Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

So you went from claiming that CIA water boarding was part of the thread topic to now saying that's it's not irrelevant to mention it. In other words, you were wrong. I accept your apology, tyro.
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Conde Lucanor
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by Conde Lucanor »

fiveredapples wrote:So you went from claiming that CIA water boarding was part of the thread topic to now saying that's it's not irrelevant to mention it. In other words, you were wrong. I accept your apology, tyro.
No. I'm just using your own statements, but as you can easily see, that only leads to contradictions:

1) First, you state an issue in your introductory statement.
2) Then, that statement is quoted in a response.
3) You complain that issue it's not the topic of the debate and should be kept out.
4) Then you're told you should have kept it out yourself from your posts.
5) Then you get mad. To make things worst for you, several instances of the same issue are quoted from your other posts in the thread.
6) You say those statements are irrelevant to the real issue, even though you mentioned them.
7) You are asked why would you complain about someone talking about an issue that you say is irrelevant to the topic, if you talked about that issue yourself.
'8) You look the other way.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

I'm not wasting my time explaining things that are irrelevant. I don't care what you think. I don't care what "winning" point you think you've made. Philosophy people will understand who's right, here, and that's all I care about. I don't write for morons to agree with me. I'd be disappointed if that happened. So, have your say on whether CIA water boarding is part of this topic. You can even have the final say on the matter like Greta had on the Water Boarding debate, where she took the opportunity to misrepresent the argument we had. The biggest fucking moron took it upon herself to mischaracterize the thread. Brilliant Left Wing propaganda. Lose the debate but summarize with lies. So, it's all yours. I won't waste my ability on idiots.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

Back to real philosophy. I will pick up where I left off.
So how does the UN decide which cases of inflicting severe pain are cases of torture and which cases of inflicting severe pain are not torture? It'll help to look, again, at the 6 Cases they list in which inflicting severe pain counts as torture:

1) obtaining information
2) obtaining a confession
3) punishment
4) intimidation
5) coercion
6) discrimination
Let's rehash a little. We saw that the purpose behind adding the 'purpose' clauses (above) was to divide the cases of intentionally inflicting severe pain into those that are torture and those that aren't torture, because, as is tacitly assumed by the UN itself, not all cases of intentionally inflicting severe pain are cases of torture. In other words, we established that 'intentionally inflicting severe pain' is a necessary condition, but it alone doesn't constitute torture. This brings us to the 'purpose' clauses. So we should ask: How do each of these clauses, these particular circumstances, make an intentional inflicting of severe pain an act of torture? In other words, what is philosophically at work in each of these special circumstances such that they make intentional inflicting of severe pain acts of torture? Do we have a coherent answer for each case? And are these cogent answers?

I will start from #6 and work my way through to #1.

With (6) discrimination, there's a connotation of it being infelicitous, whether ethically, morally, or legally, so how could the purpose of discriminating against someone cause this person to lose his right to consent or not consent to having severe pain inflicted on him? Nothing comes to mind, so that explains why we instantly think that it would be torture to intentionally inflict severe pain on someone for the purpose of discriminating against him. And even that phrasing should sound strange. After all, wouldn't we discriminate first and then inflict the severe pain? We aren't discriminating in inflicting the pain, are we? Either way, it's not an important thing to clear up. Our wanting to discriminate against someone wouldn't cause him to lose his right to consent or not consent to the severe pain.

With (5) coercion and (4) intimidation, it's a similar story. How could our wanting to coerce or intimidate someone cause him to lose his right to consent or not consent? Again, we're left without an answer, so those too look like clear cases of intentionally inflicting pain on someone without his required consent, as he has not lost his right to consent or not consent.

With (3) punishment, the matter is a little more tricky, I believe. I think if we had this discussion, say, 100 years ago, our answer might be different simply because what we think is appropriate as punishment has changed over time. We are now more averse to causing others pain, and this stretches to cases of punishment too. So while floggings were once considered appropriate punishment for certain wrong doings, now it would probably be considered torture for the same wrong doings. In fact, the entire thinking about 'punishment' in general has changed such that most people think it's wrong to punish criminals by causing them pain. I can't say I agree with this, but that's irrelevant. The point is that 'punishment' too now doesn't seem to cause the one punished, guilty though he be, to lose his right to consent or not consent to the severe pain. And this is true despite the fact that in talking about punishment we're supposing a wrong doing has taken place by the one being punished. So, punishment is different as a purpose because we at least start to attribute malfeasance to the person being inflicted with severe pain. Yet we now no longer think it's appropriate to punish him with severe pain, so most people will readily agree that punishment doesn't cause the person to forfeit his right to consent or not consent, so Act X (an act of intentionally inflicting severe pain on someone) is torture in such cases. (Again, I think this is a debatable topic, but it's not this thread's topic.)

With (2) obtaining a confession, we have something along the lines of 'punishment.' If we think of the matter as a legal one, then the law doesn't permit causing severe pain in order to extract confessions, so then the person wouldn't forfeit his right to consent or not consent in such cases. Mind you, we have to settle which set of laws apply and to whom. But most people lazily think of the US laws and apply them across the board in all cases, so they come away thinking that's it's always wrong to cause severe pain to anyone to get a confession. But, generally, the thought is that if we have enough evidence to strongly believe he committed the crime, then why do we need his confession? And if we don't have enough evidence to strongly believe he committed the crime, then why are we causing him severe pain? In other words, in neither case does it seem like he has lost his right to consent or not consent.

This brings us to the most interesting case: (1) obtaining information.

And, that's it for today. Sorry once again to cut off at the most interesting part, but I need to rest to do this some justice.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

Let's pick up where we left off. We were trying to answer the question of how each of the purpose clauses, the particular circumstances, make an intentional inflicting of severe pain an act of torture. The answer with regard to discrimination, coercion, and intimidation seems simple enough: none of these purposes causes someone to forfeit his right to consent or not consent to being inflicted with pain, let alone severe pain.

With respect to punishment, the rationale was different but ultimately the conclusion the same: the person does not forfeit his right to consent or not consent to severe pain.

With respect to obtain a confession, the rationale was different yet again but the conclusion the same: the person doesn't forfeit his right to consent or not consent to severe pain in those circumstances.

To answer the question with respect to 'obtaining information,' it's best to look at the other purposes to notice that we subscribe to certain moral codes of conduct with respect to those goals. So, for example, we think that physical punishment -- that is, causing pain -- is not acceptable in dealing with our children nor inmates. The punishment (such as spanking) may be performed as a way to edify your child, but you aren't supposed to spank him simply to punish him. And even if you think it's not a prison's job to rehabilitate, it's clear that we no longer believe it's right to cause them physical pain. When it comes to discrimination, coercion, and intimidation, we already consider these immoral acts or at least forms of malfeasance such that their pursuit would in no way cause somebody else to lose his right to consent or not consent to being inflicted with severe pain.

But what about obtaining information? What moral codes, what moral wrong-doing or moral malfeasance, do we attach to obtaining information? None! Obtaining information is a perfectly morally neutral purpose. Yet the UN pretends as if it (obtaining information) is somehow morally tainted such that it makes any act of 'intentionally inflicting severe pain' an act of torture. The reason why 'obtaining information' looks so out of place on this list of purposes is because it is out of place. It doesn't belong on the list as it cannot do any of the philosophical work that the other purposes at least seemingly do. 'Obtaining information' as a purpose is completely morally neutral and thus does not delineate the circumstances under which an act of intentionally inflicting severe pain on someone would be an act of torturing that person. In other words, 'obtaining information' is morally inert. It does not belong on this list as it does not square with our conception of torture.

The UN has given us a poor definition of torture. Worse yet, its implementation would give precisely the wrong moral verdicts in many of the ethical arguments and debates that relied upon it for their definition of torture.

This is my conclusion for now, but I'll have to re-read what I've written and maybe clean up some things later.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

I want to say that this thread, this exercise in trying to unpack, or simply fully understand, the UN's conception of torture is far from a polished work. Writing a philosophy paper on this topic would require a lot of rephrasing, a lot of following certain trains of thoughts further, and elucidating some ideas better, but this is the leg work necessary to writing such a paper. I concede that in some aspects I have stopped short or spoken loosely, and in some technical sense I have said some incorrect things, but this is as it should be, as, again, this is a first draft.

I wanted to say something about the allure of 'obtaining information' as a purpose which allegedly makes an act of intentionally inflicting severe pain on someone an act of torture. The allure is that the purpose for causing this severe pain doesn't seem important enough. The thought is that while we might condone torture in cases of saving an innocent life, saving a school bus of children, saving thousands of innocents, we will not condone it for the purpose of "merely" having a few questions answered. That's what you're supposed to think when you read 'obtaining information,' which is a complete lie and sophistry meant to play on the unthinking. The dishonesty begins by calling 'obtaining information' a purpose to begin with, as if this is why anyone tortures others -- just to clear up some questions, the answers to which won't be used for anything other than the satisfaction of knowing the answers. That would truly be sadistic -- to torture someone just to clear up some questions you weren't completely sure about but that would serve no other purpose than being able to hear -- but never use -- the information. We don't even attribute such sadism to our enemies, yet the UN says "obtaining information" is a purpose. The purpose of saying that is to have an umbrella term that would imply that all interrogations that cause severe pain are acts of torture, which, again, is a complete lie. The UN is playing semantic tricks because it has no moral or legal argument for the conception of torture it uses. Their conception flies in the face of our conception. Their conception flies in the face of common sense. Their conception is a ruse meant for people who like the conclusions they can draw with it and don't care about putting any thought -- doing any real philosophy -- on the matter of torture.

One final caveat. While writing about the UN's conception of torture, the thought that torture is sometimes morally permissible came up. I didn't want to go down that road in this thread because it would have been off-topic. But I think it's a worthwhile philosophical road to go down, so that might perhaps be my next thread -- something about torture sometimes being morally permissible.
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by Harbal »

Torture is sometimes necessary yet no civilised society can condone it, it's a dilemma. One solution would be to have some kind of secret security organisation working behind the scene to do the job without us having to know about it. That could be the answer. :|
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

Harbal wrote:Torture is sometimes necessary yet no civilised society can condone it, it's a dilemma.
While we agree that it's sometimes necessary, that doesn't tell us anything about the topic of this thread nor even on a more general topic such as the morality of torture. The reason I say this is because all we're saying is that "it's sometimes necessary," but necessity, at least the kind suggested here, doesn't imply moral permissibility. So, if you're in the camp that says torture is morally impermissible or in the camp that says torture is sometimes morally permissible, you can take the position that torture is sometimes necessary.
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by Harbal »

fiveredapples wrote: So, if you're in the camp that says torture is morally impermissible or in the camp that says torture is sometimes morally permissible, you can take the position that torture is sometimes necessary.
My opinion: You can't both call yourself civilised and say torture is permissible, but, you can't let innocent people die if torturing an individual could lead to it's prevention. All you can do is to rationalise yourself into your preferred position.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

My opinion: You can't both call yourself civilised and say torture is permissible,....
Of course you can. You're simply running with the assumption that torture is uncivilized. That's a premise for which you have no argument, nor even thought to defend, nor likely have ever defended. But this is a philosophy forum, and no one has to accept your assumptions.

This forum is mostly infested with people who cannot provide arguments. This is why I can write reams and reams of philosophy only to meet with one-liners. These clowns actually think their pronouncements mean something. Who cares what you or I believe. We can all state our beliefs in very colorful and emphatic ways -- but that's not thought, that's not persuasive, that's not philosophy.

So what you get in a forum like this is the following: Someone like me will provide a long argument with many premises, many inferences, many explanations, many threads of reasoning, and finally come to a conclusion. Then the morons here will simply reject the conclusion without addressing any part of the argument provided. Why? Because they cannot debate on points of logic and philosophy, so they simply make pronouncements and wait for fellow morons to chime in agreement. That's what passes for 'philosophy' here. Here, ignoring someone's arguments but objecting to the conclusion passes off as "doing philosophy." Oh gee, if only my pronouncement carried such philosophical clout that I didn't need to provide arguments to be persuasive. Yet this is the mantra of morons: "I disagree; therefore, I am a philosopher."
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Harbal
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by Harbal »

fiveredapples wrote:
My opinion: You can't both call yourself civilised and say torture is permissible,....
Of course you can.
Not in my opinion.
That's a premise for which you have no argument
Well obviously not, as it's only an opinion.

Herein lies the pointlessness of your thread and your "arguments", think deeply on it and I'm sure you'll see what I'm trying to show you.
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fiveredapples
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Re: Analyzing the UN definition of 'torture'

Post by fiveredapples »

You're showing me that you don't do philosophy. Nothing more.
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