Torture Can Be Acceptable

Thanks, MDH. In this round, I will be putting forth my constructive case as well as rebuttals to Pro's case. == AFF CASE ==My case entirely revolves around showing that humans have certain natural rights inherent in them which cannot be violated under any circumstance. I should note that this debate is operating under the assumption that morality exists in some form, given that Pro is using a utilitarian ethical framework for his case. What follows is a brief justification of the existence of inviolable human rights:One of the fundamental axioms of any ethical system is that every human being has ownership over his or her own person/self. This is simply a meta-ethical truth that must be assumed for the sake of continuing with any sort of ethical discourse; to deny that humans have this personal autonomy is to deny that there is anything morally significant about humans in relation to the rest of the amoral universe, which basically negates the need for morality to exist at all. In other words, the only way to rationally deny that human beings possess ownership over themselves is to take up a nihilistic framework, which is disallowed by the nature of this debate. I challenge my opponent to try coherently negating this premise of self-ownership; until he successfully does so, we can (and must) safely assume that it is true. Once we have established that every human has complete jurisdiction over themselves as an extension of their personhood, we naturally reach the conclusion that any act of aggression towards another human being is morally unacceptable, as it represents a clear violation of that right to self-jurisdiction. By committing an act of aggression against someone, you deprive them of their autonomy, and by extension, their humanity. Torture represents the epitome of an aggressive act, as it is the purposeful infliction of severe physical harm upon a person's body against their will. For this reason, torture is a moral abomination which only serves to dehumanize its victims and can never be considered 'acceptable'.== NEG CASE ==The ScenarioPro claims that his scenario does not have to be even vaguely plausible for it to affirm the resolution. However, under that logic, Pro can simply put forth any wildly outlandish fantasy as a scenario and still win, be it about alien species who can only communicate using torture devices or magical demon fairies that can change the rules of morality. The fact that we are debating this issue seriously as it relates to the 'real world' implies that Pro's situations must also be realistic to some extent; otherwise they become irrelevant and inapplicable. Here are a couple reasons why Pro's scenario is not reasonably plausible:1. The possibility of a nuclear attack on the United States, especially by a Middle Eastern terrorist group, is virtually non-existent. This view is held by numerous experts on international affairs: "Some states have access to universities, teams of scientists, huge facilities and large state budgets all aimed at creating a nuclear weapon, and even still those countries have difficulty in producing a usable weapon... Purchasing a weapon of mass destruction would also be extremely difficult for militant groups, as the United States spends hefty sums -- around 1 billion dollars per year -- to track and buy fissile material in a bid to keep it off the market, he said," [1]. This alone makes Pro's scenario unfeasible.2. Pro's scenario seems to imply that the person being held custody is already a well-known terrorist, yet it goes on to state that he has only just now been caught, with 3 hours left until his bomb detonates. However, it is *literally impossible* for such a notorious terrorist to have entered the United States without detection-- US border control and air transportation security is among the tightest in the entire world. It is entirely unrealistic that a'high ranking member of ISIS' could get into the US and have the degree of mobility/freedom that would be necessary to implement a plan as large-scale as a nuclear weapons attack completely under the radar. The Justification1. First and foremost, Pro doesn't even attempt to justify his utilitarian ethical framework, concluding that torture is warranted "in the interests of the greater good" without ever explaining *why* 'the greater good' should be valued above the protection of individuals human beings' natural rights. Since I have justified my rights-based deontological framework and he has not done so for his utilitarian framework, mine is preferable by default.2. Pro's use of utilitarianism justifies actions far beyond merely torturing the detained terrorist. If the 'greater good' is really important enough to justify rights violations, then there is virtually no upper limit to how much torture is permissible in order to protect it. The law enforcement officials could potentially bring in the terrorist's innocent family and torture/kill them in front of him to get him to talk, and it would be justified under the presumption of utilitarianism's soundness. Yet our ethical intuitions (which Pro does make use of in his argument) would completely reject such an act as completely despicable.3. Assuming that my second objection to Pro's scenario holds up and Pro is forced to change the detainee in the scenario to a "suspected terrorist", there is a significant possibility of the detainee turning out to be innocent, thus rendering the act of torture to be immoral even by utilitarian standards, since it would have only resulted in immense pain on the victim's part without any information being obtained (i.e. additional negative utility). Furthermore, when the government ends up violating the most basic human rights of its own citizens, it defeats the purpose of its own existence and becomes illegitimate. 4. The most critical observation to make is that torture is almost never effective, so, for the same reasons outlined in my third objection, it would be condemned even from a utilitarian outlook. Under the duress which is invoked by torture, the victim is much more likely to give false information or just be completely uncooperative in general. "...a growing number of behavioral scientists has begun researching interrogation and lie-detection methods in an effort to scientifically determine what works, what doesn't, and why... a general consensus has emerged that supports the experience of interrogators like Soufan: torture doesn't provide reliable intelligence, the U.S. government's list of approved interrogation techniques is outdated, and detecting liars based solely on body language is barely more reliable than flipping a coin... According to Reuters, a Senate Intelligence Committee report, which will be released this summer, is also expected to find little evidence that the CIA’s enhanced-interrogation program led to any major breakthroughs in the war on terror. And in a report released in 2009, the CIA’s own inspector general found no evidence that the agency’s practices stopped any imminent attacks. Nor could it ascertain whether the enhanced-interrogation techniques obtained information that the agency couldn’t have obtained through less coercive means." [2]And we do have empirical evidence of the disastrous consequences that can result from acting on such misinformation. False confessions which were obtained by the torturing of Libyan nationalist Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi in 2001 is what led the US Government to (falsely) conclude that the Iraqi government had ties to Al-Qaeda [3]. Moreover, psychological studies such as the Milgram Obedience experiment and one conducted by the FBI’s High Value Detainee Interrogation Group demonstrate that humans are much most likely to just do whatever is necessary to make the duress stop, whether that entails fabrications that conform to what the torturers want to hear, or complete unresponsiveness [2][4]. This is especially true given that the detainee in Pro's scenario is a radical Islamic leader-- such people have been known to value their beliefs above their own well-being [5].Pro claims that in his scenario, there wouldn't be enough time to use more humane, alternative methods of extracting information, but that is just patently false. Research on the effects of torture done by Matthew Alexander, who has much experience conducting/overseeing numerous interrogations that occurred during the Iraq War, has conclusively demonstrated that diplomatic methods of interrogation can be used to obtain more accurate information much more efficiently, being usable *even* in high-stress situations. One of his detainees even told him so directly: "I thought you would torture me, and when you didn't, I decided that everything I was told about Americans was wrong. That's why I decided to cooperate." [6].== CONCLUSION ==Torture is *never* morally permissible, as it inevitably results in a violation of the most fundamental of human rights. Even if we give preference to a utilitarian take on ethics (which we shouldn't because I have more fully substantiated my deontological framework), torture is still not acceptable because of its abhorrent implications, the possibility of innocence, and the fact that it is almost never effective. On top of all that, the scenario which Pro's entire case hinges on is highly questionable, being non-topical at best, and abusive at worst. Thus, the resolution is negated. Back to you, Pro![1] http://news.xinhuanet.com...[2] http://www.thedailybeast.com...[3] http://en.wikipedia.org...[4] http://psychology.about.com...[5] http://www.nydailynews.com...[6] http://archive.lewrockwell.com...