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Originally Posted by tomder55

No relativism involved here since we believe that the treatment involved is not immoral.But equating a cold room ,loud music,pushing someone against a fake wall, or making someone think they are going to drown ...with torture is the worst kind of moral relativism.What you guys are doing is dumbing down torture to any method of interrogation technique that gets someone the say something they did not intend to reveal willingly .

I have asked before and have not gotten a satisfactory answer from the people who condemn these techniques. Beyond tea and crumpets...what interrogation methods would you permit on someone like KSM who was a key planner in AQ attacks?

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I realise that you yourself are not "pro-torture" as it were, but rather you seem to disagree on what the correct definition of "torture" is. Hence I did not single you out. Also I did not make myself clear enough, in that I was talking about those in the survey shown by speechless, not those on this board. They were not asked "what is torture", but rather "when is torture justified". As to the YouTube link, someone else has already pointed out that the respondents were actually asked about "enhanced interrogation", not "torture". Whether "enhanced interrogation" is in fact a metaphor for "torture" is a different question.

All that aside, defining torture as something that is different to your own definition is not relativism at all. A moral relativist says "there are no objective moral truths", and it is in fact a superior position. A common misconception is that the relativist is somehow excluded from making categorical moral judgments, as though bound by some "law of relativism". This is a mistake, and misses the point altogether. When I say "torture is always wrong", what I am really saying is "AS FAR AS I AM CONCERNED, torture is categorically wrong,". Further to this, when I say "waterboarding is always a form of torture", what I am saying is that "as far as I am concerned......etc".

Now, if one were to say "waterboarding is not torture under any circumstances", they would be making a categorical statement, and may or may not hold to a relativist position. The same would be true if someone said the complete opposite. However, if someone were to say "waterboarding is only torture if......", they would by necessity be making a RELATIVE moral judgment, in that the act of waterboarding may be considered as being right or wrong, depending on the RELATIVE conditions.

As for the objection you raise about "equating a cold room etc,.... to torture", again this is about definition of terms. Of course there are varying degrees of torture, with some forms being a lot worse than others, much like there are varying degrees of child abuse. In many countries it is considered to be abuse if a child is denied medical treatment due to religious grounds, in others it is not. As far as "enhanced interrogation" goes, I think you will find that the majority of law experts, judges, human rights organizations, ethicists, etc, believe that it IS torture, and as it happens, so do I. There are many fine law enforcment organizations worldwide that achieve fantastic results without the use of such methods, in fact most of them see it as being counter productive.

I don't know... killing is worse than torture which is worse than aggressive interrogation. But we accept killing the bad guys because we absolutely believe we are the good guys. Perhaps that is really where the difference between absolutes and relativism lies.

Obama gets on his high horse about us losing our moral compass because someone who we got valuable intel from got wet. But he loses no sleep at night while unmanned drones perform executions of the enemy under his orders . I guess it is OK that we assassinate based on intel that was obtained without causing us moral angst.

I have no doubt that there is a healthy debate to be had about which interrogation techniques work better.. I'm sure those law enforcement people from other nations often have all the time in the world on their sides and can wear the subject down slowly with kindness.
As I have noted elsewhere the reason these methods were adopted was because of the intel gap that we found ourselves in after the attacks on 9-11... intel gaps which were in no small part due to the thought that the war against jihadistan was a law enforcement exercise.
I give you as an example Obama's man at DNI Dennis Blair (from the redacted portion of his comments ) :

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"High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the Al Qaeda organization that was attacking this country."

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But... as far as effectiveness goes... I think Wrechard at Belmont Club said it best .

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When I ran safehouses in the anti-Marcos days the first order of business whenever a cell member was captured by the police was to alert the surviving members, move the safehouse and destroy all links to the captured person. That's because everyone knew that there was a great probability that the captive would talk under duress, however great his bravery and resistance. Nobody I know, or have heard of who has had experience in real-life situations has ever said, “our cell should continue as usual and the safehouse should remain open, despite the fact that one of our own is being tortured by the secret police, because I read in the New York Times that coercion never works.”

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Belmont Club » Terrorism and moral torture

I understand where you are coming from tomder55, however I feel that it is unfair to compare to compare the killing of an enemy combatant that is "in theatre" so to speak, with the mistreatment of one who has been captured, and thus taken "out of theatre". Again this all comes down to what is defined as "mistreatment" or "torture".

Although it is no doubt true that useful information was obtained through using these techniques, it does not follow that the information could not have been obtained through other means. There are many ways that information can be obtained that don't even involve interrogation, "enhanced" or not. Please note that this does not mean I believe no interrogation should take place at all.

As far as Wrechards comments go, it is my understanding that the measures he described are common practice worldwide, threat of torture or no. In fact it is my understanding that it would usually occur as soon as a member disappeared, whether it was known that they were in custody to or not. One basically has to assume the worst, and the chance that a network could be rolled up is simply too great a risk.

In any case, I doubt you are suggesting that the methods used by said secret police are acceptable means of gaining information. Even if they were more effective than the more advanced methods available to U.S intelligence gatherers, a proposition of which I am highly dubious, I would still find them to be abhorent, and I have a suspicion that you would to.

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

Interesting question.

I wonder what the demographics are for churchgoers... what percentage are Dems vs. Reps. If, as I suspect, most frequent churchgoers are Republicans, then the issue of enhanced interrogation has nothing to do with whether they go to church, but rather is a function of their conservative leanings. It just so happens that people with conservative leanings tend to go to church more often.
Elliot

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My guess is there has to be some kind of corelation between church goes and the acceptance of torure.Since this is a scientific poll not a study I am not sure if they can test for it

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

It's sort of like asking why more people with Southern accents drink mint juleps than those with Northern accents. It just so happens that a mint julep is a regional drink based in the south. More Southerners drink it. Therefore, most of the people who drink it will have a Southern accent. The fact of an accent is not the determining factor over who drinks mint juleps. The accent is a function of region, and region is the deciding factor on who drinks mint juleps.

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I think the conclusion you are jumping to here has no basis.As I said before if we had a scientific study we could be more sure

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

Similarly, churchgoing is not the deciding factor on who supports enhanced interrogation techniques. Political affiliation is the deciding factor, and it just so happens that Conservatives are the political group that is more likely to go to church regularly.

In other words, there is no cause and effect relationship between churchgoing and support of enhanced interrogations. There IS a relationship between CONSERVATISM and support of enhanced interrogations.

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Where re you getting all this from?? Are you lloking at the same poll that I am?
I'm not going to get into the question of whether the enhanced interrogations constitute "torture" or not, because that is beyond the scope of the question.

Hope this answers your question.

Elliot[/QUOTE]

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Originally Posted by tomder55

I don't know ...killing is worse than torture which is worse than aggressive interrogation. But we accept killing the bad guys because we absolutely believe we are the good guys. Perhaps that is really where the difference between absolutes and relativism lies.

Obama gets on his high horse about us losing our moral compass because someone who we got valuable intel from got wet. But he loses no sleep at night while unmanned drones perform executions of the enemy under his orders . I guess it is ok that we assassinate based on intel that was obtained without causing us moral angst.

I have no doubt that there is a healthy debate to be had about which interrogation techniques work better ..I'm sure those law enforcement people from other nations often have all the time in the world on their sides and can wear the subject down slowly with kindness.
As I have noted elsewhere the reason these methods were adopted was because of the intel gap that we found ourselves in after the attacks on 9-11 ....intel gaps which were in no small part due to the thought that the war against jihadistan was a law enforcement exercise.
I give you as an example Obama's man at DNI Dennis Blair (from the redacted portion of his comments ) :

But ... as far as effectiveness goes.....I think Wrechard at Belmont Club said it best .

Belmont Club » Terrorism and moral torture

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You are sure there was a healthy debate, and why might one ask you were so sure.There is no information that supports this.Maybe you had a feeling deep inside that really there was a discussion.That put aside you say other countries have all the time in the world to deal with terrorist, may I point out to you israel and india, or do you think america is the only country in the world.Might want to invest in a map of the world, it will broaden your horizons exponentially, I promise

I'll test my knowledge of the world and against yours any day and certainly the use of the English language. I am cetainly aware that the US is not the only country in the world battling jihadistan .Are you suggesting to me that the 2 countries that you mention have dealt with terrorist using the Marquis of Queensbury rules ? Maybe you should invest in a history book.

I said : (look closely )
I have no doubt that there is a healthy debate to be had about which interrogation techniques work better . No where is there an implication in that comment that the debate has taken place yet.

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Originally Posted by tomder55

I'll test my knowlege of the world and against yours any day and certainly the use of the English language. I am cetainly aware that the US is not the only country in the world battling jihadistan .Are you suggesting to me that the 2 countries that you mention have dealt with terrorist using the Marquis of Queensbury rules ? Maybe you should invest in a history book.

I said : (look closely )
I have no doubt that there is a healthy debate to be had about which interrogation techniques work better . No where is there an implication in that comment that the debate has taken place yet.

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What we have here is a public forum, meaning a lot of people from around the world can participate in this discusion,now for some people english is not their first languages, wow isn't that a surprise.So what did you learn today 1) America is not the only country in the world and secound that there are other languages spoken in the world.

[QUOTE=tomder55;1717618]
I'm sure those law enforcement people from other nations often have all the time in the world on their sides and can wear the subject down slowly with kindness.
/QUOTE]

This is what you had said in a previous post and my answer was isreal and india have to deal with this kind of threat everyday and yet they donot employ torture as a means of gaining information.

I think we all know America isn't the only country in the world and English isn't the only language. Many of us even recognize the condescension in that charge which seems to be a favorite among liberals. And speaking of favorites among liberals, another was complaining of Bush air raiding villages and bombing civilians, which seems much harsher than this alleged "torture."

So what does Obama do? He air raids villages and bombs civilians.

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Police fired on rock-throwing protesters angry over civilian deaths they blamed on American bombing runs in western Afghanistan, a local official said Thursday, as the U.S. military rushed a team to the site to investigate.

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Let's hear the outrage, you guys need to be consistent. But it won't come, just like I'm hearing nothing about any of the other Bush era policies he's continuing.

Update: Obama himself made that complaint.

In the OP, it would have been much fairer if the first word "Why" were not there.

It presupposes an allegation not proven.

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Originally Posted by speechlesstx

I think we all know America isn't the only country in the world and English isn't the only language. Many of us even recognize the condescension in that charge which seems to be a favorite among liberals. And speaking of favorites among liberals, another was complaining of Bush air raiding villages and bombing civilians, which seems much harsher than this alleged "torture."

So what does Obama do? He air raids villages and bombs civilians.



Let's hear the outrage, you guys need to be consistent. But it won't come, just like I'm hearing nothing about any of the other Bush era policies he's continuing.

Update: Obama himself made that complaint.

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What are you going on about?? I am not a liberal, read the question it says why church goers not why liberals.If you want to have a discusiion as to why liberals do what they do please start a new thread

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Originally Posted by Leviston

What are you going on about??? i am not a liberal, read the question it says why church goers not why liberals.If you want to have a discusiion as to why liberals do what they do please start a new thread

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You didn't like the answer I gave you.

Churchgoers are predominantly Conservative. Conservatives are predominanly in favor of enhanced interrogations. For some reason, though, you want to equate "church attendance" with being in favor of torture without any of the intervening steps.

Elliot

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Originally Posted by ETWolverine

You didn't like the answer I gave you.

Churchgoers are predominantly Conservative. Conservatives are predominanly in favor of enhanced interrogations. For some reason, though, you want to equate "church attendance" with being in favor of torture without any of the intervening steps.

Elliot

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What data do you have that backs this up, I have seen none.?. I am not the one equating that church goers favor torture, cnn and gallop pool is.

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Originally Posted by Leviston

So you are saying the sample size is not a true representation of the population.DO you know how scientific pools are conducted,Do you even know what a p value is.

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In fact I do. You see I'm in the medical field and studies are published daily. In a paper they have in introduction giving a short summary of prior studies and an important question. Next is methodology. In this part a control population is as close as possible to the case population as possible except in the one variable in question. This is to eliminate as many confounding factors as possible.

For example, if one were to do a study on church attendance versus heart attacks, you have to control, or make sure each population has the same percentage of heart risk factors. These known risk factors include , age, diabetes, smoking, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, gender and family history. You can't say that church goers have higher rates of heart attacks if you have twice the rate of smoking and high cholesterol in the church goers.

Likewise in this pew study we don't know other poentially confounding factors.
Did the church goers polled personally know someone who died on 9/11? Are they more likely to be military affiliated? Do they view America more favorably than non-churchgoers? Are they more conservative? Are they older [ WW2 generation ]?
All these factors can skew the poll at the outset, and thus invalidate the conclusion that is drawn.

As to P-value, in the medical literature <0.01 is the gold standard.
p-value - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




You may note on post #7 my biblically based answer to the question of torture.







G&P