Waterboarding

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Virtually every authoritative description of the practice specifies that it works by simulating drowning, not by almost drowning.

The results of your "extensive" study, if you would, Finn.

Some of us find this distinction important in determining whether or not the practice constitutes torture. I understand why for others this distinction is meaningless. I don't agree with them, but I don't find it irrational for someone to have a broader definition of torture than I.



It's as if there are some that want to convince people like me that water-boarding is torture based on our own definition. That it is not only the moral equivalent of attacking a prisoner with red hot pokers, it is also the physiological equivalent as well. We can, of course, debate the former, but the latter, it seems to me, is clearly false.

Many who consider water-boarding torture, consider the use of sleep deprivation and temperature extremes to be torture as well. This certainly can be logically consistent with their definition of torture, but it is not with mine. Again, use of these other techniques could quite possibly kill the prisoner if no controls are employed, but his or her death as a result would neither be intended, nor a likely outcome that is met with total lack of concern.

Inserting red hot pokers up a prisoner's anus, might not actually kill him or her, but it wouldn't be because the torturer cared either way. It would certainly seriously maim and permanently disable the prisoner, and that is so obvious that intent must be implied.

Water-boarding, sleep deprivation and other extreme interrogation techniques are employed precisely because it is unlikely that they will kill or permanently disable the prisoner.

Of course this is immaterial if you subscribe to a broader definition of torture, and when I refer to these definitions I do not contemplate statutory definitions. Immoral and illegal are not synonymous, and so in my consideration of the morality of the practices I'm not particularly concerned with legal definitions.

Of course these practices are extremely unpleasant for the prisoner, and not the equivalent of depriving him or her of television privileges, but the question is not whether the prisoner will experience considerable discomfort, but whether that discomfort is justified. I'm sure sleeping on a concrete slab in a prison cell is very discomforting, but is it torture? Hell, just having to live in a cell is highly discomforting. Is incarceration torture?

These techniques, whether or not we call them torture work, in that they can and have caused otherwise resistant prisoners to provide information that is desired and would not otherwise be obtainable. I would agree with any argument that they should only be used as a last resort and when there is a fair amount of certainty that the prisoner has important information to reveal, but they can work and to insist that they, and, for that matter, less ambiguous practices of tortures, never do is simply an attempt to condition the debate to one's preferences rather than what is factual.

Again, I suppose if one is certain that torture and extreme interrogation practices do not work then there is no reason to fear the possible consequences, and attendant responsibility for prohibiting their use, but
that isn't the case and the moral question is a bit tougher to answer.

How convenient that you aren't concerned about the legalities. All the forgoing illustrates clearly why these laws are not left up to those of, with all due respect, Finn, lesser intelligence.

JTT wrote:

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Virtually every authoritative description of the practice specifies that it works by simulating drowning, not by almost drowning.

The results of your "extensive" study, if you would, Finn.

Some of us find this distinction important in determining whether or not the practice constitutes torture. I understand why for others this distinction is meaningless. I don't agree with them, but I don't find it irrational for someone to have a broader definition of torture than I.



It's as if there are some that want to convince people like me that water-boarding is torture based on our own definition. That it is not only the moral equivalent of attacking a prisoner with red hot pokers, it is also the physiological equivalent as well. We can, of course, debate the former, but the latter, it seems to me, is clearly false.

Many who consider water-boarding torture, consider the use of sleep deprivation and temperature extremes to be torture as well. This certainly can be logically consistent with their definition of torture, but it is not with mine. Again, use of these other techniques could quite possibly kill the prisoner if no controls are employed, but his or her death as a result would neither be intended, nor a likely outcome that is met with total lack of concern.

Inserting red hot pokers up a prisoner's anus, might not actually kill him or her, but it wouldn't be because the torturer cared either way. It would certainly seriously maim and permanently disable the prisoner, and that is so obvious that intent must be implied.

Water-boarding, sleep deprivation and other extreme interrogation techniques are employed precisely because it is unlikely that they will kill or permanently disable the prisoner.

Of course this is immaterial if you subscribe to a broader definition of torture, and when I refer to these definitions I do not contemplate statutory definitions. Immoral and illegal are not synonymous, and so in my consideration of the morality of the practices I'm not particularly concerned with legal definitions.

Of course these practices are extremely unpleasant for the prisoner, and not the equivalent of depriving him or her of television privileges, but the question is not whether the prisoner will experience considerable discomfort, but whether that discomfort is justified. I'm sure sleeping on a concrete slab in a prison cell is very discomforting, but is it torture? Hell, just having to live in a cell is highly discomforting. Is incarceration torture?

These techniques, whether or not we call them torture work, in that they can and have caused otherwise resistant prisoners to provide information that is desired and would not otherwise be obtainable. I would agree with any argument that they should only be used as a last resort and when there is a fair amount of certainty that the prisoner has important information to reveal, but they can work and to insist that they, and, for that matter, less ambiguous practices of tortures, never do is simply an attempt to condition the debate to one's preferences rather than what is factual.

Again, I suppose if one is certain that torture and extreme interrogation practices do not work then there is no reason to fear the possible consequences, and attendant responsibility for prohibiting their use, but
that isn't the case and the moral question is a bit tougher to answer.

How convenient that you aren't concerned about the legalities. All the forgoing illustrates clearly why these laws are not left up to those of, with all due respect, Finn, lesser intelligence.

I knew you wouldn't last more than a few weeks.

...even though you are an a-hole

Any reasonable person examining all the evidence we have - without any bias - would conclude that the overwhelming likelihood is that the president of the United States authorised illegal torture of a prisoner and that the evidence of the crime was subsequently illegally destroyed.

Congresswoman Jane Harman, the respected top Democrat on the House intelligence committee in 2003, put it as simply as she could: "I am worried. It smells like the cover-up of the cover-up."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article3086937.ece?Submitted=true-06

I'm troubled about things like water boarding. Not just water boarding, but also things like guantanamo bay.

Fair enough. They are troubling realities and it would be foolish to declare that they fall within the All-American set of Mom, Flag, and Apple Pie. Lots of things are troubling. Does that mean they are all to be considerd "bad," or to be avoided?

There is a philisophical dilemma for those who object to the ostensible dark behaviors of humanity. This is a dilemma that too many wish to ignore.

Take pacificsim for example. Very few people would leap to the assertion that violence is "good," and yet the vast majority of us can accept that violence in certain situations is acceptible.

I have tremendous respect for anyone that is willing to die or lose his freedom before engaging in violence. There are precious few of these people, but their committment is to be commended. The rest of us can talk all we want about non-violence but there are quite a few scenarios where we will not only find it A-OK to be violent, but wish for the ability to be overwhelmingly violent. However...what is the case when their personal pacificism imperils their family?

Bent Ones invade your home. Do you allow them to have their bent way because the only credible means of opposition is violence? They rape your wife and daughters, and kill or maim your sons, but you remain true to your principles. Or do you invoke the God, in which you probably don't believe, to invest in you the might of Angels and the power to crush any all of these invaders?

I am half-japanese, and my grandparents were put into camps during WW2. I am unable to ignore the similarity to the use of "terrorist" now and "spy" then.

Understandable...to an extent.

The internment of Japanese citizens during WWII was shameful, but it should not be viewed solely through a lens manufactured in 2007. Generally, people do shameful things because they think they are justified. In this case they were very wrong, but their intent was not so black and white. This in no way excuses what they did.

There is a facile similarity between WWII internment of Japanese citizens, and Guantanamo, but it falls to shreds pretty quickly once reasoned consideration is applied.

* The detainees are not American citizens
* The detainees were rounded up on a battle field, not by virtue of their ethnicity
* The detainees have all been put through a process that reliably or not is intended to judge their continued danger
* There are far more examples of Guantanamo detainees who have been released and gone on to engage in warfare against the US than can be said about the Japanese who suffered internment
* None of the detainees are contained with their family members

This is not to, necessarily, condone the detention of enemy combatants as Guantanamo but it is to draw a very sharp distinction with Japanese internment during WWII.

Now on to other arguments:

One set of my grandparents were Norwegian immigrants and one of my great-uncles was murdered by the Mafia. How is this instructive to what I believe today?

Another set were Irish immigrants, and the lousy way in which they were treated is well established. How is this instructive to what I believe today?

We all can reach back for ancestral wrongs and lay claim to them, but is this rational?


If those in Guantanamo Bay are criminals, charge them with a crime and continue with due process. Let them rot in jail, but after, and only after we give them a trial by jury or put them up for waqr crimes.

Fair enough, but how certain are you that this has not been the case?
Sure you've read singular accounts that might lead you to this conclusion, but can you say that all of the detainees are innocent dupes?

If waterboarding is justifiable to those who think it's nessisary for national security against foriegn threats, is it then acceptable for those threats which are domestic? Should we treat organized crime in the same way we treat terrorism? The answer is an obvious "no." We shouldn't be torturing people in the first place.

No, the answer is not obviously NO.

I don't care who the terrorist might be or what their nationality might be. If an American citizen is credibly suspected of have information about a catastrophic event, I'm all OK with waterboarding him or her to get the info necessary to avoid the catastrophe

Organized crime in America doesn't present the same threat as do Islamists. If they did, I'm all for torturing them.

I keep hearing about what we must adapt to "in times of war." I've heard it for so long now, I've forgotten what a time of peace is, and what behaivors and decisions would no longer be concidered acceptable if we were not in conflict.

Your are so very young for this to be a credible argument. "So long" for you is most likely something less than 10 years. Hey, you are entirely entitled to your opinion and it should not be dismissed because of your restricted experience, but if you open the door, expect someone to enter.

My country doesn't stand for much anymore. Dream over. Honestly, I'd love for the UN to make a sanction against the USA for crimes against humanity. Even if futile it make shake some awareness and perspective into some Americans about what we have allowed our counry to become.

I don't know what country you lay claim to but mine, the USA, stands for quite a lot. If there was a truly objective international body that could investigate the relative sins of America, I would be all for it just to shut up the anti-American caterwaulers, however the UN cannot be relied upon for objectivity. If you think they can, you further reveal your innocense.

There is great virtue to youth. Perspective and rationality are not among the high points.

Dream over.

How sad. You've delivered a self-inflicted TKO.

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* The detainees were rounded up on a battle field, not by virtue of their ethnicity

Strawmen. Plural.

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A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "set up a straw man" or "set up a straw man argument" is to create a position that is easy to refute, then attribute that position to the opponent. Often, the straw man is set up to deliberately overstate the opponent's position.[1] A straw man argument can be a successful rhetorical technique (that is, it may succeed in persuading people) but it is in fact a misleading fallacy, because the opponent's actual argument has not been refuted.[2]

Its name is derived from the practice of using straw men in combat training. In such training, a scarecrow is made in the image of the enemy with the single intent of attacking it.[3] It is occasionally called a straw dog fallacy, scarecrow argument, or wooden dummy argument.

An ad hominem argument, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: "argument to the man", "argument against the man") consists of replying to an argument or factual claim by attacking or appealing to a characteristic or belief of the person making the argument or claim, rather than by addressing the substance of the argument or producing evidence against the claim. The process of proving or disproving the claim is thereby subverted, and the argumentum ad hominem works to change the subject.

It is most commonly used to refer specifically to the ad hominem abusive, or argumentum ad personam, which consists of criticizing or personally attacking an argument's proponent in an attempt to discredit that argument.

Other common subtypes of the ad hominem include the ad hominem circumstantial, or ad hominem circumstantiae, an attack which is directed at the circumstances or situation of the arguer; and the ad hominem tu quoque, which objects to an argument by characterizing the arguer as acting or arguing in accordance with the view that he is arguing against.

Ad hominem arguments are always invalid in syllogistic logic, since the truth value of premises is taken as given, and the validity of a logical inference is independent of the person making the inference. However, ad hominem arguments are rarely presented as formal syllogisms, and their assessment lies in the domain of informal logic and the theory of evidence.[1] The theory of evidence depends to a large degree on assessments of the credibility of witnesses, including eyewitness evidence and expert witness evidence. Evidence that a purported eyewitness is unreliable, or has a motive for lying, or that a purported expert witness lacks the claimed expertise can play a major role in making judgements from evidence.

Argumentum ad hominem is the converse of argumentum ad verecundiam, in which the arguer bases the truth value of an assertion on the authority, knowledge or position of the person asserting it. Hence, while an ad hominem argument may make an assertion less compelling, by showing that the person making the assertion does not have the authority, knowledge or position they claim, or has made mistaken assertions on similar topics in the past, it cannot provide an infallible counterargument.

The argumentum ad hominem is a genetic fallacy and red herring, and is most often (but not always) an appeal to emotion.

Nuff said.

can you say that all of the detainees are innocent dupes?

If those in Guantanamo Bay are criminals, charge them with a crime and continue with due process. Let them rot in jail, but after, and only after we give them a trial by jury or put them up for war crimes.

Organized crime in America doesn't present the same threat as do Islamists.

Generally, people do shameful things because they think they are justified. In this case they were very wrong, but their intent was not so black and white. This in no way excuses what they did.

If an American citizen is credibly suspected of have information about a catastrophic event, I'm all OK with waterboarding him or her to get the info necessary to avoid the catastrophe.

This time I'm not going to go through everyone, I'll only show you one, the rest you are free to figure out on your own. I understand quite well the concept of a strawman. I think I illustrated that well,

... and if you have your doubts, you're welcome to illustrate how I've mislabeled the arguement as per definition. If you're not willing to do so, saying you have your doubts is really meaningless.

For instance:

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

can you say that all of the detainees are innocent dupes?

when I said...

Diest TKO wrote:

If those in Guantanamo Bay are criminals, charge them with a crime and continue with due process. Let them rot in jail, but after, and only after we give them a trial by jury or put them up for war crimes.

I don't have enough information (very few do) to make judgement on the detainee's guilt. It's ultimately irrelavant though. The suspension of Habeas Corpus for these individuals makes us look like hypocrites, worse, it makes us hypocrites. These individuals being proven (in any court) guilty or innocent has been bypassed and we have moved directly to a detention camp.

I won't say that any of them are innocent, but give them a trial, and show that we hold up to our own standards. This flexibility is dangerous.

As for Finn's arguments, his logical falacies are distracting from his factual falacies.

For instance:

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Organized crime in America doesn't present the same threat as do Islamists.

In essence this statement is true. But only in that it identifies that Organized crime and terrorism present different threats (methods/victims/etc). This statement fails to establish some measureable difference in how the threats are more or less severe. If he plans on making the arguement that organized crime is a lesser threat, he has failed.

In the same post he refers to shameful things from poor justifications made in the past, but in no way offers how the justification he offers differs from that of the past and it's shameful outcome.

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Generally, people do shameful things because they think they are justified. In this case they were very wrong, but their intent was not so black and white. This in no way excuses what they did.

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

If an American citizen is credibly suspected of have information about a catastrophic event, I'm all OK with waterboarding him or her to get the info necessary to avoid the catastrophe.

More than nuff said.

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Diest TKO wrote:

This time I'm not going to go through everyone, I'll only show you one, the rest you are free to figure out on your own. I understand quite well the concept of a strawman. I think I illustrated that well,

Up to this point you've illustrated nothing other than an ability to cut and paste a definition.

Quote:

... and if you have your doubts, you're welcome to illustrate how I've mislabeled the arguement as per definition. If you're not willing to do so, saying you have your doubts is really meaningless.

For instance:

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

can you say that all of the detainees are innocent dupes?

when I said...

Diest TKO wrote:

If those in Guantanamo Bay are criminals, charge them with a crime and continue with due process. Let them rot in jail, but after, and only after we give them a trial by jury or put them up for war crimes.

I don't have enough information (very few do) to make judgement on the detainee's guilt. It's ultimately irrelavant though. The suspension of Habeas Corpus for these individuals makes us look like hypocrites, worse, it makes us hypocrites. These individuals being proven (in any court) guilty or innocent has been bypassed and we have moved directly to a detention camp.

I won't say that any of them are innocent, but give them a trial, and show that we hold up to our own standards. This flexibility is dangerous.

Then respond to Finn's point with that counter-argument. He didn't say: "How can you say that all of the detainees are innocent dupes?" To call that a strawman is a stretch.

In any case, it's only one, and a very small one.

I gotta say, your frequent typo/misspellings are distracting from your point. Seriously, get a spell checker going ... or maybe take a little more time typing your words. I'm not grading your paper here, but you drop so many in a post it's ridiculous. You want to call this ad hominem, be my guest.