[I]t turns out to be the case that torture's not very effective. And so if you're dealing with someone who has no moral qualms whatsoever, like Donald Rumsfeld, it might be worth pointing out that its not in his interests to continue a policy that's simply feeding us false information. I mean, somebody where you that the moral - whatever part of the brain that deals with moral reactions, they're defunct at some point - but … it’s a thing that we found that out. It’s a bit or argument that we can use to make abolishing torture more appealing to people. But supposing it did... I mean the whole point is... I mean you're talking about two different levels of objection, right? that every time you tortured someone, they actually revealed what you couldn't get revealed in some other way. Would you then continue torturing? of the problems with those arguments is that someone like Rumsfeld or whomever will be able to come up with a case - somebody who was tortured and did reveal information that intelligence wanted to know (there'll be 70 other cases where it didn't). But they'll be able to come up with one. And then what do you say? Well it's alright??
Susan Neiman