The Philosophical Developments Of The Ticking Time Bomb Scenario
Torture is a difficult philosophical concept, as it involves indefinite discussions as to whether it is justified. That notwithstanding, the use of torture is an old age criminal tactic that has survived since the earliest civilizations to the modern-day. In essence, torture entails the infliction of pain and suffering, both mental and physical, to get an individual to reveal certain information or to punish them for a certain act they committed (Brecher 5). In contemporary society, and by international law standards, the prohibition of torture is absolute. Most international instruments and laws such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and the UN Convention against Torture, all identify prohibition against torture as a non-derogatory right (Clemens 3). This means that there are no exceptions, be it terrorism, war, or any other emergency that can warrant the use of torture against an individual. However, this legal threshold is rarely adhered to, and many states have always found ways to circumvent legal considerations and inflict pain and suffering over suspects of certain crimes. One such justification for torture is the use of ticking time bomb scenarios. There are philosophical perspectives such as the utilitarian approach by Jeremy Bentham, which prefers an exception to the prohibition of torture (Clemens 11). Hence, it is important to undertake a critical analysis of the moral justification of torture through the view of the ticking time bomb hypothesis.
The Ticking Time Bomb Scenario
Generally, the ticking time bomb scenario is a hypothetical concept that seeks to show that there are circumstances where torture is allowable. The scenario imagines the case of a terror suspect who has set up various bombs, which are set to blow at a given time (Sung 195). The government officials all know that the person they have in custody is responsible or has information about the bombs. If the terrorist does not disclose the information about the bomb, it will go off and so many people will die as a result (Sung 195). However, if the terrorist is tortured and provides information, the bomb will be detonated, and many lives will be saved (Sung 195). Hence, in that scenario, is it justifiable for the prisoner to be tortured?
Majorly, the ticking time bomb theory, which was propagated in the 1960s by Jean Larteguy, provided various conditions or assumptions under which it operated (Devlin 3). First, torture had to be effected only where there was sufficient evidence that the prisoner had relevant information which was enough for authorities to secure a conviction for a certain offence. Secondly, the torturer has to be convinced that the prisoner is likely to give true information, when they are threatened that severe torture will be used. Thirdly, the torturer has to have exhausted all other means of getting the information from the prisoner. Fourthly, the torturer has to be convinced that the information is time-sensitive, and if it is not gotten, a bomb is likely to go off. Fifthly, it has to be reasonably believed that the magnitude of bomb going off would be grave, in terms of death of civilians, maiming, severe pain and suffering, whose effects will last longer than the pain and suffering endured by the prisoner being tortured (Devlin 3). Lastly, the torture will not be more detrimental than the consequences of the bomb going off. It is important to realize that all these conditions are merely assumptions, based on a hypothetical scenario and the real life events might not be as straightforward.
Since this is merely an experimental scenario, the response to such a hypothesis depends on the varying ideological beliefs. On the one hand, the consequentialist would argue that even those states that prohibit torture will be inclined to torture someone if they had a prisoner who possessed critical information, such as a bomb, or a weapon of mass destruction, which was set to go off. The essence here is that the lives of the many people who will be saved by the information far outweigh the prisoner's right not to be torture. On the other hand, opponents would state that such a hypothetical scenario is based on so many assumptions that would be detrimental to the prisoner. For instance, the ticking time bomb scenario assumes that the person in custody is actually a terrorist and that the act of torture will be effective in getting the required information.
Jeremy Bentham and the Utilitarian Position. Jeremy Bentham is one philosopher who is considered to have birthed the ticking time bomb ideology. In his 1804 essay titled the 'Means of Extraction for Extraordinary Occasions', Bentham claims that if there were a reasonable suspicion that hundreds of innocent people were held illegally. They were being tortured, and if the authorities knew that one criminal had information to get free those hundreds of innocents, then it would be proper to use superior torture for this one person, to get the requisite information (Clemens 9). However, the ideal application of this torture as per Bentham is government by various principles. First, the reason for the torture must be established and clear. Secondly, the critical information required or nay other action must be in the power of the prisoner being tortured (Clemens 9). Thirdly, the torture must be carried out in public interest. Fourthly, there have to be regulations providing for the type and level of torture to be used (Clemens 9). Fifthly, an urgency has to be proved, in the sense that any delay in obtaining the information could be intolerable (Clemens 9). Lastly, there has to be a provision for compensation to any person subjected to undue torture and punishment to the person who inflicts torture unduly (Clemens 9).
What stands out in Bentham's ideology is the limitation to the use of torture only for 'compulsive operations and extraordinary occasions' (Clemens 10). This means that Bentham is keen on emphasizing the utility of torture to ensure that it is not just used to obtain simple confessions. Further, the utilitarian perspective operates on the notion that torturing one criminal for a few minutes to save hundreds of innocents is plausible. It is even still plausible to use torture to get a criminal to give up other accomplices or information about a crime. However, Bentham's ideology's most important idea is that torture is now utilized to prevent future criminal acts. This is the same perspective that is employed in the contemporary torture systems such as the approach taken after the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. The problem with such a conclusion is the consideration that people might be tortured in regards to future unreal events that might never even occur.
Torture Post 9/11. It seems that the ticking time bomb idea moved quickly from a rarely mentioned academic philosophy to an actionable idea in the period after the United States terror attack of September 11, 2001 (Clemens 2). As the war against terror intensified in the post-9/11 era, so did the justification for using force against terror suspects increase (Clemens 2). Proponents of the ticking bomb argued that the rise of terrorism presented an extreme threat that it was no longer plausible to maintain the traditional view of the prohibition against torture (McCoy 1). It was thought that the traditional moral constraints that granted prohibition as a non-derogatory right were inapplicable.
Largely, the Bush administration invented measures which were directed towards ensuring that future acts of terrorism were limited and the suspects responsible from the 9/11 were to be used in aiding information gathering (Devlin 2). Hence, it was common for the Bush Administration to portray the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as a force that utilize brave American in order to extract 'vital information' from 'dangerous' terror suspects using alternative procedures (McCoy 1). Clearly, this was a euphemistic way in which the government legitimized torture using the ticking time bomb approach. It was communicated that the interrogation methods employed by the CIA, though tough, were efficient in extracting information from the terror suspects that could not be found anywhere else (McCoy 1). The main justification for using torture to obtain information which will help save lives. Essentially, after 9/11, the consensus within the United States security agencies was that torture was justified as long as it was relevant in stopping mass terror attacks (McCoy 1; Hassner 83). Hence, the United States counterterrorism measures and policies did not shy away from authorizing the use of enhanced interrogation techniques. For instance, in 2005, a memorandum allowed the CIA to use enhanced interrogation methods such as waterboarding, where a ticking time bomb scenario was presented (Hassner 83).
Should Torture be Institutionalized/Legalized? Since the revival of the ticking time bomb theory, there have been debates about whether torture should be institutionalized. Some of Bentham's conditions regarding the justification of torture included the level and magnitude as torture and compensation for undue torture. Hence, a few people who support the use of torture in emergencies have proposed that such emergencies have to be laid out, and the methods used be specifically outlined, for accountability purposes.
One of the prominent pro-torture institutionalization authors is Alan Dershowitz. Dershowitz operates from the point that torture happens all the time, and it is used by government authorities to obtain information from people who are considered dangerous (Brecher 57). However, there is a danger of abuse, when these off the books torture operations are sanctioned and unregulated. Therefore, Dershowitz proposed a creation of a torture system, within the governmental security system. Here, before torture is executed, the torture would have to obtain a torture warrant, which would then hold the person involved accountable (Brecher 15). This system would prevent torturers from engaging in excesses and abuse of power. Essentially, Dershowitz speaks from a harm minimization perspective, where having a system that described the level and type of torture to be inflicted protects the victim from being overly tortured (Bagaric and Clarke 582). When it reaches a point where torture needs to be institutionalized, it would mean that it is no longer prohibited but acceptable within legal institutions.
The Fallacies of the Ticking Time Bomb Concept
The ticking time bomb scenario should be approached with a critical eye because, despite it being a simple hypothetical idea, it has turned out to appeal to public audiences in modern times. This ideology's entertainment can lead a society into a slippery slope, where the idea of torture is slowly legitimized and institutionalized (Devlin 3). By way of example, torture used to be against American society's values, having ratified the Convention against Torture. It prohibited all forms of cruel punishment in its domestic laws. However, after 9/11, the people had a shifted view, as a survey revealed that thirty-two percent of Americans were ready to torture terror suspects (Luban 1426). Hence, a concept that is supposed to be a mere hypothetical scenario is now actively invoked to justify torture.
The ticking time bomb's idea serves the purpose of shifting perceptions and misleading people on various grounds. First, the ticking bomb scenario aims to get the liberals, who are absolute prohibitionists of torture, sway their standing (Luban 1440). Even the liberal, when presented with the scenario, would then agree that torture could be allowed in at least one that situation (Luban 1440). Hence, the liberal is no longer held by principle, and the ticking bomb scenario has proved that even principles can be breached under certain circumstances (Luban 1440). What is left then is the price that one has to pay for such a breach of principle. The liberal is brought down from the moral high ground where they could hold the torturer accountable to the point where they are standing on the same side as the torture (Luban 1440). The danger of a liberal giving in to only one exception of torture opens a Pandora's Box, where it will be difficult to deny any future propositions to torture.
The second reason why the ticking time bond should be viewed with a critical eye is that it changes the torturer's face. The reason why torture is abhorred in society is that torture is always viewed as cruel, inhumane, sadistic, and brutal (Luban 1441). However, with the ticking time bomb, the torturer changes identity and is looked at differently. Here, the torturer is no longer the cruel person, but he/she is a hero (Luban 1441). An example of the personnel who worked for the United States government to interrogate terror suspects after 9/11 was being brave men and women who are willing to do what it takes to stop acts of terror from occurring in the future. Further, these public servants do a lot to save innocent lives (Luban 1441). Hence, even if they engage in acts of torture, the ticking time bomb concept has sanitized their conduct and given them a heroic identity. Humanizing the torturer only serves to make torture seem acceptable when the international law position insists on an absolutist approach.
Besides, the assumptions that give validity to the ticking bomb theory are mostly faulty. For example, if the prisoner who is thought to be a terror suspect is indeed a fanatic and has no plans to give up information about a nuclear explosion that they have set up. The fanatic sets a bomb with the plan that he/she is willing to die from the explosion. In such instances, there would be no time to save innocent people's lives, as evacuation is almost impossible. However, torture is likely to be ineffective because the prisoner is willing to die rather than give up information about where the explosion is hidden. Hence, this defeats the assumption that underlies the ticking time bomb that torture will likely get the prisoner to give up vital information, in time, to defuse an explosion.
Additionally, the ticking time bomb idea is one that is too simplistic and appear to misrepresent the actual realities of the world in which people live. Luban (1441) narrates the story of a real life case that occurred in 1995, the Philippine police received intelligence that the Al Qaeda terror group planned to assassinate the Pope and bomb several United States airlines. This information was confirmed by the torture a Pakistani explosives maker subjected to various enhanced interrogation techniques such as waterboarding, hitting with a chair and being inserted lighted cigarettes in private parts (Luban 1441). The torture was so severe and cruel that even the Philippine police were surprised that the prisoner survived it. However, if the police had not tortured the suspect, thousands of people would have died from airplane crushes. Even though the technique worked, the torturers almost killed the prisoner before he could talk (Luban 1441). In the several weeks that he was tortured, the police had no intelligence about the Al Qaeda plans. All along, it could have been that the prisoner did not have any idea about the plans of Al Qaeda or maybe, there could have been no planned attack in the first place (Luban 1441). Hence, the torture would not have been justified because the police were undertaking it by the time they also did not have any information.
Another example of how defective the ticking time bomb hypothesis is related to the uncertainty of the concept. Suppose government authorities had like fifty terror suspects detained at Guantanamo Bay. They have reason to believe that one of them has crucial information about where the leader of a terror organization is hiding. How would they approach the issue. The main dilemma will be if it is justifiable to torture all of the fifty prisoners hoping to get the one who will reveal crucial information or not (Luban 1444). If and when the torture of forty-nine people is allowed to capture only one, what would stop the authorities from torturing more people? For instance, where the suspects will not break when tortured, it would be possible to torture their loved ones, as they see, just to push their nerves (Luban 1444). Maybe torturing a child of the suspect will drive them to break, and the chain goes on and on. This example presents the uncertainty in the real world that cannot allow the ticking time bomb to be a reliable point of reference (Luban 1444). Once the way is opened to allow the torture of even one innocent person just to get to the truth, then nothing stops people from being torture infinitely.
