It's a been a pretty hotly-debated issue in (politico-)philosophical circles for the past 400 years; so don't think it'll be easy.
Torture is wrong, bad, illegal, and ineffective. In a modern world it shouldn't be supported, even from an "Old Testament" sort of good guy.
And the philosophical debate is far from over; it is ongoing: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/torture/ Reading some of the literature can be quite fascinating.
Ouch, the down-votes :(
Wary minds see/hear these words and immediately ignore any of your content. Think of it as a debating equivalent of pulling a godwin.
Bob says: yeah it's pretty easy to see that every even integer greater than 2 can be expressed as the sum of two primes.[1]
I say: not so fast, you can't just claim things like that. I mean it might be intuitive or 'generally accepted' (and even stochastically probable!), but the truth-value of such a statement is difficult to prove.
[1] Goldbach's conjecture.
For the record, I'm pretty sure torture is usually morally wrong. But I also think that there are many cases where it may be permissible, e.g. the ticking time-bomb thought experiment.
(Detractors of the ticking time-bomb experiment will argue that it's a fabricated scenario which never happens in real life. I don't think that's true.)
I think to say "torture is always wrong" is just something to say to fit in socially. I don't think you can make moral decisions about any action murder, theft, etc; there must be a contextual framework and hierarchy of values.
His argument is clearly based on the philosophical framework of Virtue Ethics. You can refer to the literature on that, if you want the arguments. Though I can tell you now, contextualism is quite orthogonal to Virtue Ethics.
FWIW, I don't think it's "wishy-washy" at all, definitely less so than stating "I'm against torture mostly, except for <contrived hypothetical situation>".
> I think to say "torture is always wrong" is just something to say to fit in socially.
This is just assuming bad faith. People that base their moral framework on things like Virtue Ethics definitely don't do it for social acceptance.
> I don't think you can make moral decisions about any action murder, theft, etc; there must be a contextual framework and hierarchy of values.
In theory, maybe. In practice, similarly to utilitarianism, it is completely unworkable. It's the wrong way out, morality is not a matter of engineering, fortunately there are other options.
If you must rationalize it, go ahead. But you can argue yourself into any number of conclusions. In the end that's a game with no winner.
This thread speaks volumes about the low moral character found in people like 'Ronco' and much of the SV wannabe culture.
This smacks of the kind of inane, conversation drowning behavior of PETA. What is theoretically wrong with the "ticking time bomb," since you wrote that specifically? What is the lapse in logic or the shaky philosophical flaw in the "theory?" And then you go and besmirch the whole "SV wannabe culture" because they don't have the same thoughtless moral certainty that you do.
Reasonable people can disagree and it does not mean one side is evil or one is stupid, necessarily. I think it is a bit much to say Ron Conway is despicable or whatever because of this.
It's not quite about torture per se (which is actually a clear moral good vs evil issue - after all you don't hear people saying we need to consider both sides of the rape argument to reach a balanced view).
Point here being that PG wrote a feelgood piece about the SV great and good that will be lapped up by many who are engaged in tech. Central to the piece is that Ronco's success was down to his great character so it is entirely on topic to discuss. But (a bit like Google's "don't be evil") when you scratch the surface of the subject there's a quite different story which reveals the article as a bit of a propaganda piece (whether or not unwittingly).
The only counter-argument is, does it actually happen in real life? Some say yes, some say no.
For example: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/10/world/kidnapping-has-germa...
The assumption is not at all moronic.
In a ticking time bomb scenario, a suspected terrorist might or might not give up the correct location of the device in many circumstances - could be a lead pipe, asking nicely, bribery, being attractive, making a convincing moral argument, or they may be unwilling, or unable in the event that they are innocent. Clearly none of those can be assumed and it won't be the same each time.
So even if one were to look at it from a purely amoral utilitarian viewpoint - even on those kind of sociopathic terms it is still absurd and very telling for an individual to seize on torture as a magic bullet for obtaining success. When we also consider that torture is widely documented as ineffective for gathering information, we are left with sadists, stupids, and immature creeps whose understanding of the world is based on action movies.
On the contrary, the only people proposing torture are doing it from a purely emotional standpoint. And what a disgusting and shameful emotional standpoint they are revealing themselves to have.
Did you actually read the original article [1]? Nowhere does Ali Soufan really make a case that torture is actually ineffective. Soufan makes claims that digging through receipts and conventional methods were more effective than whatever "torture" the CIA actually did but nowhere is the claim "torture is not effective" substantiated.
You are showing your emotions by claiming that anyone that could think torture could be effective (setting aside the decision to use it based on moral grounds) must only be doing so because of emotions. Is thinking that digging through someone's receipts during an investigation also an emotional position? What you have made is a non sequitur.
Take the emotion out of it. Where is the actual evidence or theory of why it cannot possibly work? The problem you have is that any example of torture yielding the intending information disproves your position entirely. You will really make that claim? As well, I asked what is the delineation because everyday parents as well as police use the tactics on the spectrum of discomfort to yield results often-times (nothing is perfect) the results are obtained. So where is this magical line of delineation? I don't think it exists. You are only proving the point that the fact based decision of whether or not torture can be effective in yielding information is being made based on emotion rather than reality. The Mexican military have used the tactics of torture to discover information that they were trying to find and in instances they did yield that information. [2] Again, any instance that shows that it "works" disputes directly your claim. Now, again, this is separate from our decision not to use such tactics because they are wholly disgusting and morally despicable but we are being coy if we claim it does not work because we want to make ourselves feel better.
1. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/opinion/06soufan.html?_r=2... 2. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07...
You are missing the point entirely. Sure it can sometimes work (hence my lead pipe comment). However, it is widely documented as one of the poorest methods available for getting accurate information. The only reason left for favouring it therefore is simply an emotional one - and a deeply nasty emotion at that.
Your pseudo-utilitarian line of argument could just as well be applied to rape or murder. But these are cultural universals - the fact is that all societies consider these things, including torture, to be immoral and crimes (and yes they still occur of course). To be debating 'both sides of the argument' in these issues as if it were somehow a reasonable activity is therefore objectively a sign of individual and societal sickness.
Don't fool yourself, the systematic practise of torture is no different from the systematic practise of murder or rape (indeed it often includes those acts even in modern times) - to be an apologist for this is something that will shame you to your grave. To paraphrase Father Phil from The Sopranos, now you can never say that nobody told you.