. Those just cause pain and suffering, which people will tell anything to stop it.

We need to be creative. Does the prisoner's religion mean a lot to them? Make them eat something outlawed. Does the prisoner has a disease? Don't give them medicine.

Does the prisoner like music?

Make them listen to this:

[spoiler=absolute torture][/spoiler]

Anyone who thinks torture is an effective way of extracting information from an individual is deluding themselves. "Pretty sure" that they know something is not a valid excuse for torture.

Articles were provided by users in earlier posts, read them.

[font=Verdana][color=green]"Traditional means of torture"? And what, all news forms of torture are cutting edge and use new technology, to give the torture victim as little pain as possible?

Torture is torture. End of. The only difference between physical and mental torture is that the physical torture bears scars that people can see.

More onto Teg's point; there's no valid excuse/justification for torture at all. It's against Human Rights, which means it's illegal. And thus, has no valid excuse/justification.

SamRavster: Do humans have rights when they deny the rights of another human being? I realize that statement can be misconstrued, but really? Torture is torture, no matter who is doing it. The only difference is what effect it has afterward.