More wisdom from Sam Harris. This time in defense of torture.

[Crunchy Frog]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sam-harris/in-defense-of-torture_b_8993.html

It's nice to see Sam Harris providing unequivocal evidence that you don't need religion to come up with justifications for atrocities. Imagine "logical" and "rational" processes leading to this sort of thinking.

If our intuition about the wrongness of torture is born of an aversion to how people generally behave while being tortured, we should note that this particular infelicity could be circumvented pharmacologically, because paralytic drugs make it unnecessary for screaming ever to be heard or writhing seen.

I wouldn't normally bring this up in the R/T forum, except that so many here seem to regard him as a hero and a font of wisdom and morality.

I'm not a great fan of religion myself, but I've always been singularly unimpressed by Harris's wholesale condemnation of it, even in its most liberal and tolerant forms.

I'd be interested to know if any of the liberal religious people on this board feel an inclination to "be convinced of the 'danger and illegitimacy' of their core beliefs" by someone whose worldview allows him to advocate the use of torture.

I'd be interested in hearing what Sam Harris's admirers think about this particular line of reasoning of his. Why should I think that rejection of religion confers some sort of moral authority? Can anybody here tell me why I should regard him as morally superior to someone like Martin Luther King Jr.?

As I've said, I'm not a religious person, but I do object to the wholesale condemnation and scapegoating of religion that Sam Harris seems to engage in. It's true that religion is often used to justify atrocities, but they clearly can be just as easily justified without recourse to religion.

[greyl]

1. It's ultimately an anti-war piece, emotionally.

I think he's waging an intellectual argument with our society at large as evidenced by our invasion of the mid-east.

Harris's final words in the essay:

"Which way should the balance swing? Assuming that we want to maintain a coherent ethical position on these matters, this appears to be a circumstance of forced choice: if we are willing to drop bombs, or even risk that rifle rounds might go astray, we should be willing to torture a certain class of criminal suspects and military prisoners; if we are unwilling to torture, we should be unwilling to wage modern war."

and earlier:

I hope my case for torture is wrong, as I would be much happier standing side by side with all the good people who oppose torture categorically. I invite any reader who discovers a problem with my argument to point it out to me in the comment section of this blog. I would be sincerely grateful to have my mind changed on this subject.

[saltpoint]

3. A very good point, but still. It's quite a difficult posture to accept

for one's government.

(Not putting the blame on you, but on Harris' general conclusions.)

[greyl]

4. Yes, immediately emotionally repugnant, yet

rationally sound under consideration, I think. And rationally sound on the virtue of empathy with human lives. If we decided to have the choice between losing 2 lives or 1 life, I think it'd would be hard to make an emotional argument that 2 lives are less important than 1.

It's key that he doesn't want to be confused with advocating the torture that our military is engaged in today. The argument he constructed (in 2005) is considering a purely hypothetical pill. Non-violent torture.

(Is it possible that, that among things, he's pointing out that we all are accepting the Iraq invasion in a Sartesian existentialist sort of way?)





edit: now I see a thread in LBN titled "Scientists 'should be allowed to test on apes'" :(
I'm done with thinking for the night. :)

[saltpoint]

5. Possibly. I do see the distinction, but stumble over the idea of

torture as a planned instrument, a frame of reference by someone who holds power over someone who does not.

The Abu Ghraib photographs were globally transmitted via the web and other media, and suggested a betrayal of principle as much as a more immediate, repellent action taken against the helpless.

I'm definitely partisan on this, admittedly. Politically partisan and psychologically bent toward Geronimo's brave bands against Crook and Miles, toward the anonymous prisoners Amnesty International attempts to free, toward the dissenters and intellectuals sent into exile because their governments wanted their voices silenced.

There is a time for a table-clearing, back-of-the-hand rescue from a frame of reference that involves planned physical assault in the name of the State.

I'm not sure but that this is one of those times.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. I think you're giving Harris too much benefit of the doubt

He does advocate the current torture:

Given the damage we were willing to cause to the bodies and minds of innocent children in Afghanistan and Iraq, our disavowal of torture in the case of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed seems perverse. If there is even one chance in a million that he will tell us something under torture that will lead to the further dismantling of Al Qaeda, it seems that we should use every means at our disposal to get him talking.

And I disagree that it is a generally anti-war piece:

The only way to rule out collateral damage would be to refuse to fight wars under any circumstances. As a foreign policy, this would leave us with something like the absolute pacifism of Gandhi. While pacifism in this form can constitute a direct confrontation with injustice (and requires considerable bravery), it is only applicable to a limited range of human conflicts. Where it is not applicable, it is seems flagrantly immoral. We would do well to reflect on Gandhi’s remedy for the Holocaust: he believed that the Jews should have committed mass suicide, because this “would have aroused the world and the people of Germany to Hitler’s violence.” We might wonder what a world full of pacifists would have done once it had grown “aroused”—commit suicide as well? There seems no question that if all the good people in the world adopted Gandhi’s ethics, the thugs would inherit the earth.

He is arguing there is such a thing as a just war, if it is in defence of 'good' people; and that therefore the willingness to kill someone should mean a willingness to torture them too. It's a utilitarian argument - that physical pain and psychological suffering of a few suspected terrorists is worth exchanging for the possible saving of innocent lives. There also seems to be a judgmental side to it - the suffering of people who have caused harm matters less.

If we knew that the torture had guaranteed results that couldn't be produced in other ways, then he'd have a better argument, I think - just as you can justify shooting someone if they are aiming a gun at someone with apparent intent to shoot, you can justify causing someone pain to force them to drop a knife. But the problem with his argument is the "if there is even one chance in a million" part - we don't know if torture will produce any useful information, but he's willing to try it just in case. This institutionalises torture as 'another line of inquiry'. And in reality, terrorists do not get captured with information that can be used to prevent bombings. At best, their fellow terrorists have to change their plans, which they would do anyway, without torture - because other means of interrogation (befriending them and turning them is held to be most reliable) exist.

[greyl]

28. That's quite possible, however...

I'm honestly trying to wring out his argument. He never argues that the current invasion of the mid-east is justified, does he? Does he ever claim that the torture our military is involved in is successful? His argument is not that torture works.

"It's a utilitarian argument - that physical pain and psychological suffering of a few suspected terrorists is worth exchanging for the possible saving of innocent lives."

My take is that he's talking about known terrorists not suspected terrorists as our government refers to the masses at Guantanamo or Abu Ghraib. He specifically mentions Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

If you and I ever agreed that a particular war with all it's unavoidable collateral damage were justified, what grounds would we have to disallow successful torture as a means to save lives? I don't know. It's difficult for me to imagine justified fatal collateral damage, and similarly difficult for me to imagine how non-fatal, non-disfiguring, non-crippling interrogation (Harris's hypothetical pill) of the figureheads of the enemy is less ethical than causing the collateral damage.

The fact that Harris refers to Gandhi's emotionally shocking pacifist solution(a la Sartre) to the Holocaust is keeping his "pro-torture" argument in context.

One of the first things I thought of when reading Harris's essay are the difficult hypothetical ethical dilemas involving stabbing a child to death in order to save hundreds of lives. I doubt than any of us wouldn't recoil in horror at the idea of stabbing a child to death, but rationally however, I doubt that any of us would say it wasn't for the greatest good. Especially if someone else was doing the stabbing.
In Harris's argument, using his imaginary pill, nobody is doing the stabbing.

Another thing that came to mind is that there are degrees of torture in the real world, and that most parents and many teachers have no trouble justifying them. "Stand in the corner with your nose to the wall", "stay in your room until you tell me where you got those cigarettes" etc...

To make my position clear: I don't justify the current invasion of the mid-east or any torture that our military is involved in today to further that invasion.

edit: how much weight do you think we should give to the summation lines of the essay?:

"Assuming that we want to maintain a coherent ethical position on these matters, this appears to be a circumstance of forced choice: if we are willing to drop bombs, or even risk that rifle rounds might go astray, we should be willing to torture a certain class of criminal suspects and military prisoners; if we are unwilling to torture, we should be unwilling to wage modern war."

I think it's the most important part and that the answer is "we aren't willing to wage modern war".

[muriel_volestrangler]

34. No, I think Harris is perfectly willing to wage modern war

and he's willing to have people tortured too. That's what the last paragraph is about. He lays out his reasons for regarding some wars as necessary, and claims that torture too is sometimes needed.

He says this is "an argument for the use of torture in rare circumstances". Unless you can point to some reason to think the whole article is satire in the spirit of "A Modest Proposal", and that Harris is actually an absolute pacifist who thinks no war is ever justified after all, we should take it at face value - he wants some people tortured, in some circumstances, such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. No, he isn't supporting torture at Guantanamo - he's supporting it at Diego Garcia, or wherever Mohammed is being held. Mohammed is, still, a suspected terrorist - there's been no trial, and no court has passed a sentence of torture on him. He doesn't claim that the military torture is successful - just that if there's a one in a million chance of it being so, it's justified on Mohammed. Whether it's the US military, or the CIA, that has been torturing him is a minor point, and one we don't have the information for anyway.

His hypothetical 'torture pill' is just a way of decreasing the 'dehumanisation' of the torturer. It's also a bit of wishful thinking - we may as well imagine a pill that gives someone a good ethical system, so that they willingly tell us what we need to know to prevent the terrorist acts. There, I've just shown that torture is unnecessary. OK, not really, but it's as valid a point as Harris' imaginary pill.

Harris seems to be saying that purpose counts for nothing. Injuring or killing people who don't pose a threat to others is undesirable, but we accept a certain amount as 'collateral damage'; so he says we ought to regard harming a certain number of innocent people on purpose in the same spirit. It's just not the attitude that our society takes, that's all; we know that people will be injured and killed in traffic accidents next year, but we wouldn't accept someone tying a person, even a convicted criminal, into a car to do crash tests on a new airbag. Neither would we accept forcibly removing a kidney from a suspected murderer. We don't condone doing harm on purpose, just because it helps some way. It's only accepted when there is no other way of preventing known violence.

[saltpoint]

2. I try very hard not to be a one-issue voter. There is a smallness to it,

and I strive for the wide screen, even if I personally fall short of its higher standard.

I don't like several votes of some Democrats one bit, but would still vote for them over George Allen, THE CAT BUTCHER, Romney, Giuliani, and so forth down the grocery list of GOP hacks and psychos.

But on the subject of torture, I believe that the memoranda now-AG Gonzales drafted to Bush regarding the "quaintness" of the Geneva convention's prohibitions against torture are singularly horrifying.

It's not about party or politics. It's just dead wrong.

And the Bush administration is to blame for the resurgence of rationalizing like Harris'.

Bush has been comparing himself to Harry Truman lately.

I think that's more than a bit of a reach.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

7. I've been reading some of his books from the library

now that I'm on summer break, and I will be honest. It feels sometimes like I am reading the thoughts of a person with a mental illness. He makes enormous leaps and expects the reader to follow.

[Finder]

12. "He makes enormous leaps and expects the reader to follow."

Unlike religious texts that make perfect logical sense.:crazy:

Sorry, couldn't resist. Could you cite a specific leap of logic?

I think he tends to challenge the reader at times by his lack of political correctness--heck, I agree with him mostly and even I get angered at times.

I like writers who are able to spark emotion and deep thought in the reader.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. Well, now, comparing him to

religious texts would be a low bar, indeed.

There were times he made me a bit angry, but by the end of the book I was thinking "I believe this fellow is a card short of a full deck."

I don't have time at the moment to go back to the library and get the book again, but it would be a fun debate. Maybe we should have a few more threads just on some of his writing. Although they tend to be flamefests.

[Crunchy Frog]

14. I hope you will post on your impressions of his books.

I don't have the inclination to read them myself. There's too much stuff out there that I find infuriating, and it tends to take too much out of me to read it myself. I am interested in seeing your take on them though. I would hope that the discussion would remain in the plane of debating ideas rather than turning into a flame-fest. That may be too much to expect though.

[beam me up scottie]

8. Exactly who "regard(s) him as a hero and a font of wisdom and morality" ?

Why do some people have to invent straw men to justify their premise?

That was a hypothetical question, by the way.

I wouldn't normally bring this up in the R/T forum, except that so many here seem to regard him as a hero and a font of wisdom and morality.

Right.

[Crunchy Frog]

9. I apologize for the hyperbole of last night's OP.

It was late and I was not at my most coherent. I will rephrase it by saying that I've seen what appears to me to be a degree of uncritical admiration for the man on this forum. Running an advance search with the keywords "Sam Harris" turned up 60 threads not including this one. His books and essays are promoted with a high enough degree here that I felt it worthwhile to present a different side of the coin.

I didn't go out looking for dirt on Sam Harris. Someone else posted a link to this essay in GD last night, and I was frankly shocked. I posted it here because I thought it would probably provoke more interest and discussion on this forum than on GD, and because I find any defense or attempted justification of torture to be horrifying, particularly when it comes from someone ostensibly on our side.

[beam me up scottie]

10. Thank you.

I thought it was uncharacteristic of you.

Except for that one sentence, I see nothing at all wrong with holding anybody, religious or not, up for scrutiny in this forum.

Or any other forum, for that matter.




Having said that, Sam Harris and I see eye to eye on a lot of things.

[Crunchy Frog]

15. Thank you.

I hope the ideas can be discussed without descending to flames. I admit I was feeling a bit inflamed last night.

[beam me up scottie]

16. I hope so too.

He's right on target about a lot of things.

But some people won't listen to anything the man has to say because he's been vilified and branded as a christian basher by the religious reich.

[Finder]

11. Nobody is saying he is morally superior...

nor does he claim to be. If you disagree with him, post the flaw in his argument.

[varkam]

17. Having read the book...

I think his writing is that of a genuinely intelligent individual who makes a lot of good points, and a few I strongly disagree with. For instance, I tend to think that Bush isn't much better than a 1st world Hussein. Harris, however, disagrees. Another thing I disagree with Harris on is the notion he has that religious moderates are the ultimate obstacle in our quest to world peace. I think it can sometimes be the case, however; for example, if I call a fundie out on hate rhetoric and then a moderate calls me out and says "Hey! You have to be tolerant, fella! You're not respecting his beliefs, and by extension my own - though mine are not nearly as radical." Then it can become a problem. I don't think moderates are the core of the problem. If there were no moderates (just atheists and fundamentalist theists) then it would be easier to stage the fight, but the problem would still be there. The core of the problem is fundamentalism, in my estimation. Religious moderates rarely feel so certain in their god to kill others over it - fundamentalists habitually do.

Beyond that, he does make some very good points about religion in general and how the whole argument that atheists can't have morals is simply preposterous. "The bible no more informs on morality than a mathematics textbook informs on geometry" is a passage that comes to mind. In other words, morality is external from both the bible and god.

More than that, organized religion is, fundamentally speaking, divisive. It's just basic psychology. Organized religion is nothing more than a group of people sharing similar beliefs and traditions. Obviously, there is more than one such group in the world. Any time you have multiple groups whose characteristics are at odds with one another, there will always be in-group solidarity vs. out-group hostility. The levels of these, however, depend largely on the religion in question and upon the individuals members of the group.

But I digress. Harris' book was a mixture of philosophy of mind, socio-political commentary (some of which was off-base, IMHO), and objections to religion. I wouldn't call myself a "Sam Harris admirer" nor would I say that Harris believes (at least in my reading) that rejection of religion confers moral superiority. I generally think that religious beliefs and the morality of an individual have a correlation of exactly 0.0. Needless to say, I don't think one should regard him as morally superior to MLK Jr. He may be, for all I know.

I think Harris' main point was not a rejection of religion, but of unjustified belief (i.e. belief for which there is no evidence). He does mention some of the communistic regimes and noted that their justification did not come from religion, but from unjustified belief in certain forms of "social darwinism".

[TallahasseeGrannie]

18. I also think he has some valid points but

here is where we part ways. He believes religion to be the greatest societal problem today. I believe that religion satisfies a tribal behavior and without it, some other sort of grouping would occur. Gang activity around the country proves that point. It is violent and deadly, with 350 deaths in LA in 2003 alone. And for every death it is estimated that 3-4 gunshot injuries related to gangs were seen in ER's in LA. And that is just LA. This is a higher rate of death than in Iraq.

Gangs are not related to religion at all. There are similarities, of course, but they are not religions.

I also don't buy his concept that moderate members of religious communities are to blame. I also believe that if there was ever any sort of movement to eliminate religion, those moderates would become much LESS moderate.

His insistence that we eliminate religion is unrealistic, in my opinion, and it doesn't work within the problem. You can't take a long-time human behavior and eliminate it completely. You can modify, legislate it but you can't just clean house and start over. I think that the Russian Revolution proved that fairly well. It looked great on paper but it didn't pan out in reality. And this concept is one that the "left" sometimes has a difficult time with. Utopia cannot be achieved.

[immoderate]

39. Tribal groups enforce behavior without religion.

You could take the opposite view on the same evidence. When civilization existed in tribal sized groups, it was not necessary to invoke religion to moderate behaviors. Direct social pressures would be all that is necessary in groups that number in the hundreds.

In tribal groups, religion had the purpose of explaining origins and natural events, not enforcing rules of behavior. No rules of civility applied when encountering other tribes. This is clear from the Old Testament. God has no problem with the Hebrews wiping out other tribes.

Religion as a social moderator, comes into its own when larger groups, where citizens don't actually know each other, need to be socialized.

Note that gangs don't shoot their own members, but members of other gangs. Without religion, as you point out, they still have their own internal code. Killing members of rival gangs is absolutely compatible with scripture.

--IMM

[ozone_man]

19. Here is the place to start.

Ask yourself whether it is ever acceptable to torture someone.

If bombs seem too impersonal an evil, picture your seven-year-old daughter being slowly asphyxiated in a warehouse just five minutes away, while the man in your custody holds the keys to her release. If your daughter won’t tip the scales, then add the daughters of every couple for a thousand miles—millions of little girls have, by some perverse negligence on the part of our government, come under the control of an evil genius who now sits before you in shackles. Clearly, the consequences of one person’s uncooperativeness can be made so grave, and his malevolence and culpability so transparent, as to stir even a self-hating moral relativist from his dogmatic slumbers.

If you answer yes, then Sam has made his point that there are conditions under which torture may be acceptable. The rest is just determining which set of circumstances are acceptable to employ torture.

[okasha]

20. And if the answer is no,

Sam Harris is a moral monster, no different from Albert Gonzalez or George Bush.

[ozone_man]

21. If the answer is no,

then you are in disgreement obviously. But I suspect also that you don't have any daughters. ;) Or, maybe you do and would would choose not to save them, which is a difficult decision to make. No right or wrong in my opinion.

I think he used that analogy, simply to make a more emotional case. Another scenario is stopping a terrorist who has called in a nuclear bomb threat for a major city. Would torture be acceptable in that case? If it meant saving a million lives?

I don't condone torture, but there may be situations where it is acceptable. The rules of modern warfare are different than they used to be. It is now possible for one terrorist to kill a thousand or even a million people.

[okasha]

22. The commission of evil for a greater good

was the Inquisition's and the Gestapo's excuse for torturing and murdering those they considered dangerous to their societies. If it was wrong for them--I assume you believe it was wrong for the Inquisition to burn "heretics" and for the Gestapo to exterminate Jews--why would it be any less wrong for us?

[ozone_man]

25. You haven't answered the "ticking bomb" case.

Are you going to let a whole city die at the hands of a a terrorist? Time is running out. It's an ethical choice, not an easy one by any means.

How do we justify the "collateral" damage in warfare of tens of thousands of lives, thousands of them children, yet we struggle over the ethics involved of torturing a suspected terrorist involved in the war. This is the question he's asking. People hardly raise an eyebrow to the daily slaughter that's going on. It's out of sight, out of mind.

So we can now ask, if we are willing to act in a way that guarantees the misery and death of some considerable number of innocent children, why spare the rod with known terrorists? I find it genuinely bizarre that while the torture of Osama bin Laden himself could be expected to provoke convulsions of conscience among our leaders, the perfectly foreseeable (and therefore accepted) slaughter of children does not. What is the difference between pursuing a course of action where we run the risk of inadvertently subjecting some innocent men to torture, and pursuing one in which we will inadvertently kill far greater numbers of innocent men, women, and children? Rather, it seems obvious that the misapplication of torture should be far less troubling to us than collateral damage: there are, after all, no infants interned at Guantanamo Bay. Torture need not even impose a significant risk of death or permanent injury on its victims; while the collaterally damaged are, almost by definition, crippled or killed. The ethical divide that seems to be opening up here suggests that those who are willing to drop bombs might want to abduct the nearest and dearest of suspected terrorists—their wives, mothers, and daughters—and torture them as well, assuming anything profitable to our side might come of it. Admittedly, this would be a ghastly result to have reached by logical argument, and we will want to find some way of escaping it. But there seems no question that accidentally torturing an innocent man is better than accidentally blowing him and his children to bits.

In this context, we should note that many variables influence our feelings about an act of physical violence. The philosopher Jonathan Glover points out that “in modern war, what is most shocking is a poor guide to what is most harmful.” To learn that one’s grandfather flew a bombing mission over Dresden in the Second World War is one thing; to hear that he killed five little girls and their mother with a shovel is another. We can be sure that he would have killed many more women and girls by dropping bombs from pristine heights, and they are likely to have died equally horrible deaths, but his culpability would not appear the same. There is much to be said about the disparity here, but the relevance to the ethics of torture should be obvious. If you think that the equivalence between torture and collateral damage does not hold, because torture is up close and personal while stray bombs aren’t, you stand convicted of a failure of imagination on at least two counts: first, a moment’s reflection on the horrors that must have been visited upon innocent Afghanis and Iraqis by our bombs will reveal that they are on par with those of any dungeon. If our intuition about the wrongness of torture is born of an aversion to how people generally behave while being tortured, we should note that this particular infelicity could be circumvented pharmacologically, because paralytic drugs make it unnecessary for screaming ever to be heard or writhing seen. We could easily devise methods of torture that would render a torturer as blind to the plight of his victims as a bomber pilot is at thirty thousand feet. Consequently, our natural aversion to the sights and sounds of the dungeon provide no foothold for those who would argue against the use of torture.

[bluesbassman]

29. Not so much an ethical choice, as it is of self defense.

As in the scenario cited earlier with the little girls. Faced with clear and compelling evidence that an individual holds crucial information related to a SPECIFIC event that will cause the death of ANY number of people, and where said individual refuses to reveal that information, then it becomes a matter of self defense or self preservation requiring the use of as much force as necessary to obtain the information. But we have to be prepared to accept the consequences associated with the use of torture, whether it is "justified" and produces the desired results or not. I'll expand on this last thought further on.

However, in the case of "suspected" terrorists, who may or may not have information that fits the aforementioned criteria, there is an additional factor that Harris does not address. That is the "blow back" created from the use of torture as an interrogation tool. We'll surely never know what the statistics are for number of new terrorists created in response to the use of torture as an intelligence gathering tool, but I'd lay odds that the number is significant.

Personally, I would not hesitate to use any form of force to save my daughter or loved one from harm. But I'm prepared to suffer the consequences for my actions. Unfortunately governments, and especially bush and his cabal, are not. In fact, we have seen how they have preeminently established legal opinions that not only absolve them from culpability, but form oversight as well. It's way too slippery of a slope to allow government to possess even tacit approval of the use of torture as a routine tool.

[beam me up scottie]

31. You're becoming one of my favorite posters, bluesbassman.

Very impressive insight, as usual.

I appreciate your honesty.

The issue is not as black and white as some people would have us believe, is it?

[trotsky]

55. Very, very good writeup of the distinction.

I agree with bmus above. Nice stuff, bluesbassman.

[okasha]

30. See Buffy's post below

Are you going to let a whole city die at the hands of a a terrorist? Time is running out. It's an ethical choice, not an easy one by any means.

If "time is running out," then the terrorist has only to (a) resist torture for a short time or (b) tell his torturers that the bomb will go off in Peoria in 45 minutes and sit back and relax till the bomb goes off in Chicago in half an hour. These "ticking bomb" scenarios all assume that the terrorist will break immediately or is woefully stupid. Neither is likely to be the case.

How do we justify the "collateral" damage in warfare of tens of thousands of lives, thousands of them children, yet we struggle over the ethics involved of torturing a suspected terrorist involved in the war. This is the question he's asking. People hardly raise an eyebrow to the daily slaughter that's going on. It's out of sight, out of mind.

Who's "we"? Speak for yourself.

[ozone_man]

36. Start with several assumptions.

The starting point is to examine a hypothetical, ideal case and go from there.

Assumptions:

1) The city will definitely blow up if the bomb is not disarmed.

2) The method of torture is sure to work, resistance is futile. The terrorist is guaranteed to tell the truth. This may be considered as Harris' "truth pill" or the truth serum so often used in spy movies.

3) There is enough time to extract the necessary information to save the city.

What do you do? Wait for the city to blow up or use the truth pill on the terrorist? You're time is running out, tick ...

Harris argues that people's reaction to torture in these circumstances is warped by the uncomfortable thoughts of the pain inflicted upon the terrorist being tortured. But that is irrational considering the pain inflicted upon the tens of thousands of civilians and their families by collateral damage. To drive the point home further, he suggests that if a "truth pill" was used to remove all observable indications of pain from the person under torture, so that when they wake up, they tell the truth, it would level the playing field with collateral damage, which we rarely observe the effects of.

Conversely, I could argue that if the images of human victims of collateral damage were printed daily on the front page of the newspaper, that there would probably be no more war. Another valid argument. But our press is not likely to do that.

So there is a disconnect between what people perceive as cruel punishment for the terrorist under torture and the countless thousands of victims of collateral damage during war.

None of this addressed the effectiveness of torture certainly, but presumably methods could be perfected to achieve the desired results, i.e., the "truth pill". And I don't think Harris is suggesting the use of torture except under extreme circumstances such as might occur during the investigaton of a terrorist plot.

I was shocked when I read this section of Harris' book, but when examining the reasoning he is using, it becomes much less so. He is a rationalist, so many of the ethical situations that he confronts us with are designed to make us think. I don't condone torture, except under the most extreme circumstances where many lives are at stake. Certainly it is a slippery slope, so in reality, there will probably never be a legalized use of torture.

But the ethical arguments stand, I think. Most people would react by torturing the terrorist to save the city, if they knew it would work, especially if they kew that they would not have to observe any indications of pain during the process.

There are many ethical situations that one could come with that illustrate the contradictions that we accept on a daily basis. One is the fact that most of us drive cars or use fossil fuels, yet we are watching our Earth die a gradual death. It's irrational behavior, but one that we have come to accept. So, we are all terrorists when it comes to the Earth's ecosystem. But the Earth doesn't need us. It will eventually recover long after we have died out as a civilization. The Earth's methods of torture are cruel when confronting us terrorists, yet they are ethical at the same time. ;)

[okasha]

40. Okay, let's take your logic--and Harris'--and kick it up a notch

Harris argues that people's reaction to torture in these circumstances is warped by the uncomfortable thoughts of the pain inflicted upon the terrorist being tortured. But that is irrational considering the pain inflicted upon the tens of thousands of civilians and their families by collateral damage.

A terrorist has his finger on a button connected to a bomb that will blow up tens of thousands of civilians and their families. His condition for not pushing that button is that you--you personally--rape, torture and mutilate your own daughter. By your own showing, it is "irrational" for you to refuse. What do you do? Tick..

[ozone_man]

44. You still haven't answered.

Oops, times up. There goes the city.

Regarding your hypothetical situation, The terrorist doesn't have the button if he is in captivity, or if he is not in captivity, then he can't be tortured. So, you have to start with a realistic scenario.

[okasha]

48. You ducked the question.

Neither situation is anywhere near realistic. The point I'm getting at is that there is a bright line you don't cross over if you want to retain any claim to ethical or moral behavior. If you're willing to torture the hypothetical terrorist "for the greater good of the greatest number," then there is no rational argument against torturing anyone else "for the greater good of the greatest number." It's not even a slippery slope. The first step over is all it takes.

[ozone_man]

50. One situation is more realistic.

The situation where a terrorist has been captured and he is being interrogated about his involvement. For example 911 actually happened, not one, but four planes. This is real stuff, though I still harbor some LIHOP thoughts. I don't know of any terrorist who has ever asked what you are suggesting, but if so, I don't think anyone, especially not me, would comply with that request.

Now if you change the question to one where the terrorist has a captive, then it becomes a more realistic scenario, but he is not in custody and cannot be tortured, so it doesn't fall into this topic exactly. It falls into the topic of negociating with terrorists who have hostages, and it happens rather frequently. It depends what the demands are, sometimes there are demands to free prisoners, sometimes a ransom demand. It would be reasonable demand that we get out of Iraq and stop this war, but not what you have suggested.

So, your turn now. It seems I was wrong, the clock still has a few more ticks left. Tick ... tick ...

[okasha]

52. See my post immediately preceding.

I don't know of any situation in which I think torture would be morally acceptable. If it can be done once, it can be done again. If it can be done again, it can become standard operating procedure. Would you trust Albert Gonzales or George Bush with such a policy?

In your post below, about the School of the Americas practicing a "different" type of torture, you're trying to draw a moral and ethical distinction that doesn't exist. You're predicating the morality of torture on the nature of the victim, not on the nature of the act. That's a dodge.

BTW, back in the eighties I was a member of a humanitarian organization that worked with Central American refugees. So I know just exactly how bad the death squads and such were. The differnce between the Atlacatl Batallion and Sam Harris is that Harris just hasn't gotten a hands-on chance to act on his sadism.

[trotsky]

56. The point being lost with your moral posturing

is that there are very few moral absolutes. Now unlike virtually every real-world torture scenarios, this one is set up so that you know the torture will work, and you know that getting the information will prevent the deaths of thousands. Knowing these things, what can you do? I realize that your difficulty in letting an evil atheist have a point is getting in the way here, too, but just take a step back and think about the suffering of one (which might not even be suffering - just the administering of a truth serum) versus the death and suffering of thousands.

Especially if my kids were among those thousands - there is no question I would do whatever it takes. But I'm sure that in every situation you've ever encountered, you have always acted with the "appropriate" moral action, right? I do get that impression from you.

I don't support the Bush and Gonzalez torture program. But I don't think one needs to, in order to see that in some limited cases, torture becomes less of a moral prohibition and more of a moral dilemma.

[okasha]

61. Blather.

Now unlike virtually every real-world torture scenarios, this one is set up so that you know the torture will work, and you know that getting the information will prevent the deaths of thousands.

I thought you didn't put stock in "imaginary beings."


Knowing these things, what can you do? I realize that your difficulty in letting an evil atheist have a point is getting in the way here,

Of course, I also oppose Gonzalez and Bush because they're "evil atheists." Put a cork in the projection, trotsky.

[trotsky]

62. WTF?

I thought you didn't put stock in "imaginary beings."

It's a thought experiment. It's entirely imaginary. Hello??? Oh wait, I see, you don't want to answer the question, so instead you deflect and mock. Got it. And then throw in an accusatory personal attack for extra measure - just to avoid ANSWERING THE QUESTION.

Must make you awfully queasy, just thinking about those gray areas. Rigid religious thinking will do that to a person.

[beam me up scottie]

65. Yes, she has consistently refused to answer the question, hasn't she?

Other people seem to have no problem admitting that it's a quandary and that there is no definitive right or wrong.

But then, the people who actually considered it, did so without an agenda.

[okasha]

70. So sorry for your reading difficulties.

Your local community college may be able to help.

[Name removed]

76. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[okasha]

78. Uhmm, isn't there a rule or something about not using material from the

DU groups to call out a member outside that group?

And sweetie, I haven't cut loose with "snarky" on this board yet.

[beam me up scottie]

80. No. Why would reposting someone's words be against the rules?

There is a rule about using the groups to whine about posters in other forums, though.

[muriel_volestrangler]

42. It's not hypothetical - Harris is advocating the torture of Khalid

Sheikh Mohammed, now, in real life. He says so.

Given the damage we were willing to cause to the bodies and minds of innocent children in Afghanistan and Iraq, our disavowal of torture in the case of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed seems perverse. If there is even one chance in a million that he will tell us something under torture that will lead to the further dismantling of Al Qaeda, it seems that we should use every means at our disposal to get him talking.

Not because he knows there's a ticking bomb, in the cliche for this argument; because there's a small possibility Mohammed might have some useful information. And he says before this that he he is not against war itself.

You say: "presumably methods could be perfected to achieve the desired results, i.e., the "truth pill"". Why do you presume this? Is that more worthy of presumption than that a cheap, plentiful way of extracting electricity from sunlight will solve the energy crisis next year? Both are things people have tried to invent, but no-one has succeeded. Why presume a deus ex machina for how to extract information for terrorists?

[ozone_man]

45. He presents both hypothetical and actual examples.

The hypothetical example was used to convince you that there are cases where one may approve of torture. For example, go back to a day before 911, and say that one of these guys was apprehended, but we didn't know the specifics, what exactly was going to happen. What level of interrogation would be acceptable to drag out the truth from the terrorist? The bomb case is pretty realistic too, it may happen, and represents a possibility for a many times larger loss of life than 911. If the answer is ever yes, that there may be cases where torture is justified, then it remains to discuss what these particular situations are.

The "truth pill" was introduced to make the apparent affects of torture invisible to the witness like collateral damage is for most of the world. It's out of sight, not on the front page. Most people don't want to hear about collateral damage anyway. He's saying that it is irrational to not be much more upset with the collateral damage to thousands of innocent victims then it is with the idea of torture of terrorists.

Personally, I don't approve of torture, but there may be certain circumstances, such as when thousands of lives are at stake, where it is acceptable.

[SPKrazy]

77. I Say Torture The Bastard

but then I value the lives of many over the lives of one who wants to kill the many.

does that make me bad?

[Random_Australian]

24. Ack! You can set an arbitrary value to collapse the stats is all, but

saying "Given the variablity of the world there may be some point at some time that (torture) would give the best outcome, though this would itself be an evil act" does NOT translate to making any sort of case for making rules under which it is 'allowable' - in fact, the best option would be to make so many rules against it that in order for someone to torture, they would have to be willing to pretty much sacrifice themselves;

in other words, though it is technically possible that there are worse outcomes than one person bieng tortured (as in, say, 500,000 people bieng tortured) we should at no point accept torture as any practice anywhere ever.

Yay stats!

[Random_Australian]

23. Sam Harris' logic is flawed.

Otherwise known as "I lurve my stats"

[Finder]

38. Could you show us where the flaw is? n/t

[Random_Australian]

47. I can't remember where I put the original, but this is close.

I had a MUCH better one written out but I can't find it.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=74019&mesg_id=74191

[NMMNG]

26. While I agree with Harris on some things

I certainly don't agree with him on this.

Imagine that a known terrorist has planted a bomb in the heart of a nearby city. He now sits in your custody. Rather than conceal his guilt, he gloats about the forthcoming explosion and the magnitude of human suffering it will cause. Given this state of affairs—in particular, given that there is still time to prevent an imminent atrocity—it seems that subjecting this unpleasant fellow to torture may be justifiable.

I don't see such a man giving up desired information even under torture. Therefore torturing him would not only be barbaric but useless.

And really, how can information gained via torture be trusted? Innocent people will say nearly anything if they think it will stop the torture, thereby condemning themselves for crimes they didn't commit. Guilty people will likely lie and lead investigators on wild goose chases. Therefore, once again, torture is not only barbaric but useless.

[greyl]

32. His hypothetical “truth pill” works.

"The action of the pill would be to produce transitory paralysis and transitory misery of a kind that no human being would willingly submit to a second time. Imagine how we torturers would feel if, after giving this pill to captive terrorists, each lay down for what appeared to be an hour’s nap only to arise and immediately confess everything he knows about the workings of his organization. Might we not be tempted to call it a “truth pill” in the end? No, there is no ethical difference to be found in how the suffering of the tortured or the collaterally damaged appears."

Later he argues that if the truth pill is only rarely effective, the benefit of its success outweighs the wrongness of its administration.

[NMMNG]

33. Meh

When his hypothetical "truth pill" results in individuals telling the truth without suffering misery, only then could I advocate its use. Just because the captors don't have to experience the prisoner's agony doesn't mean it's not barbaric.

[struggle4progress]

27. Well, everybody believes in something. And so Sam believes in torture.

[bloom]

35. So he's making the same case as the neocons...

very Machiavellian like. The Manhattan Institute could hire him to make arguments and speeches.

"I am one of the few people I know of who has argued in print that torture may be an ethical necessity in our war on terror."


I think he may be one of the few to make that argument who is regarded by some as being on the left. Many right-wingers have made that argument. See "Too Nice for Our Own Good?"

http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110006134

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1475839



Anyway - it's interesting to see him making the case for immoral behavior. No more help to atheists that the college kids exchanging Bibles for porn.

[Finder]

37. You are missing the point--as usual.

He is using the same logic for torture that is used to justify war. Many support the war on terror based on certain logic...that is who he is trying to get to think.

[beam me up scottie]

41. With athiests like bloom,

who needs reichwingers to vilify atheists?

They can all punch out and go home.

[bloom]

43. Or maybe you just read it how you want it to read.

People do that too.

[ozone_man]

46. How about the School of the Americas brand of torture?

I draw a distinction between the torture of a terrorist and the training of military to conduct torture operations against civilians in South America. Can you justify general Clark's involvement with the School of the Americas?

On December 16, 1996, a few months after the Pentagon admission of the torture manuals, Clark visited the SOA, not to demand accountability but to give a commencement speech at an SOA graduation ceremony. Six years later and still, no one has been held accountable for the use of the torture manuals at the SOA. The SOA trained death squad leaders, assassins and military dictators. Its graduates were found responsible for some of the worst human rights atrocities in Latin America, including the El Mozote massacre of more than 900 civilians in El Salvador in 1980, the murder of Guatemalan Bishop Juan Gerardi in 1998 and of Colombian Archbishop Isaías Duarte in 2002.

At almost every campaign stop, Gen. Clark is facing critical questions concerning his connection to the SOA and his continued unpopular support of the school. Asked about his continued support of the SOA during an event in Manchester, NH, on Dec. 19, 2003, Clark responded, " I’m not going to have been in charge of a school that I can’t be proud of." In reaction to a question asked in Concord, NH, about the torture manuals Clark stated: "We're teaching police procedures and human rights . . . never taught torture." Despite cosmetic changes, the SOA remains a combat training school that teaches Latin American soldiers commando tactics, psychological operations, sniper and other military skills. Its graduates continue to be linked to massacres and other crimes. A few examples:

· In April 2002, the Venezuelan Army Commander-in-Chief Efrain Vasquez and General Ramirez Poveda -- both graduates of the SOA -- were key players in an attempted coup against the democratically elected Venezuelan government. In total, the school has produced at least eleven military dictators.

· In October 2003 it became public through documents released by the Mexican Secretary of Defense that SOA-trained ex-soldiers are now working as highly trained hired assassins for the Gulf Drug Cartel. SOA graduates comprise over a third of 31 renegade soldiers who were previously part of an elite counter-drug division of the Mexican Army.

· In December 2003, the Colombian prosecutor general's office ordered the dismissal of SOA graduate Oscar Eduardo Saavedra Calixto for failing to prevent a 2001 massacre of 27 civilians in the village of Chengue. human rights Reports consistently cite SOA-trained Colombian officers for collaboration with paramilitaries.

http://www.commondreams.org/news2004/0120-03.htm

Next week, the week of June 5, Congress will vote on an amendment to close the SOA/ WHINSEC. Rep. McGovern (MA) will introduce an amendment to the Foreign Operations appropriations bill to cut funding for the SOA/ WHINSEC!

We expect a close vote and need as many people as possible flooding the offices of the House of Representatives with calls in support of a YES vote on the amendment. This is it! And it's the people power of our movement that will get this amendment passed! Visit the Legislative Action Index for more information, for a sample call script and to send an email to your Representative:

http://www.soaw.org/new/

The U.S.-operated School of the Americas is often cited as having served as a training ground for members of death squads in Latin America by several human rights activists, most prominently SOA Watch (which terms it the "School of the Assassins"). Some graduates have gone on to commit atrocities as key military figures, though the School officially denies that any human rights abuses are taught in the curriculum (which it considers to have improved and modernized since the end of the Cold War) and claims that the majority of its graduates have not demonstrated such behaviour.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_squads

[okasha]

49. Oh, good gods.

You do realize that's the equivalent of the freepers' "Clinton did it tooooooo!"

[ozone_man]

51. No, I see the SOA type of torture as different

because it's not isolated cases of interrogating a known terrorist, but has been used against leftist civilians, religious leaders, children in South America, in addition to leftist militia. The school had a torture policy. Remember the death squads of El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, the murder of four nuns in 1980, Arch Bishop Romero? We are the terrorists in most cases.

School of the Americas: School of Assassins

"Here is the School of the Americas. It's a combat school. Most of the courses revolve around what they call "counter-insurgency warfare." Who are the "insurgents?" We have to ask that question. They are the poor. They are the people in Latin America who call for reform. They are the landless peasants who are hungry. They are health care workers, human rights advocates, labor organizers. They become the insurgents. They are seen as "the enemy." They are those who become the targets of those who learn their lessons at the School of the Americas." - Father Roy Bourgeois:

School of the Americas: School of Assassins

Maryknoll World Productions (1995: 13 minutes)
Narrated by Susan Sarandon
Transcribed by Darrell G. Moen

TRANSCRIPT

Susan Sarandon: In the late afternoon of December 4, 1980, an unmarked grave was found in a field in El Salvador. When it was opened in the presence of the U.S. ambassador, it revealed the bodies of four women: Maryknoll Sisters Mara Clark and Eda Ford, Ursaline Sister Dorothy Kazel, and lay missionary Jean Donovan.

Of the five officers later found responsible for the rape and murder of these women, three were graduates of the United States Army School of the Americas. According to the Pentagon, the mission of the school is to train the armed forces of Latin America, promote military professionalism, foster cooperation among multinational military forces, and to expand the trainees' knowledge of United States customs and traditions.

The School of the Americas originated in 1946 in Panama. Now, it is located on the grounds of Fort Benning, Georgia. The school teaches commando operations, sniper training, how to fire an M-16, and psychological warfare. Since no major declared war between Latin American countries has occurred in decades and the communist threat has vanished, why provide this kind of training?

Representative Joseph Kennedy: If you look at the course ranges that are offered to these inividuals, they in fact are a dedicated way of teaching military leaders in foreign nations how to subvert their local communities.

Susan Sarandon: Since it opened, more than 55,000 military officials from 23 Latin American and Carribean countries have trained at the school. About 2,000 students a year. As facts have emerged about the school and its graduates, it has drawn the attention of a growing number of human rights activists, such as Maryknoll Father Roy Bourgeois.

Maryknoll Father Roy Bourgeois: Just down the road here is the School of the Americas. It's a combat school. Most of the courses revolve around what they call "counter-insurgency warfare." Who are the "insurgents?" We have to ask that question. They are the poor. They are the people in Latin America who call for reform. They are the landless peasants who are hungry. They are health care workers, human rights advocates, labor organizers. They become the insurgents. They are seen as "the enemy." They are those who become the targets of those who learn their lessons at the School of the Americas.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13436.htm

Watch the video.

Sam is not supporting torture except in extreme cases, where it is likely that a terrorist has information. His views on Abu Ghraib.

I am one of the few people I know of who has argued in print that torture may be an ethical necessity in our war on terror. In the aftermath of Abu Ghraib, this is not a comfortable position to have publicly adopted. There is no question that Abu Ghraib was a travesty, and there is no question that it has done our country lasting harm. Indeed, the Abu Ghraib scandal may be one of the costliest foreign policy blunders to occur in the last century, given the degree to which it simultaneously inflamed the Muslim world and eroded the sympathies of our democratic allies. While we hold the moral high ground in our war on terror, we appear to hold it less and less. Our casual abuse of ordinary prisoners is largely responsible for this. Documented abuses at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and elsewhere have now inspired legislation prohibiting "cruel, inhuman or degrading" treatment of military prisoners. And yet, these developments do not shed much light on the ethics of torturing people like Osama bin Laden when we get them in custody.

[Crunchy Frog]

53. Okay, okay. I accept personal responsibility

for everything done by the SOA in the name of Wes Clark, and now acknowledge the correctness of Sam Harris's thinking.

Really, this has to be the most absurd attempt at threadjacking that I've ever seen here on DU, and that's saying alot. This must be the ultimate resort of someone who has no argument relevant to the discussion at hand.

Edit: Based on some of your earlier posts, I was going to attempt to engage you in a genuine discussion. I now realize that would be pointless, as you would most likely simply throw Clinton's penis or Chappaquidick at me in response.

For the record, yes I oppose the SOA. Yes, I disagree with Democratic political figures like Al Gore and Wes Clark on the issue of their having expressed support for that institution. No, I do not believe that Al Gore or Wes Clark endorse torture as a policy. I also believe that this is an irrelevancy brought into the discussion due to an inability to successfully argue the actual issues being debated in the thread.

[okasha]

54. Bingo.

n/t

[ozone_man]

57. Just trying to determine your sincerity

in regards to the torture issue. I.e., how you would justify supporting a candidate who openly supports the SOA. If Wes Clark approves of the SOA, isn't that also condoning the methods of torture, death squads, training of military leaders to topple governments in SA? Also belongs to the National Endowment for Democracy, another front organization to bring "Democracy" to the world and countries like Venezuela in particular.

But it is relevant to the OP. Sam Harris makes a key distinction between attrocities like Abu Ghraib and interrogating someone like OBL. I see parallels between Abu Ghraib and some of the attrocities committed by U.S. troops in Iraq with our covert operations in South America in the 80's. This Negroponte fellow seems to have been involved in the death squad operations in Honduras as Ambassador to Honduras and is now head of a large operation in Iraq as Ambassador to Iraq. This is the type of torture culture that needs to stop.

If confirmed Negroponte will head up the largest US embassy in the world, with more than 3,000 employees and over 500 CIA officers. Despite what some would call Negroponte's infamous history in Central America as US ambassador to Honduras during the 1980s, he has come up against almost no Congressional opposition, even from Senate democrats who once criticized him for supporting widespread human rights abuses.

As ambassador to Honduras, Negroponte played a key role in coordinating US covert aid to the Contra death squads in Nicaragua and shoring up a CIA-backed death squad in Honduras. During his term as ambassador there, diplomats alleged that the embassy's annual human rights reports made Honduras sound more like Norway than Argentina. In a 1995 series, the Baltimore Sun detailed the activities of a secret CIA-trained Honduran army unit, Battalion 3-16, that used "shock and suffocation devices in interrogations. Prisoners often were kept naked and, when no longer useful, killed and buried in unmarked graves." In 1994, Honduras's National Commission for the Protection of Human Rights reported that it was officially admitted that 179 civilians were still missing.

A former official who served under Negroponte says he was ordered to remove all mention of torture and executions from the draft of his 1982 report on the human rights situation in Honduras. During Negroponte's tenure, US military aid to Honduras skyrocketed from $3.9 million to over $77 million. Much of this went to ensure the Honduran army's loyalty in the battle against popular movements throughout Central America.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/04/28/1449257

One thing I will say about Sam that I don't quite agree on is I think he's been sold on the war on terror a bit too much. He hasn't mentioned the other incentives for this war like oil, though he mentions "interests". The war in Iraq had no connection to the war on terror, until it was made to be so by drawing Al Queda into Iraq. In this sense, I think he is more or less a centrist politically. But I think his rational arguments for the use of torture in isolated instances, i.e., where terrorists have been captured, are difficult to refute, when there are thousands of lives at stake. His contrast with the collateral damage that we never see makes him come up with the "truth pill" analogy to absolve our guilt in the process of torture. It's an interesting ethical argument, not one that has a right or wrong answer necessarily (IMO). But there is a right or wrong answer in regards to SAO or Abu Ghraib. They're both wrong. One can argue that if you allow it in one instance of torture, e.g., to torture an Al Queda terrorist, it can occur in others. Possibly, but look at the collateral damage of war to get some perspective. That is his ethical argument.

[Crunchy Frog]

58. Candidate bashing forum is here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=132

I don't bring candidate debates into this forum. I'm sure you can start a thread over there on this issue and get lots of responses.

[ozone_man]

59. How do you respond to Sam's argument?

Knowing that the torture of a terrorist would reveal the information that would save a city from a bomb causing thousands of deaths, would you resort to torture? That is his ethical question, part A. We'll get to part B once you answer part A. ;)

[Crunchy Frog]

60. My position on that question is

that one can imagine all kinds of extreme scenarios under which people might engage in behaviors that cannot be in any way endorsed by any moral code. There are situations in which desperate people will resort to eating each other, just as an example. We do not have any legal codification, or sets of protocols governing cannibalism in our society. We always regard it with absolute moral repugnance and censure, but there may nevertheless be some situations in which we might consider the behavior to at least be understandable.

When human beings are reduced to the most elemental levels of raw survival, extreme behaviors may occur and even be understood and excused. Our legal system often takes that into consideration when judging a particular case. It is possible that your scenario would be such a case.

Because there are extreme hypotheticals in which an inherently immoral action may be understandable and even excusable, does not mean that these actions should be somehow institutionalized or codified into law. Even if you can imagine a situation in which resorting to cannibalism could somehow have been viewed as justifiable, I doubt that you would advocate codifying and institutionalizing cannibalism into our society and our legal system. I take that same position on torture. Sam Harris does not appear to take this position. What does a "torture pill" represent other than an institutionalization of torture?

In the extreme hypothetical that okasha described in post #40, I would be inclined to excuse your behavior if you chose to save thousands of people from certain death by raping and mutilating your daughter. If you did, I would hope that the legal system would understand the extremity of the situation and show leniency towards you. I would not want to have such a situation and your response to it institutionalized as policy and codified by protocols.

I would sum up by bottom line this way. What people may do out of desperation, in an immediate and extreme life or death situation, may be understandable and even excusable, but can not serve as a basis for a legitimate moral or legal code.


I appreciate your abandoning the attempt to drag the candidate wars into this forum. I'm a veteran of the '03-'04 primary wars. They were ugly, and I have no desire whatsoever to get back to them. We should be able to discuss philosophical issues in this forum without dragging in that other garbage. Thank you.

[ozone_man]

63. Good answer.

When you talk about the ethics of torture and cast a stone at Sam Harris, then you should be willing to recieve a stone thrown at the guy in your avatar (Wes Clark), if that's a contradiction to your argument. This is after all an R&T forum within a larger Democratic discussion forum. I think R&T includes ethics and morality. I think it was fair game.

Regarding your answer, you don't answer directly, but it was a good answer. I don't think Harris is suggesting codifying torture exactly, but he does present some rational arguments for it's use in extreme situations, as he explains, like OBL. How do we justify the collateral damage to people that suffer arms and legs blown off, many thousands, yet our "compassion" prevents us from considering torture of a terrorist, prehaps even if it involves a "truth pill", who might have information that would save many lives. It's a simplistic argument, but still a good one. I think this was in a chapter on ethics in his book, where he presents various ethical dilemmas like this.

It's a horrible thought, but if a nuclear weapon goes off in a city in the next 10 or 20 years, I bet a few people change their minds. I think the comparison to cannibalism is a good one. We wouldn't want to codify it, yet it makes sense from a rational perspective in certain situations. The Donner party comes to mind. So, like cannibalism, torture is not something that we should codify. The problem is that we use torture where it shouldn't be used, like Abu Ghraib, or teaching brutal South American dictators to subdue the peasants, instead of reserving it for the handful of cases where it might actually be appropriate, like interrogating the nuclear terrorist or uncovering some other terrorist plot.

But I probably disagree with Sam about this war on terror. I think we are the world's largest terrorist and exporter of terror. But that is a political view. Sam was presenting a rational or ethical view, which exists outside of one's political views. I don't think he's right about everything either, but he seems right about most of what he says, at least from my atheist perspective.

[Crunchy Frog]

64. Sam Harris is an appropriate subject for debate in this forum.

Beating people over the head over the percieved deficiencies of their preferred Democratic candidate or other favorite Democratic party figures are not, at least not that I've seen. Sam Harris is a major proponent of atheism, and his writings are frequent subjects of discussion here. For that reason I consider bringing his views up for discussion on this board to be appropriate.

Your attempt to bring my preferred candidate into the discussion seems disinguous and looks like an attempt at making a low blow. To my mind it makes you look bad and undermines the credibility of your arguments, which is unfortunate as you do actually appear to be capable of debating this issue in an intellectually honest fashion.

Once again, I will tell you that I come to this forum to engage in debate about issues involving religion and theology as well as the views of prominent spokespersons on these issues. If you choose to attempt to steer the discussion into candidate wars, I will not engage you on it in this forum. There are other forums for that.

[beam me up scottie]

66. And accusing atheists of regarding Sam Harris as a hero and font of wisdom

is appropriate for this forum?

I wouldn't normally bring this up in the R/T forum, except that so many here seem to regard him as a hero and a font of wisdom and morality.

I don't feel sorry for you at all.

After all, you're getting what you asked for, a reaction from the people you insulted.

[Crunchy Frog]

67. So I take it that this post of yours is now null and void?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=74019&mesg_id=74055

I apologized and you appeared to accept my apology.

I don't quite get this running hot and cold, or wild mood swings or whatever, but that's okay. To each his own. Have a happy 6/6/06. :hi:

[beam me up scottie]

68. Oh, I took your word for it at first.

Until I read your last post.

ozone man tried many times to explain his point of view and finally resorted to bringing up the hypocrisy of condemning Harris while supporting Clark:

When you talk about the ethics of torture and cast a stone at Sam Harris, then you should be willing to receive a stone thrown at the guy in your avatar (Wes Clark), if that's a contradiction to your argument. This is after all an R&T forum within a larger Democratic discussion forum. I think R&T includes ethics and morality. I think it was fair game.

Just thought I'd point out the hypocrisy of calling the comparison of Harris to Clark "inappropriate" and "an attempt at making a low blow" by someone whose thread was based on a straw man and intended to insult atheists.

:hi:

[Crunchy Frog]

69. Okay, whatever. Have a nice day.

[ozone_man]

71. Thanks for adding some clarity.

It wasn't clear to me that Crunchy_Frog wanted to really discuss the issue, or just lob a bomb over the fence so to speak, so I lobbed one back. ;)

[Crunchy Frog]

72. Well, just so you admit that's what you were doing.

;)

[ozone_man]

73. I think it was fair.

All under the category of ethical dilemma of torture and "collateral damage". But it was in part that I thought as BMUS surmised, that maybe you had another agenda on your mind than just discussing the issue. ;)

[Crunchy Frog]

74. And what agenda might that be, pray tell.

You seem to do a better job of reading my mind than I do, so I'm anxious to hear your answer and find out exactly what my agenda was.:)

[ozone_man]

82. Why don't you tell me.

The way you phrased this suggested that you might have an issue with Sam Harris, yet you didn't bother to argue the point really, until I raised a related ethical argument in regards to your "hero" Wes Clark. If one is truly concerned about torture, then that person must certainly be concerned about the morality and ethics of a candidate who defends the School of the Americas, which has taught torture since 1946. That's fair, right? :)

I wouldn't normally bring this up in the R/T forum, except that so many here seem to regard him as a hero and a font of wisdom and morality.

[bloom]

79. Some people are all about

what they THINK other people's agendas are - when they have no clue. ;-)

[beam me up scottie]

81. People who constantly malign atheists on DU are pretty transparent.

Even when they think they're clever.

I feel sorry for them.

An atheist must have hurt you, I mean them pretty badly.

[Crunchy Frog]

83. You're definitely right about that.

Now I'm out to malign atheists who must have "hurt" me.

I'm actually far closer to atheism than I am to any sort of religious belief. Prior to hanging out in this forum, I would have expected my sympathies to be drawn more toward the atheist side of things than the other way around. What I've found instead is that I'm drawn toward liberal minded people who are tolerant and respectful of others, irregardless of the presence, or lack, of spiritual beliefs.

I think that atheism could use much better spokespersons than Sam Harris, but then Christians could certainly use better ones than Falwell and Robertson.

I don't start threads very often. I do seem to have managed to spark some meaningful discussion with this one, before it devolved into the inevitable flame war.:)

[beam me up scottie]

75. You're welcome.

I hate trying to discuss an issue with someone who isn't interested in discussion, but rather in stereotyping groups of people.

Ah, well, one more for the ignore list.

Since the raw story hate piece was published, it's been like whack-a-mole around here.