Even if I knew, I would say no to torture. If you torture a terrorist, what have you accomplished? If you save the lives of x people while dehumanizing one, you have just accomplished his goal for him. He no longer needs to kill anyone to achieve his desired end. As I've stated before on other issues, the end cannot justify the means.
He wanted to die? The goal of the terrorist was to kill millions of people, he didn't accomplish his goal...
How can you make a decison without examining the consequences of your decision, ie. the end?
What if someone had a nuclear weapon aimed at NYC that was set to launch and the only way to disable it was to get a code out of him?
Given the choice between the torture of one man and utter devastation, you are saying that the better consequence would be the loss of millions of innocent lives?
I don't buy that.
The goal of terrorists is to sink us to their level. They can accomplish this in two ways: kill so many of us that we go insane and throw aside every value that we hold, or simply by us torturing them, thereby throwing aside every value that we hold. If they can accomplish that without killing millions of people, I'm not sure why they should even bother killing everyone.
You completely ignored what I said. "As I've stated before on other issues, the end cannot justify the means." The question is not about the consequence, but about the action. You can never know the final consequences of your actions, but you can know the rightness of your actions. If you torture him, what's to say you won't anger 10 people with nukes and more people will die?
You have just named perhaps the most extreme hypothetical situation. Incidentally, it is also extremely rare. Allowing torture with just this sort of event in mind makes it legal in that instance, yes... but it also makes it legal in many other instances where the consequences are drastically less severe, and in which torture is completey unjustified. Of course, it counters his question, technically. But it is still a poor justification for the legalization of torture.
Besides, in this extremely rare hypothetical situation, a person would probably be willing to break the law to stop the weapon from launching.
If I have to listen to the leader of my country speak in broken sentences, make up words, mangle words, use words incorrectly, and embarass this country with verbal blunder after verbal blunder, then hell yes, torture the rest of the world also.
This fool can't say a complete sentence without pausing and reading the next part of the sentence. This is torture to anyone with an IQ over 90, I only wish dumbya's IQ were that high
This fool can't say a complete sentence without pausing and reading the next part of the sentence. This is torture to anyone with an IQ over 90, I only wish dumbya's IQ were that high
Cyclo -
"the end cannot justify the means"
this is one of the most overused, useless phrases. the end absolutely can justify the means. let me give you a hypothetical thought experiment:
you're the conductor of a train that cannot be stopped. you're on a straight track, but there's a split in the track up ahead and you get to choose if you want to go right or left.
on the right side of the split, there are four people bound to the track - if you go that way you will kill all four people.
on the left side of the split, there is one person - if you go that way you will kill one person.
Which way do you choose to go???? Obviously to the left, where there is only one person.
But wait what's the "end" in this case. It's saving the lives of four people.
But what's the "means" in this case. It's killing one person.
Yet clearly, the "end" of saving four people justifies the "means" of killing one person.
In many, many cases you can make an adequate guess as to what the end will be (just see the thought experiment above - cases where you have to choose how many people die and live - shooting down a suicide plane that's going to crash into a skyscraper for example). And the end is noble enough to justify the means, even if it means killing people.
edit - format
You may not know with absolute certainty what the consequences of your actions are, but you should always choose the action with best consequences, shouldn't you?
If I believe, based on my best knowledge that torturing one man would save the lives of millions, I'd do it, as distasteful as it would be.
You're referencing a choice between the lesser of two evils, not and means/end scenario.
For example, does the prospect of a "free" Iraq justify the death of Iraqi civilians and destruction of so much of Iraq's infrastructure set in motion by Bush's unprovoked attack? And if you believe it does, does it also justify the lies told by Bush to initiate the means to that end? Even though the lies had nothing to do with a "free" Iraq to begin with?
And even so, using your scenario, what if that one person on the left track is the president of the U.S. and the four on the right are convicted murderers already sentenced to death?
We can invent hypotheticals all day long. The bottom line is this; the ends do not justify the means. What we may consider our means may very well be someone else's end.
Like all those "freed" Iraqi corpses.
The 'means' in your example can be defined differently. You're viewing it in a strictly utilitarian sense. Suppose the one man was the scientist who would cure cancer, HIV/AIDS, and discover cold fusion? What if you didn't know that and killed him before he had the chance to do these things? How would this affect the outcome of your decision? The point is the means you choose may very well have unexpected consequences. You can only do what you think is right (or at least the least wrong, in this case) given what you know at the time. You can never know the actions of another for certain in the future, so acting as if you can is completely improper.
What if you did know the one was the guy who would do all these things so you went to the right and killed the other four, then the guy on the left killed everyone on the train? You never would have anticipated it, yet it's one hypothetically possible outcome. All of a sudden, your simple utilitarian calculation isn't looking so good. In the end, you're simply arguing impossible hypotheticals in an effort to justify an unjustifiable position. This is probably the purpose of your thought experiment, but it's fundamentally flawed, IMO, because of the rules you base it on. I submit that torture is never justifiable in reality because you can never know another's actions before they carry them out.
No, there are certain cases when you should and certain when you should not.
For CycloWizard I posted this:
For you I have the following hypothetical:
You're on a deserted island. There's five people on there - a surgeon who is skilled in every possible way, a man healthy except for a damaged kidney (he will die if it is not replaced), a man healthy except for a damaged heart (he will die if it is not replaced), a man healthy except for a damaged lung (he will die if it is not replaced), and finally, a man healthy in every way.
Now, the only way to save those 3 people is to give them new organs. The surgeon can do the procedure if he had the replacement organs.
Do you kill and cut up the perfectly healthy man to save the other 3 people??? Obviously not (or we'd be doing this type of thing all the time today).
Why?
The end is great - You save 3 people.
But how do you do it? You have to kill a perfectly healthy person.
Thus, this is a case where the end does not justify the means
But let me make it clear. As shown by the two thought experiments above, there are cases when the ends justify the means, and there are also cases when the ends do not justify the means. There is not an absolute method in existence, or we would always know what was right and wrong, and many philosophers would be out of a job
You're changing the experiment. You're only attacking the rules of the experiment, as you say - and clearly just have issue whether we can know absolutely what the ends are. But clearly, the ends can justify the means, provided we can know the end (I simply hate that phrase).
To say that you cannot justify something because you don't absolutely know the end is really hampers one's ability to make decisions. For example, what if by not torturing that person, you don't get needed information in time and the second coming Jesus Christ is killed by a nuclear bomb as a result?
So does that mean torture is justifiable in reality because you can never know another's actions before they carry them out?
Clearly not.
We have to do our best to determine what the ends will be. And in certain cases, we must use the idea that it is possible for the ends to justify the means. And in other cases, we must reject the idea that the ends justify the means (see my post to Rip).
So I should choose my action based on something that I cannot know? That doesn't sound like a very good basis for judgment to me. One thing I do know is that if people hate us enough to nuke our civilians, torturing one man is not going to stop it from happening.
This may be the only time I've ever agreed with you. :thumbsup:Originally posted by: BBond
You're referencing a choice between the lesser of two evils, not and means/end scenario.
For example, does the prospect of a "free" Iraq justify the death of Iraqi civilians and destruction of so much of Iraq's infrastructure set in motion by Bush's unprovoked attack? And if you believe it does, does it also justify the lies told by Bush to initiate the means to that end? Even though the lies had nothing to do with a "free" Iraq to begin with?
And even so, using your scenario, what if that one person on the left track is the president of the U.S. and the four on the right are convicted murderers already sentenced to death?
We can invent hypotheticals all day long. The bottom line is this; the ends do not justify the means. What we may consider our means may very well be someone else's end.
Like all those "freed" Iraqi corpses.
Originally posted by: CycloWizard
So I should choose my action based on something that I cannot know? That doesn't sound like a very good basis for judgment to me. One thing I do know is that if people hate us enough to nuke our civilians, torturing one man is not going to stop it from happening.
This may be the only time I've ever agreed with you. :thumbsup:Originally posted by: BBond
You're referencing a choice between the lesser of two evils, not and means/end scenario.
For example, does the prospect of a "free" Iraq justify the death of Iraqi civilians and destruction of so much of Iraq's infrastructure set in motion by Bush's unprovoked attack? And if you believe it does, does it also justify the lies told by Bush to initiate the means to that end? Even though the lies had nothing to do with a "free" Iraq to begin with?
And even so, using your scenario, what if that one person on the left track is the president of the U.S. and the four on the right are convicted murderers already sentenced to death?
We can invent hypotheticals all day long. The bottom line is this; the ends do not justify the means. What we may consider our means may very well be someone else's end.
Like all those "freed" Iraqi corpses.
:thumbsup:
Like scaling Mt. Everest or unlocking the secrets of the atom, no matter how complex or difficult, once accomplished even the most incredible acts become commonplace.
Originally posted by: BBond
You're referencing a choice between the lesser of two evils, not and means/end scenario.
For example, does the prospect of a "free" Iraq justify the death of Iraqi civilians and destruction of so much of Iraq's infrastructure set in motion by Bush's unprovoked attack? And if you believe it does, does it also justify the lies told by Bush to initiate the means to that end? Even though the lies had nothing to do with a "free" Iraq to begin with?
And even so, using your scenario, what if that one person on the left track is the president of the U.S. and the four on the right are convicted murderers already sentenced to death?
We can invent hypotheticals all day long. The bottom line is this; the ends do not justify the means. What we may consider our means may very well be someone else's end.
Like all those "freed" Iraqi corpses.
The ends can justify the means, if we know what the ends are. See my other posts.
Just because the means is another person's end, does not make my end unjustifyable.
I'm not changing the experiment, just pointing out its flaws. You assert that, IF all ends were known with 100% certainty, that the means could be justified accordingly. I don't take exception to that statement. Unfortunately, this is NEVER the case, so we're back to square one, in reality, where the ends are never specified or known. Your experiment is futile, since it is similar to saying 'if 2=5, how would things be?' Your initial premise is simply false to the extent that it's not even a useful exercise to parade around it. If 2=5, then everything would be different. Unfortunately, we're stuck in a world where 2 != 5, so we have to go from there. Thus, I submit that I can do only what I see is right, without knowledge of the actions of other people affected by my actions.
Real-life example: One of my friends is/was (who knows) going out with a girl (psycho!). She is really sick, so he took a shuttle to a grocery store, bought a bunch of food, and made her dinner at her place, even fed her. She was so pissed that he picked a kind of soup she didn't like that she dumped him on the spot (like I said, psycho!). In this case, he could never have known her actions, so he chose the means he thought was best at the time without this knowledge. His actions were still right, even though the end didn't come out the way any of us would have anticipated (I'll even argue that the end was preferable to the one he wanted
). I guess my point, if I have one, is that right action will lead to the most desirable outcome, even if you don't see it. In the case of torture and all these hypothetical nukes, it's quite possible that, had someone acted appropriately a long time before according to right means (i.e. not installing dictators in the Middle East) that terrorism never would have developed and we wouldn't be in this predicament. This was probably not the intention of the guy who installed the dictators, but it's an end that might have been prevented had he used right means instead of seeking only to reach the desired end. /ramble
It is impossible to accomplish good through doing evil, no matter how desirable the ends. That is why I believe the ends cannot justify the means.
You know a tree by its fruit.
You know a tree by its fruit.
It's tempting to say that the end justifies the means, but isn't that exactly the reason and excuse terrorists use to justify what they do? shure, we BELIEVE and KNOW our cause is right, but do you really think they don't feel the same? how we feel about our thruth is absolutely worthless, because everyone has their own thruth, and it's impossible to "qualify" it.
terrorist feel that the western world, and the USA in particular, are in war with them, and just as we feel we are the rightous peace fighters, so do they.
terrorist feel that the western world, and the USA in particular, are in war with them, and just as we feel we are the rightous peace fighters, so do they.
Sorry, but IMHO, being known as a man or a nation of flexable or part-time principles does not accrue honor or esteem. Nor does it make you worthy of emulation.
Not to nitpick CycloWizard, but isn't 2! equal to 2? (1X2=2)
Not to nitpick CycloWizard, but isn't 2! equal to 2? (1X2=2)
Originally posted by: CycloWizard
I'm not changing the experiment, just pointing out its flaws. You assert that, IF all ends were known with 100% certainty, that the means could be justified accordingly. I don't take exception to that statement. Unfortunately, this is NEVER the case, so we're back to square one, in reality, where the ends are never specified or known. Your experiment is futile, since it is similar to saying 'if 2=5, how would things be?' Your initial premise is simply false to the extent that it's not even a useful exercise to parade around it. If 2=5, then everything would be different. Unfortunately, we're stuck in a world where 2 != 5, so we have to go from there. Thus, I submit that I can do only what I see is right, without knowledge of the actions of other people affected by my actions.
Real-life example: One of my friends is/was (who knows) going out with a girl (psycho!). She is really sick, so he took a shuttle to a grocery store, bought a bunch of food, and made her dinner at her place, even fed her. She was so pissed that he picked a kind of soup she didn't like that she dumped him on the spot (like I said, psycho!). In this case, he could never have known her actions, so he chose the means he thought was best at the time without this knowledge. His actions were still right, even though the end didn't come out the way any of us would have anticipated (I'll even argue that the end was preferable to the one he wanted
I guess my point, if I have one, is that right action will lead to the most desirable outcome, even if you don't see it. In the case of torture and all these hypothetical nukes, it's quite possible that, had someone acted appropriately a long time before according to right means (i.e. not installing dictators in the Middle East) that terrorism never would have developed and we wouldn't be in this predicament. This was probably not the intention of the guy who installed the dictators, but it's an end that might have been prevented had he used right means instead of seeking only to reach the desired end. /ramble
I don't think that it matters that you don't know what the ends are with absoute certainty. Afterall, none of us can predict the future.
When faced with a choice, taking everything you know into consideration, how would it be moral to chose the option that gives the worse consequence?
For me, the potential death of millions of innocent people would be a far worse consequence than the torture of one.
3chordcharlie
Diamond Member
- Mar 30, 2004
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Hehe... != means 'not equal to', not factorial.
How can you claim it's moral to commit an act that you know is evil? As I've already pointed out numerous times, there is no reasonable expectation that you will improve any situation through torture. However, there is reason to believe that if you act justly, good things will come from it, even if you can't see them at the time.
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