"" Both of these documents are merely declarations of principle, but their message is clear: torture is justified in no situation. .
.
One major problem with the use of torture in a single, exceptional case is the "slippery slope- concept. Once torture is justified in an extreme case, it can be more easily justified for less serious cases. At present, torture is not permissible in the US "it is forbidden by the eighth amendment to the Constitution. Such a ban is either absolute or it is not "it can not waver between the two. Once one exception is defined "once the ban has been pushed slightly aside for a single case "other exceptions can be found as well. Amnesty International supports this logic; heir "Ladder of Torture- shows that once an extreme case is justifiable, say "A man has planted a bomb and admits it. We must torture to save lives,"" then lesser and lesser cases become justifiable until relatively inconsequential cases become grounds for torture. The ladder's last rung is "A man has refused to tell the police where a suspect is. He must be tortured to make sure others don't do the same."" It is partially for this reason that no nation in the world has a constitution which says that torture is legal, and at least 112 nations explicitly prohibit its use. It is very dangerous to consider torture morally justifiable in an "extreme- case, for if authorities use torture once and it works, it may be easy for them to become "addicted- to its use. .
In practice, justifying torture becomes impossible. In any thought experiment designed to justify its use in a specific scenario, certain assumptions are generally made. The bomber scenario previously described is an excellent example. Do we or do we not torture the terrorist? In this instance, it seems that the consideration for one person can hardly outweigh the lives of millions of people. Yet even in this extreme situation, consider what is assumed.
