This is the point in dispute. I am completely skeptical that waterboarding can be executed in military situations (and yield the desired results) without committing the antecedent of the above conditional statement. If waterboarding did not inflict severe pain or suffering, I am highly skeptical that it would work as a coercive tool in prying information from enemies intent on our destruction. Looking at things from a commonsensical angle, the fact that waterboarding indeed inflicts severe pain and suffering would in fact be the reason it is effective in training troops (more on this below) as well as frightening prisoners into confessing desired information. The threshold of pain must be intense enough to coerce the confession, to induce a complete betrayal of both cause and one’s military fellows… and so interrogators therefore must toe the line of pain infliction to the place on the continuum where a prisoner feels his only and best remaining choice is betrayal and confession. (That the confession of information he offers is factual is a different subject entirely, and whether something like waterboarding is both effective AND moral is another consideration entirely as well). A little water up the nose is not going to get it done when these individuals are willing to strap bombs to their stomachs or run airplanes through sky scrapers… It’s gonna take a lot of water.

“Severe pain or suffering is not something people volunteer for, unless they are masochists; severe pain or suffering is not something we inflict on our own troops for training purposes, for why would we cause prolonged harm to our own special forces?”

The issue from here on out becomes one of context (I remember the concept of “context” as being incredibly important to at least one of the discussants here). Let us say that a man, for whatever sadistic reason, forces his 12-year-old daughter to tread water in the icy Atlantic for 2 hours – mind you while naked and posing as shark bait. The man imposing this excruciatingly painful task against her will would rightfully find CPS on his front doorstep. However, the same very task is imposed upon Navy SEAL candidates, who willingly take on such circumstances. The intent is to determine the overall pain tolerance and strength of the men attempting to pass BUD/S tribulations. Without question, the icy water and corresponding hypothermia, fatigue, and fear of death are painful in both cases. In the case of the daughter, the imposed suffering is considered child abuse, while the SEAL candidate opts to embrace such great suffering as an indicator of his military qualification. Thus, in the case of the SEAL, we find a refutation at one and the same time of the claim that “severe pain or suffering is not something we inflict on our own troops for training purposes” and that only masochists volunteer for severe pain and suffering: the SEAL proves his worth through willingly enduring such pain and danger. (If the test were not excruciatingly painful, the test would fail to certify that the SEAL candidate is capable of immense pain tolerance).

The difference in context (between US military training versus the interrogation of a known terrorist) reveals a great deal as well: the US military authority imposes waterboarding on our special forces who willingly sign up for such procedures as part of personal training and endurance trials, as preparation for and simulation of what might be imposed by the enemy, an enemy that chops off the heads of United States’ servicemen. If the Navy SEAL cannot endure the above oceanic scenario, however, he is taken out of the water and sent home, having failed the tribulation, but not pushed to the brink of death except in his own choosing. In all such cases the ability to decline further pain is afforded. There is, of course, no such friendliness offered in the context of the imprisoned terrorist. We inflict this pain against his will and with the aggressive intent to coerce – hopefully with the more water poured comes the eventual breaking of his will – and it is in such light, in such a context, that the entire debate must hinge.

I was answering a question that Tyler asked.

“unless you’re also suggesting that the government has the ability and will to (a) discern when it is or isn’t torture and (b) care. So far, there is no evidence of either.”

On the contrary, the released CIA memos, from what I have heard, show that they did make an effort not to cross the line into torture, so they did care about discerning whether or not they were inflicting severe suffering on KSM.

As for Hitchens, you are right, he said that it was torture, and I weigh that in thinking about whether waterboarding is torture. But, at the same time, it puzzles me that he would experience something he considers torture and then ask to go through it again. That may not be worth a bit in your book; it is in mine. I doubt that anybody would choose to be flogged, and furthermore want to go through it a second time. That, for me, makes it unclear that the act of waterboarding constitutes torture every single time. Hitchens’ statement contradicts his actions during the experience, in my book.

You are certainly free to disagree with me on this point. But it seems to me that if there was no conditional by which waterboarding may possibly be justified, there would be outrage at the waterboarding of Hitchens as much as at the waterboarding of KSM. If it’s wrong under every possible condition, then it was wrong to do it to Hitchens, even if he consented to it.

Also, appealing to Hitchens to argue that waterboarding is sometimes not torture is kind of disingenuous considering that his conclusion after being waterboarded was the opposite. In fact, he said, “if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture.”

I believe that waterboarding can be torture, which has been defined as inflicting severe pain or suffering. What is unclear is that waterboarding is always torture. To refute this all I have to show is one instance of waterboarding that does not inflict severe pain or suffering, and I think that can be found in the fact that we waterboard troops for training purposes. The Attorney General has said that waterboarding our troops is “not torture in the legal sense because you’re not doing it with the intention of harming these people physically or mentally, all we’re trying to do is train them.” And this is not a former Attorney General, but Obama’s own AG Eric Holder, as cited here: http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NjAwY2M0ZjljYjAzYzFiYzljZjNkNDY1YTE1YmVhMDU=. I doubt you will be convinced that intent is relevant. But if it isn’t, then you will be committed to saying that we torture our own troops for training purposes. You will also be committed to saying that the waterboarder is automatically guilty of inflicting severe pain or suffering even if he didn’t mean to, in which case the waterboarding of Hitchens would be a crime despite the fact that the waterboarder intended no prolonged harm and Hitchens asked for a second round. I would think that if the pain was severe enough to count as torture, he wouldn’t have asked to try it again. Had he done that, perhaps I’d be more open to the notion that waterboarding is always torture. That he asked to go again, though, is another reason to think that it is not always torture. Severe pain or suffering is not something people volunteer for, unless they are masochists; severe pain or suffering is not something we inflict on our own troops for training purposes, for why would we cause prolonged harm to our own special forces? If waterboarding can be done without inflicting severe pain or suffering, then waterboarding is not always torture. So, to make it clear that waterboarding is always torture, you’d have to convince me that we willfully cause prolonged harm* to our elite special forces, that Christopher Hitchens is a masochist, and that Keith Olbermann is a sadist for proposing that Sean Hannity get waterboarded (I am most open to being convinced that Olby is a sadist).

*I am taking prolonged harm to be the same as severe pain or suffering, as in the UN law on torture according to this article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124243020964825531.html.

“If today you can take a thing like evolution and make it a crime to teach it in the public school, tomorrow you can make it a crime to teach it in the private schools, and the next year you can make it a crime….Today it is the public school teachers, tomorrow the private. The next day the preachers and the lectures, the magazines, the books, the newspapers.” Although he doesn’t say this, there is an implicit “where does it stop?” in his statement. Similarly, in your previous comment(s), you seem to be saying that if waterboarding is permissible yesterday, harsher forms will be permissible tomorrow, and even harsher forms will be permissible in a few months. As much as I understand the concern in asking where it stops, it is a non-sequitur to say that it goes from waterboarding to harsher forms, or that a person going 80 will be going 120 soon, or that censoring evolution leads to the inquisition. These are all fallacious. I raise the point in part because I think most of your arguments are good. But the slippery slope argument you have been making isn’t one of them.

I will try to write out my reasons for saying it is unclear that waterboarding is always torture tonight. I apologize for the snide remark that I left in response to your asking the question.

Your last comment makes no sense. I have not argued that waterboarding is torture because we would slide down to Al Qaeda’s level if we continued to waterboard. I have argued waterboarding is torture on other grounds. I am asking you, since you have stated that you are not convinced waterboarding is always torture what would the conditions be that would make it torture?

Non-fallacious arguments.