1. Is not helpful or useful even if, by chance, accurate information is given [1,2].
2. Hurts our national security [2].
3. Is unnecessary. Given that torture is one of the most harmful options to pick from, it's likely there are other, less harmful options available, and if so, the logical and ethical action is to pursue those instead.
On that third point I challenge you to prove me wrong. You won't be able to, however, because we have no meaningful oversight of these practices.
In the vast majority of cases I have no argument. In both cases which have come public and those which have not. The support by both the executive and legislative branches as well as military and intelligence is not only morally abhorrent but both in the grand scheme and in small scales is in practice ineffective. The price, that is, is not worth paying.
But I am also practical. Looking at the big picture in the long term, I recognize that people in power will face very difficult decisions. I recognize that the world is an ugly complicated place and the best leaders making the best decisions will have to take morally reprehensible actions.
If you rally against it, make absolute laws against it, enforce them perfectly with the most terrible punishments – it's still going to happen. People are still going to make those choices.
But if you are capable of even the slightest sympathies to the realities of the world – you might be able to minimize the damages.
Moral absolutes and prohibitions don't work. You don't design bridges and airplanes not to fail, you design them to fail well.
It is not a defensive of horrible acts, but a recognition of the tiniest exceptions. The arts and literature are full of these topics probing questions about ethically wrong actions being the right decision, and they have a point. Rarely, but surely. There's a wide gulf between never and almost.
1. Is not helpful or useful even if, by chance, accurate information is given [1,2].
2. Hurts our national security [2].
3. Is unnecessary. Given that torture is one of the most harmful options to pick from, it's likely there are other, less harmful options available, and if so, the logical and ethical action is to pursue those instead.
On that third point I challenge you to prove me wrong. You won't be able to, however, because we have no meaningful oversight of these practices.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9867266 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9868400