<Don't ask questions if you can't handle how people answer them.>

Sheik, are you having a bad day?

Where did I say anything about my having a problem iwth how people answer them.

Reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeefucking-lax. People can answer any question however they want. Have at it.

So, I say again, "Please answer the question with the assumptions in place."

Is this a difficult question for you? I hope so, y'r not human if it's not.

<The sad fact of the matter is torture of any form rarely results in useful information.>

I see. So, if you knew that there was a bomb somewhere that you knew was close to where one of your loved-ones lived or worked, you'd just ask them nicely? Bullshit. If you had that person in YOUR hands, you'd just wait 'till the cops showed up to give them their Constitutional rights? You'd wait until they went through the judicial system and hope that your loved one was not blown up and you had to bury what was left of them?

Bullshit.

This is the kind of question as, 'What would you do if you had in your hands someone that killed your loved one?' While I do not believe in capitol punishment, I'd not want to be the guy that was under my control in this situation. That's where any Buddhist nature ends...

<The usual circumstances in which torture results in "useful" information is when the interogators already know something and ask for confirmation - which, of course, they get.>

If you say so.

<that said, its absurd, the whole setup is idiotic since how would you KNOW theres a bomb but not its location?>

Thus the hypothetical.......the point of the question is the hypothetical, NOT the actual logic around this question. That's why hypotheticals are so difficult. They pin-point a difficult issue and ask people to make difficult choices. This is one of those.

<torture is NOT a good way of getting information as all interrogation experts agree.>

Well, obviously some disagree.

<still, that hypothetical is good at arguing for torture, at least in 2008 America, which is looking more and more like post-WWI germany all the time.>

No, I disagree about the latter part of that question.

Here's another one:

In Iraq, the military has good intel that a group that they have been looking for has been placing IADs is located at X locations, where our troops will be going the next day, but they don't know exactly where. They go to X location and they catch the guys there who making IADs. More IADs are right there. The military finds cryptic maps that make sense to ONLY those that know how to read the maps, and the unreadable maps show 20 IADs there were JUST places the day before, not one having a chance to go off yet.

What do they do? Ask nicely? Or, just put the guys in jail and hope that these guys see the error of their ways and choose to give up the info on their own?

Or, do they just wait until the IADs go off and hope that no one is seriously harmed?

How about if the FBI is legally tapping a terrorist IN YOUR CITY, and they find out that these terrorists have planted some really, really big bombs in areas where kids congregate, but they don't know if these places are schools, or maybe movie theaters or maybe kindergarden classrooms... They KNOW that there are bombs, there's no question about it.....they have the guys that make the bombs...............they just don't know where the bombs are............

What should they do?

<but its not enough reason to let our government sink to Nazi level morality.>

Saving the lives of dozens of our troops or children is not "enough reason"? Really?

Well, I disagree. Waterboard them.

They KNOW

How many situations, where water boarding has been used, fit this criteria?

I've been digging around to test the veracity of what some here believe, and it's a mixed bag.

Here's one quote, "A Japanese Admiral is captured in the last week of November 1941, by covert means, and is asked where the Imperial Japanese Fleet has gone. He refuses to tell, and is subjected to torture, and then gives some inaccurate information on December 1st. He is told that the information will be verified within 48 hours, and if it is incorrect, the torture will be more severe. He then provides the accurate information...Yes, it is hyperbolic hypothetical, but it illustrates that when information coerced by torture can be verified, and the torture victim fears the outcome of providing inaccurate information, torture can be effective."

Yes, torture is wrong on any level. Even waterboarding, the lesser of all evils in terms of torture is STILL torture - and it's wrong.

I just wonder how super-human all these terrorists are compared to us. Which of us - if waterboarded - would not give the person asking the info the info that the person wanted? Hitchens would have, right? Would YOU? Would YOU have the presence of mind to lie convincingly enough so that they'd believe you? I doubt it. And, ESPECIALLY when the information - such as my hypotheticals - are VERIFIABLE, like the successful example above.

Another site had a situation similar to the one above where the interrogators (hypothetically or not, I do not remember) were able to verify the information, thus allowing IMMEDIATELY to find out if the information was correct or not.......just like in my hypotheticals.

I simply DO NOT believe that people here would NOT want that terrorist waterboarded if THEIR loved ones were the ones that were maybe going to die if the information was not received. I just can't picture anyone sitting at a funeral of their loved one, saying, 'X is dead, but we're a better country because we did not torture the person that would have resulted in X still being alive today.' Bullshit. I don't believe ANYONE who says that. Well, unless they are a long-time Buddhist or maybe super-religious in another way, that is, who are able to separate the care that they have for their loved ones and these moral quandaries.

I'm just saying that while I find torture to be abhorrent to say the least, if MY loved ones were on the chopping block? Well......I don't know if my morals would hold up, and after this discussion, I do not think that they would, and I don't believe ONE PERSON HERE who would possibly let their loved ones die for this theoretical ideal of 'good vs. evil'.

Whatever. I don't believe you.