[subego]

The premise of this thread is that one can gather useful intelligence from torture, however you choose to define it.

If one accepts that premise, I don't see a reason why this shouldn't be approached like any other scientific discipline, and is therefore open to all the same questions of what constitutes ethical research. To be clear, I'm not proposing torture should have the same ethical framework as other scientific disciplines, but I think there's no question it should have an ethical framework.

What would that be?


As a note, if you disagree with my opening premise, I propose your case will be better served by allowing unmolested discussion between those who agree. Likewise, there's already a thread where that question is in full swing.



I stole the naming convention from design219, so I want to give him credit.

[Uncle Skeleton]

The premise of torture conflicts with all medical and scientific ethics. If you're going to be considering any sort of research on torture (and I don't quite see how you decided to put the two together), I think it's safe to say that ethics will have nothing to do with it. All you'll be dealing with are issues of logistics and reliability, and possibly evading detection, but not ethics.

[SpaceMonkey]

If the ethical framework for the medical profession can be boiled down to "do no harm," then perhaps the equivalent ethical framework for a torture "profession" would be "do no permanent physical damage."

As an aside, I am disappointed that this thread will not be addressing MacNN as torture. Carry on.

[subego]

Originally Posted by SpaceMonkey 

As an aside, I am disappointed that this thread will not be addressing MacNN as torture. Carry on.

Way to wreck my Series 03.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

If you're going to be considering any sort of research on torture (and I don't quite see how you decided to put the two together)

I'll answer your entire question, but it seems prudent to tackle this part first.

Honestly, I'm a little stunned you don't see a connection. I'm pretty sure you're a scientist by profession, so I risk coming off like an asshole here, but isn't research the way we figure out how things work?

To put it another way, how do you determine reliability without research?

Edit: even if you're only getting your reliability data in situ, isn't that still research?

[subego]

Originally Posted by SpaceMonkey 

If the ethical framework for the medical profession can be boiled down to "do no harm," then perhaps the equivalent ethical framework for a torture "profession" would be "do no permanent physical damage."

Well, this certainly provides framework upon which to build, but at the cost of severely limiting what one could do with it.


Just to explain a little where I'm coming from here as to why I'm approaching this in a detached manner.

The three choices here seem to be: not approach it at all, approach it detached, or approach it indignantly. I choose the second because it strikes me the first and the third have little value. I'm open to different approaches.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by subego 

Honestly, I'm a little stunned you don't see a connection. I'm pretty sure you're a scientist by profession, so I risk coming off like an asshole here, but isn't research the way we figure out how things work?

To put it another way, how do you determine reliability without research?

Edit: even if you're only getting your reliability data in situ, isn't that still research?

I see a connection between science and most things in the world, not because there is one but just because, as they say, to a man with a hammer everything looks like a nail. But I don't see a connection with torture. The reason is in your post: I don't think we do care how torture works. The premise you stated in the OP was simply that it does work. From there, it doesn't really matter how. More to the point, anyone interested in using torture in the first place is only interested in getting results, and getting them as fast as possible. They are not interested in how the method works, they're not even interested in optimizing the method for the theoretical maximum yield. To this person, all they need is the premise you started from: it just works.

Besides that, I'm pretty sure the topic of torture methods would be part of psychology, a field I struggle to accept as a hard science to begin with, at least the higher order cognitive stuff like "what's the neurophysiological basis of ennui."

[Uncle Skeleton]

subego, I've thought it over and I think I must be missing something. Can you give an example or two of research on torture (not just research that counts as torture)?

[Kerrigan]

I think that the testimony of a servus should only be valid in court if obtained under torture.

[subego]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

The premise you stated in the OP was simply that it does work. From there, it doesn't really matter how. More to the point, anyone interested in using torture in the first place is only interested in getting results, and getting them as fast as possible. They are not interested in how the method works, they're not even interested in optimizing the method for the theoretical maximum yield. To this person, all they need is the premise you started from: it just works.

Close. I said it can work. I think even the hardest of the hardcore supporters of torture for intelligence gathering purposes wouldn't go so far as to say it does work. I think if one's opinion is "can", accuracy and reliability are paramount.

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Besides that, I'm pretty sure the topic of torture methods would be part of psychology, a field I struggle to accept as a hard science to begin with, at least the higher order cognitive stuff like "what's the neurophysiological basis of ennui."

Completely agreed, but it's all we've got.

As an aside, psychology is obviously a field where there are plenty of bioethics questions that aren't particularly cut and dried.

I also think the current standards are probably too ethical. I don't think you could swing the Milgram experiment now. I say this errs too much on the side of caution.

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

subego, I've thought it over and I think I must be missing something. Can you give an example or two of research on torture (not just research that counts as torture)?

This is a good question, so you're at least half getting it. I think the other half is my poor communication, as well as me taking such an unusual approach.

I can't really give you any examples, but I don't think it's safe to take that to mean they don't exist. They'd be considered very privileged information by those who generated them, and were the people who generated it part of the first world, it probably get them thrown in prison for participating.

[Uncle Skeleton]

What about historically? Or even theoretically? I'm just having a hard time conceptualizing what such an experiment would even be. It's not as simple as inflicting pain (cheaply/quickly/slowly/whatever), there is already such a thing as pain research, and I think it's clear that torture is more than the pain itself. It would have to translate that pain into... what? Then you get into what is a measurable positive outcome of torture. Is it information? How do you quantify it? Is it satisfaction of the experimenter? How can that possibly be "detached," as you put it?

It might just be that I've been institutionalized wrt scientific ethics, but I'm having trouble coming up with any "science of torture" that would make sense even without regard for ethics. Did you have anything in mind when you thought of this thread?

[subego]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

What about historically? Or even theoretically? I'm just having a hard time conceptualizing what such an experiment would even be...

Did you have anything in mind when you thought of this thread?

Well, I'm neither a scientist or a bioethicist, so this makes things a little dicey.

In fact, I'm so little of a bioethicist I question my own ethics for assuming a public forum is an appropriate place to debate this. I guess if I stand behind Milgram, or make a thread like this one, I should be less squeamish, but it's not like I'm actually as detached as I'm presenting myself.

That being said, I see it like any other experiment. You generate a hypothesis and test it.

Beyond ethics, the sticky part is coming up with the proper controls. The largest (but by no means the only) difficulty which comes to mind is how you can have a piece of information the experimenters can verify, but that the subjects also have a vested interest in keeping secret.

I can think of ways to do this, but it's dark territory.

Edit: likewise, IGT (Information Gathering Torture) is probably more an "art" than a "science" at this point, so it seems to me that much of the process at this juncture would be the conceptualization of how to run an experiment.

That, and coming up with three letter acronyms.

[subego]

To approach this from another angle, the first of the "torture series" was about waterboarding, which we will consider to be an example of torture for the purposes of this thread.

I believe there are circumstances wherein waterboarding someone will elicit useful information, but the sheer quantity of times the technique was used on Khalid Sheik Mohammed indicated to me information gathering wasn't the goal.

Despite the issue I have with the way it was used on KSM, those who like myself believe waterboarding is a "valid" form of IGT (as in it can produce the intended result) have a responsibility to consider the implications of its systematic application.

The most obvious (to me) initial question about its systematic application is, well... since it can't be systematic without a system, just what is that system?

Now, from a legislative standpoint, I think waterboarding should probably be illegal. This means that for myself, I've mooted the ethical question in practical terms.

I don't think that absolves me of the responsibility of considering the aforementioned implications, and it really doesn't absolve the people who think it should be legal.

I'm lookin' at you, Cheney. Why haven't you posted yet? Bawk, bawk?

[Uncle Skeleton]

Well it's clearly not "illegal" in all cultures (in as much as they have internal "laws" they respect). So in those cultures, do you think they have any experimentation going on to refine the technique? If so, what do you think they might be doing?

[subego]

I would imagine that in most places where it's legal they don't have the resources to refine it. You need to have significant foreign interests to be able to devote these kinds of resources to foreign intelligence gathering. If your problems are domestic, you only need straight T, with maybe a bullet in the head chaser.

Some oil-rich ME countries, China, and North Korea may be exceptions. I don't know to be honest, both in terms of the legal status in said countries and what actually goes on.

In most countries that have significant foreign interests, I'm pretty sure it's illegal. The ones I'd bet on having done this to some extent would be the ones with genuine enemies: The U.S., Russia (who will have also kept the old Soviet stuff), Israel, South Korea, Pakistan, and India.