[lit-ideas] Is torture wrong by definition?

  • From: Eric <eyost1132@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Mon, 03 Apr 2006 06:47:46 -0400

Omar: I think that torture is wrong by definition, and no argument about
the moral badness of the tortured can justify it.



If you support capital punishment, killing in defense of one's country--you certainly seem to do so in the case of Iran--or killing in self-defense, I don't see how you can maintain that torture is absolutely morally wrong.


If you do not believe that all killing is morally wrong, how can you believe all torture is morally wrong? The tortured person lives and usually recovers, but the dead person is...well, dead.
Torture, as opposed to death, is temporary.


There are many arguments against torture, but unless you are opposed to killing even in self-defense, I don't see how you can advance the absolute moral argument.


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