Torture
* always has a sexual component to it.
* brings false confessions, while some tortures end in death.
* can destroy a person's ability to feel joy
  - have devastating physical and psychological consequences
* constitutes a gross violation of basic human rights and human dignity.
* creates evil and causes unacceptable suffering for individual victims and their families.
* crime against humanity.
* crime under international law'
* has no political, religious, cultural, gender, class or age boundaries.
* involves hurting an animal, giving the animal no option but to endure the pain.
* is almost synonymous with unbearable pain and suffering.
* is also endemic in China, where the use of electric shocks and leg irons is widespread
  - routine in the interrogation of suspects in cases of common crime
* is an act that defies the boundaries of language
  - aggravated, or worse form of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
  - attempt to destroy a fellow human being physically and mentally
  - egregious violation of human rights and the inherent dignity of the individual
  - extreme form of cruel and inhuman treatment
  - inhuman form of gaining a confession
  - banned but in two-thirds of the world's countries it is still being committed in secret
  - believed to play a role in a number of deaths in custody
  - common among serial killers
  - endemic in many countries in Asia
* is forbidden at all times and in all circumstances
  - under the Constitution and it criminal act under the Penal Code
  - one of the most horrible things one person can do to another
  - perpetrated worldwide, yet it is an international crime
  - persecution
  - pervasive in the justice system in Saudi Arabia
  - routine in Algerian prisons
  - routine, particularly in police custody
  - sanctioned as a means of securing confessions
* is the act of allowing or causing excruciating pain for the purpose of punishment
  - assault on a helpless human being
  - deliberate infliction of pain to extract information or to punish opponents
* is the most convenient form of coercion in times of no war
  - private of human rights violations
  - to use pain to punish or force someone to do something
  - unacceptable under all circumstances, in all places and at all times
* is used as an instrument of power
  - by more than two-thirds the world's governments
* is used to extract confessions and to enforce discipline
  - information or confessions and as a form of punishment
  - interrogate prisoners of war
  - intimidate, to silence dissent
  - punish people, to obtain information, or to make people afraid
  - silence the voice of dissent
  - violence
  - widespread and systematic
  - widespread, even in the most civilized of nations
* leads to countless deaths every year.
* long-standing problem in Turkish police stations and gendarmeries.
* operates on the principle of reversal, which includes the perversion of all cultural taboos.
* persists daily, all over the world, even though it flouts international law.
* predominates as blood pours from open wounds and the intestines come out from the bodies.
* refers to an act resulting in severe suffering, either physical or psychological or both.
* results in physical disabilities, sometimes permanent.
* takes place in detention centres and in prisons.
* thrives in darkness.
* worldwide, man-made epidemic.

Tempering
* decreases hardness and strength, but increases ductility and toughness.
* form of heat treatment that controls the toughness and hardness of steel.
* helps to prevent the eggs from curdling.
* is actually a re-heating and slow cooling process
  - especially important if fish are going from cool water to warm water