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.