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Is Torture Ever Warranted?

            
             The Oxford dictionary states that torture is "The action or practice of inflicting severe pain on someone as a punishment or in order to force them to do or say something". In the past prisoners would be tortured to an unspeakable degree to obtain the information they require, some countries still condone this action today. Alan M Dershowitz believes that torture is acceptable in some scenarios where time is essential. No matter how pressing the situation or its urgency torture should never be a used as a means to prevent potential terror attacks. Rather than using torture, through shared intelligence terror plots can be prevented. There will be three parts to this essay, the first being the argument reconstruction and analysis. The second part will be a counter position to Dershowitzs torture warrants and the third will be how the value theory would assess the ethical issue. .
             Part 1: Argument Reconstruction & Analysis .
             In Alan M Dershowitz's The Case for Torture Warrants he argues that federal officers or the FBI lack the power and protection to handle a potential "ticking bomb" scenario. This hypothetical 24 like scenario is were a bomb is going to go off in a highly populated area and hundreds of lives will be lost unless a captured accomplice tells counter terrorist units the location of the bomb or threat just in time to prevents it. The accomplice is proving hard to crack so now federal agents are forced to begin torture to get the answers they need or let innocent people die. Dershowitsz continues to argue that with torture warrants federal officers would be able to gather necessary information by conventional means or by non-lethal torture, without backlash by the law when it comes to foiling terrorist plots. He believes that higher authorities such as judicial officers or the president of the United States should be the only bodies able to issue this warrant.


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