Measuring Human Rights (33): Measuring Racial Discrimination

The measurement of racial discrimination may seem like a purely technical topic, but in reality it comes with a huge moral dilemma. In order to measure racial discrimination, you have to categorize people into different racial groups (usually in your national census). On the basis of this you can then collect social information about those groups, and compare the average outcomes in order to detect large discrepancies between them. For example, do blacks in the US earn less, achieve less in school etc. Only then can you assume that there may be racism or discrimination and can you design policies that deal with it.

Now, categorizing people into different racial groups is not straightforward. You need to do violence to reality. Racial classifications and categorizations are not simply a reflection of factual reality, of “real group identities”. Instead they are social constructions or even fantasies influenced by centuries of prejudice, stereotypes and power relations. If we want to use racial classifications to measure discrimination, then we give people labels that may have little or nothing to do with who or what they are and how they identify themselves. Instead, these labels perpetuate the stereotypes and power relations that were the basis of the racial classifications when they were first conceived centuries ago. For example, “black” or “African-American” is not a simple descriptive label of a well-defined and existing group of people; instead it’s an ideological construction that was once used to segregate certain groups of very different people and subordinate them to a lower station in life. (Evidence for the claim that race is a social construct rather than a natural fact can be found in biology and in the fact that racial classifications differ wildly from one country to another).

In other words, the “statistical representation of diversity is a complex process which reveals the foundations of societies and their political choices” (source). In this particular case, the foundation of society was racism and the political choices were segregation and discrimination. If today we use the same racial and ethnic classifications that were once used to justify segregation and discrimination, then we run the risk of perpetuating racist social constructions. As a result, we may also help to perpetuate stereotypes and discrimination, even as we try to go in the opposite direction. It’s a form of path dependence.

Statistics are not just a reflection of social reality, but also affect this reality. Statistical categories are supposed to describe social groups, but at the same time they may influence people’s attitudes towards those groups because they contain memories of older judgments that were once attached to those groups. The dilemma is the following: the use of racial classifications to measure discrimination means giving people labels that have little or nothing to do with who they are or what they are; but they have something to do with how others treat them. It’s this treatment that we want to measure, and we can’t do so without the use of classifications. Using such classifications, however, can help to perpetuate the treatment we want to measure and avoid.

More posts in this series are here.

Human Rights and International Law (23): The Dilemma of Treaty Ratification Rates

1899, US Senate Ratifies Treaty of Paris

(source unknown)

In the case of human rights treaties, we face a tough choice: should we aim at universal/near-universal acceptance and ratification, or should we instead limit ourselves to the goal of “real” or meaningful acceptance and ratification? The problem with human rights treaties is that ratification is almost costless. A country can ratify them even if it has no intention of respecting their provisions, because it knows that lack of respect will not result in any serious harm. The same is not true for other types of treaties: a country ratifying a military collaboration treaty, a fishery treaty etc. knows that non-respect of the treaty provisions can lead to harmful retaliation by other treaty signatories or fines imposed by some international institution.

The relative costlessness of human rights treaties means that most if not all countries will readily accept them. They can only gain: signaling support for human rights by way of treaty ratification can even reduce outside pressure for better rights protection. After all, a country that signals willingness to respect human rights should have more leeway than a country that openly and willingly violates those rights.

Hence, near-universal ratification rates are a natural outcome in the case of human rights treaties. Some argue that instead of pursuing the commonly accepted goal of near-universal ratification of human rights treaties, we should instead aim for “real” and meaningful acceptance; in other words, acceptance only by states that do intend to implement the treaties’ provisions. States that would sign the treaties simply to signal a positive attitude towards human rights and to relieve outside pressure should therefore be excluded from ratification.

Exclusion means raising the cost of ratification – for example by way of preconditions for acceptance incorporated into the treaties or by way of effective sanctions in case of non-respect. This in turn means that treaty ratification rates will be brought down.

All of this sounds reasonable at first sight, but it does create a dilemma. Treaty ratification, even if it is at first mere signaling by an authoritarian state that doesn’t have any intention of respecting the treaty, can have beneficial effects over time. By making “fake” or “shallow” ratification more difficult we would also destroy those beneficial effects. What kind of effects am I talking about? Well, for instance, a treaty can promote a human rights culture. When a state accepts a treaty, even if only for the purpose of international signaling, it also signals, inadvertently, to its own population: it signals that human rights are becoming universal moral norms. The state therefore can’t help but increasing the legitimacy and salience of human rights, and its oppressed population can use this fact: it can wield the language of human rights in a more effective way than before, both against the state and in order to rally support.

Hence, we may see an effect of treaty ratification going in two opposite directions: shallow ratification my reduce outside pressure against the ratifying state, but may also increase inside pressure.

So it’s not obvious what we should do. Should we aim at near-universal ratification, or at meaningful ratification? Both strategies have pros and cons. Near-universal ratification may reduce the meaning of human rights – if even the worst dictator can ratify a human rights treaty without any significant cost, then human rights will lose their appeal. We may even increase the number and severity of human rights violations because states that signal adherence to human rights will see a reduction of international pressure. On the other hand, making ratification more costly will reduce the number of ratifications, which in turn will reduce the moral stature of human rights and will make it more difficult to argue that human rights are universal.

I’m not ashamed to say that I can’t see an easy way out.

More posts on this series are here. Some data on treaty ratification rates are here. More dilemmas are here.

The Ethics of Human Rights (59): Human Rights and Theories of Justice

Blind Justice, Playboy Magazine Illustration, 1980s

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First of all, my apologies for the ridiculous length of this post, but I wanted to offer a systematic overview of some of the most common theories of justice and to try to figure out which one is best from a human rights perspective. Given the variety of theories of justice this can’t be anything but long.

You could say that this is all wrong and that it’s better to argue the other way around: first establish which theory of justice is best and then see if and to what extent it leaves room for or requires human rights. And indeed, you would have some good reasons for this approach: human rights are

• very specific instructions without an obvious moral justification
• more like a list than a coherent theory, with clear contradictions between the items on the list
• contested with regard to their applicability (some rights may or may not be absolute, basic, universal etc.).

A theory of justice, on the other hand, is

• general, abstract, coherent and internally justified (at least down to a basic level at which morality can’t be justified by even more deep moral values)
• clear about its scope
• and uncontroversially applicable, ideally at least.

However, the latter point just begs the question. Actual as opposed to ideal theories of justice are much more controversial than human rights. There are many of them, and they are more incompatible with each other than the different elements of the system of human rights. So, the more fruitful approach is to start with the system of human rights and see which theory of justice it requires – or which theory is most amenable to it. If we find such a theory, its compatibility with human rights will speak for it, whereas theories of justice that are on important points at loggerheads with human rights are prima facie less attractive.

Theories of Justice

OK, so let me start with a very brief and admittedly superficial ad crude description of some common theories of justice:

1. Theories of justice can stress the importance of the consequences of actions: just actions are those that produce or maximize good consequences and avoid or minimize bad consequences. These are called consequentialist theories.
2. Other theories claim that acting in a just way requires respect for rules. Those are deontological systems of justice.
3. And then there are theories that stress people’s virtues: people act in a just way if they act virtuously.
4. Of course, mixed theories are also common.

These four groups contain a variety of subgroups.

(1) Consequentialist theories differ about the type of goodness that is to be maximized or produced.

(1.1) Hedonist theories say we must maximize pleasure and minimize pain (or, alternatively, happiness and misery respectively).

(1.2) Welfare theories argue for preference satisfaction claiming that people’s preferences can’t always be framed in hedonistic terms.

John Stuart Mill

(1.3) Qualitative theories select a list of admirable or strong preferences (as in John Stuart Mill’s utilitarianism), or “an objective list of goods” that have to be maximized. Instead of treating all forms of good or all types of preferences as equally valuable and equally deserving of maximization (as in 1.1. or 1.2.), qualitative consequentialism selects some goods as more valuable than others and more deserving of maximization: better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied in the words of Mill, because Socrates may have achieved a high level of good in some non-happiness related dimension. Hedonist or welfare theories (1.1. and 1.2) would agree with Bentham: quantity of pleasure being equal, push-pin is as good as poetry.

(1.4) Other theories want to maximize opportunities, or yet another version of the good (power, resources, beauty, freedom, advantage, capabilities etc.), or a combination of goods.

(1.5) Negative consequentialism focuses not on promoting some type of good consequences (as in types 1.1 to 1.4) but rather on minimizing bad consequences. Of course, the maximization of good consequences also involves the minimization of bad consequences, but negative consequentialism sees negative consequences as the priority. One major difference between positive and negative consequentialism is the agent’s responsibility: positive consequentialism demands that we bring about good states of affairs, whereas negative consequentialism may only require that we avoid bad ones. Negative consequentialism can be subdivided according to the type of badness that is to be minimized, and so we would get negative forms of 1.1 to 1.4.

Consequentialist theories differ not only about the type of goodness that is to be maximized (or badness that is to be minimized), but also about the proper level at which to maximize (or minimize).

(1.6) Ethical egoism claims that only the consequences for the individual matter. It prescribes actions that may be beneficial, detrimental, or neutral to the good of others as long as they maximize the good of those individuals  performing them. Ethical egoism – as well as the other types of consequentialism cited below – may be hedonistic (1.1) but may also consider other types of good (1.2, 1.3 or 1.4 above).

(1.7) Ethical altruism requires that individuals sacrifice their own good for the good of others and may even claim that this is the only way to achieve the best overall consequences.

(1.8) Classical utilitarianism claims that we should only be concerned about the aggregate good: if certain persons suffer a reduction of some chosen good, then this can be acceptable if another group of persons gains more in the chosen good (or even in some unrelated good: if killing one can cure millions of chronic headaches, then this harm may be justified if it is outweighed by the good of curing many headaches). Some forms of ethical egoism (1.6) argue that egoism promotes the general or aggregate welfare of a society and that there is therefore no difference between the goals of 1.6 and 1.8, merely in the methods used to achieve those goals: there may be an individual hand guiding self-interested people toward the common or aggregate good, or individuals in general know best how to please themselves and no central effort at maximization is necessary.

(1.9) Distributional consequentialism is opposed to classical utilitarianism because it is concerned about the distributional aspects of the maximization of some goods and about the impact of maximization efforts on individuals. This concern may be expressed in different ways:

(1.9.1) For instance, the aggregate good isn’t all that counts and imposing a high cost on some individuals in order to produce a small benefit for a large number of other individuals means imposing an injustice on the former. Hence, rather than focusing solely on the aggregate good one should take into account the actual consequences for individuals of this aggregate good.

(1.9.2) One may also have to look at other ways of differentiating between costs and benefits imposed on individuals. For example, perhaps we should abandon the aggregate good altogether and maximize the good for the worst off (which can sometimes imply that the aggregate good or at least the good of the best off may have to be brought down). Call this approach prioritarian.

(1.9.3) Other types of distributional consequentialism are egalitarian rather than prioritarian (as in 1.9.2): every individual has an equal right to have his or her good maximized up to a point that is equal to the level of everyone else (and again, the good here may be different things: resources, opportunities, preference satisfaction etc.).

(1.10) Desert based consequentialism incorporates concerns about people’s choices: if those choices pull them below some level of good, then justice may not require that we help them, even if doing so would maximize the aggregate good, would help the worst off or would guarantee equality. If, on the other hand, their misfortune is purely a matter of chance or bad luck, then justice may give them a right to assistance, even if helping them would bring down the aggregate good and even if they aren’t the worst off.

(2) Deontological theories state that moral and just behavior requires following certain rules. Justice is respect for rules even if the good consequences of disrespect are better than the good consequences of respect. Acts themselves are inherently good or evil, regardless of their consequences.

(2.1) Divine command theory is one form of deontology: an action is right and just if God has decreed that it is right. The rightness or justice of an action depends on that action being performed because it is a divine duty, not because of any good consequences arising from that action. The rightness or justice of an action holds even when the consequences are bad. God knows what he’s doing.

Immanuel Kant

(2.2) Motivational deontology claims that an action is right if its motivation is good. Kant for instance has famously argued that it’s not the consequences of actions that make them right or wrong but the motives of the person who carries out the action. He begins with an argument that the highest good must be both good in itself, and good without qualification. He then claims that those things that are usually thought to be good, such as intelligence and pleasure, are neither intrinsically good nor good without qualification. Pleasure is not good without qualification, because people can take pleasure in other people’s suffering. He therefore concludes that there is only one thing that is truly good: nothing can be called good without qualification except a good will. A good will is the will to do good, it’s a self-imposed choice or intention, based on the moral law discovered by reason, to do what is right simply because it is right, not because of the consequences or because God tells us so or because we feel we are under a duty to do so. We are under a duty, but it’s a reasoned and self-imposed duty, not one backed up by the threat of force or damnation. Good consequences can arise by chance or even as a result of bad will, and so they can’t by themselves be called morally good. They are only morally good if they are also the result of good will. And yet, this result need not be a good consequence.

(2.3) Anti-instrumentalist deontology claims that there is one basic moral rule which we should never violate, and that when this rule does not apply common sense consequentialism applies. The rule in question is the one against the use of other people. Larry Alexander has illustrated this with three well-known moral dilemmas: “Trolley”, “Fat Man” and “Surgeon”. In “Trolley”, people usually deem it acceptable to turn a switch which diverts a runaway trolley away from a track where 5 people are standing and towards a track where one person will get hit by the trolley and will die. In “Fat Man”, there’s no switch but you can save 5 people by throwing a fat man in front of the runaway trolley, thereby stopping it in its tracks. In “Surgeon“, a doctor kills one person and uses his organs in order to save 5 other lives. Both “Fat Man” and “Surgeon” are commonly rejected, and the reason, according to Alexander, is that people are being used to save others, whereas in “Trolley” no one is used – turning the switch would do what is needed to be done even if there’s no one on the fatal track. The organ donor and the fat man are used, and this use is what makes the cases immoral. So, as long as there is no use of other people, consequentialist reasoning applies, as in “Trolley”. Another, similar case is the “German Airplane“.

There are of course numerous other types of deontology, but these three will suffice to make my point.

(3) A virtue theory focuses not on rules or acts, and neither on the consequences of rules or acts. It tries to ascertain what respect for a rule or engagement in a certain act says about one’s character. For example, virtue ethicists may claim that consequences in themselves have no ethical content unless they have been produced by a virtue such as benevolence. Ditto for rules: if good rules are followed that is not in itself a sign of morality or justice; the rule follower must follow the rule because of his or her moral character. A better world will result from the improvement of our characters, our virtues and our personal excellence.

In a sense, virtue ethics isn’t opposed to deontology or consequentialism but frames itself as a prerequisite. Instead of focusing on rules, actions or consequences, we should develop morally desirable virtues for their own sake, and then, when the time comes to act morally – either to follow a moral rule or to do what brings the best consequences – those virtues will help direct and complete our actions.

This theory of justice is similar to motivational deontology of the Kantian kind (2.2), but different nonetheless. Kantian good will depends not on personal virtues or excellence, but on reason and the use of reason to discover the moral law. Here’s an example that will illustrate the difference. Suppose you’re visiting a friend who’s in hospital. You may do so because you’ve discovered, through reason, the moral law that tells you to be nice to friends, and because your good will tells you to respect this law and do what is your moral duty. Or you may do so because of the good consequences that will result from doing so: he’s happy when you visit, or he’ll visit you next time you’re in hospital; and even if you’ll never be in hospital it’s good for both of you to remain friends – not visiting him is incompatible with you remaining friends. All these justifications seem to miss something, namely the virtue of caring for friends, of being good to friends etc.

(4) Some mixed theories:

(4.1) Robert Nozick, for example, argues for a theory that is mostly consequentialist, but incorporates a certain set of minimal inviolable rules called “side-constraints” which restrict the sort of actions agents are permitted to do.

(4.2) Rule consequentialism claims that following certain rules in general produces the best consequences, given the calculation and information problems inherent in the assessment of consequences (especially long term consequences). We can’t ask people to calculate the consequences every time they want to do something. We just settle for the second best: experience has shown that some rules generally produce good results, and we stick to those rules even if in some cases it will turn out afterwards that perhaps we shouldn’t have. Rule consequentialism is a modification of act consequentialism (or act utilitarianism).

Henry Sidgwick

(4.2.1) Esoteric consequentialism is often a form of rule consequentialism because it claims that the “common man” should follow rules given his inability to judge consequences and that a caste of philosopher kings able to assess consequences should frame the rules for the common man in such a way that the chosen set of rules produces the best possible consequences compared to other possible sets of rules (not compared to all possible consequences; ideally, given high average intelligence and the absence of calculation and information problems, simple non-rule based consequentialism would perhaps produce an even better world). Sidgwick is famous for his esoteric consequentialism.

(4.3) Threshold deontology wants to avoid the conclusion that it’s justified to kill someone if doing so allows us to cure millions of chronic headaches (a conclusion often accepted by 1.8). It states that, although in general rules (such as “do not kill”) have to be respected even if better (aggregate) results would obtain by violating them, these rules can and must be violated if the level of bad consequences resulting from rule observance passes some catastrophic level (“do kill one if you thereby can save thousands of other lives”).

Human Rights

Now that we have this typology of theories of justice, let’s examine their usefulness from the point of view of human rights.

(1) Consequentialism

Although one can take a consequentialist approach to human rights and see them as something to be maximized – perhaps with a priority for those whose rights are least respected – consequentialism in general doesn’t really fit with the main concerns of human rights. These rights are constraints upon what we can morally do to other people, and these constraints are so strong that it’s difficult to imagine that one can sacrifice the rights of some in order to maximize the rights of others, let alone sacrifice rights in order to maximize some other good such as pleasure or welfare. This doesn’t mean that rights can never be sacrificed – when rights come into conflict a choice has to be made, and that usually is a consequentialist choice: which sacrifice does the least harm to different people’s rights? (E.g. the journalist attempting to divulge private, career ending but politically and legally irrelevant information about a politician). But that’s an unfortunate and probably inevitable shortcoming in the system of human rights, not it’s central logic. It would have been much better were there no such conflicts.

Socrates

Obviously, among the different types of consequentialism, qualitative consequentialism (1.3) is more attractive than hedonistic consequentialism (1.1), because we want to make a difference between harm done to those interests that are protected by human rights and harm done to someone’s interest in pleasure and happiness. Furthermore, human rights are more focused on turning us into a dissatisfied Socrates than on producing a multitude satisfied fools, although ideally we would want a multitude of satisfied Socrateses. The reason for this focus is that a fool doesn’t necessarily need freedom of speech, political rights etc.

The same is true for welfare consequentialism (1.2): people can have preferences for rights violations and we don’t want to maximize those. We also don’t want to treat expensive preferences with the same respect as inexpensive ones because human rights attach more importance to poverty alleviation than to luxury maximization. On the other hand, qualitative theories (1.3) can be paternalistic and paternalism can be an affront to liberty and hence indirectly also to human rights.

Of all types of consequentialism, negative consequentialism (1.5) is perhaps the most amenable to human rights. Human rights protection should start with the attempt to avoid engaging in rights violations. But even if this attempt is universally successful, that won’t result in perfect respect for human rights. People need the resources and capabilities to make use of their rights, and giving them those resources and capabilities requires more than the avoidance of harm. Type 1.4 tries to deliver those resources and capabilities.

Ethical egoism (1.6) is very unattractive from the point of view of human rights, although I don’t deny that selfish and self-interested actions can promote respect for human rights. However, they only do so accidentally, and the good they do is easily swamped by the bad. The opposite, ethical altruism (1.7), looks more attractive, but really is not: usually, there is no need to sacrifice one’s own rights in order to defend the rights of others. And when it is necessary, it is also pointless: rights are inherently relational – we want rights together, we want to practice religion together, to talk and express ourselves together, to govern ourselves together etc.

The focus of classical utilitarianism (1.8) on aggregate welfare is obviously detrimental to the rights of many. People have rights, even if the outcome of those rights is suboptimal on an aggregate level and even if more overall utility could be achieved when some rights are violated in some cases. Distributional consequentialism (1.9) avoids this problem and is therefore more amenable to human rights. Desert based consequentialism (1.10), on the other hand, turns back the clock: people have rights whether or not they deserve them. That doesn’t rule out limitations of rights following deserved punishment for wrongdoing. However, when the rights of convicted criminals are limited, the reason is not that they deserve this limitation. The reason is the defense of other people’s rights.

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(2) Deontology

Compared to utilitarianism, deontology seems to be a theory that is much more amenable and receptive to human rights. Deontology, after all, focuses not on the consequences of actions but on the duties we have; and one man’s rights are another man’s duties. However, the moral absolutism inherent in many types of deontology is a difficulty from the point of view of human rights. It seems to rule out the inevitable balancing between conflicting human rights. That is why threshold deontology (4.3) is better, and yet that theory isn’t without problems either, notably the arbitrariness of the thresholds, the problems posed by cases just above or below the threshold, and the fact that even with thresholds some duties and rules will still be strong enough to produce, in some cases, violations of human rights.

Divine command theory (2.1) is to be rejected since it doesn’t provide space for religious freedom. Motivational deontology (2.2) is attractive precisely because of its focus on motivation: real respect for human rights can’t come from the threat of law; it has to come from within. However, the inner moral law, the motivating element, can also make us too rigid: it forces us to accept catastrophic consequences and makes it impossible to solve conflicts between rights – unless we see the moral law as overcoming value pluralism, which I think is illusory.

Anti-instrumentalist deontology (2.3) is the best form of deontology from the point of view of human rights. Think for instance of the anti-instrumentalization argument against capital punishment.

(3) Virtue theories

These are attractive for the same reason as motivational deontology: respect for human rights ultimately depends on people’s mentalities, attitudes and virtues. However, these theories are completely useless when we have to decide what to do with conflicts between rights, catastrophic consequences etc.

(4) Mixed systems

What can we say about the mixed systems? Nozick’s side constraints look promising, but they are notoriously unhelpful when rights require positive action and assistance rather than mere forbearance. And they often do, as stated above. Rule consequentialism looks inherently unstable, and a bit like a desperate attempt to combine what can’t be combined. Esoteric consequentialism reeks of authoritarianism.

So this is the score card:

Related posts are here, here and here.

Moral Dilemma (21): Is Suicide While Pregnant Akin to Murder?

Bei Bei Shuai (AP Photo:Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department)

Here’s an interesting dilemma:

On March 14, Bei Bei Shuai will have spent one full year in jail in Marion County, Indiana. Her crime? The prosecutor calls it attempted feticide and murder. What it really is: attempting suicide while pregnant.

In December 2010 Shuai was running a Chinese restaurant in Indianapolis with her boyfriend, Zhiliang Guan, by whom she was eight months pregnant. Just before Christmas, he informed her that he was married and had another family, to which he was returning. When Shuai begged him to stay, he threw money at her and left her weeping on her knees in a parking lot. Despairing, she took rat poison and wrote a letter in Mandarin saying she was killing herself and would “take this baby with me to Hades”; friends got her to the hospital just in time to save her life. Eight days later her baby, Angel, was delivered by Caesarean section and died of a cerebral hemorrhage within four days. Three months later, the newly elected prosecutor, Terry Curry—a Democrat—brought charges, claiming that the rat poison that almost killed Shuai had killed her baby. If convicted, she faces forty-five to sixty-five years in prison. (source)

The important things to consider are:

• Bei Bei Shuai survived her suicide attempt. No dilemma if she hadn’t, or perhaps a different dilemma. The dilemma we’re considering here is whether Bei Bei Shuai is culpable and this is interesting only because she survived.
• The issue here is not the legality or morality of suicide as such.
• The poor woman was eight months pregnant; had she been two or three months pregnant this would have been akin to abortion, and while abortion is certainly controversial and perhaps even a dilemma, it’s not the dilemma we’re interested in here. Our dilemma is not akin to abortion because most proponents of abortion accept a time limit and abortions at 8 months are generally not accepted, not even by most abortion proponents.
• Time limits on abortion could give way if the child is suffering and has no chance of a decent life. But that is not the case here.

More moral dilemmas here.

The Ethics of Human Rights (51): Human Rights and Universal Moral Grammar

It seems that human morality is to some extent ingrained in the human mind and that humans possess an innate moral faculty which we can call Universal Moral Grammar (UMG). “Innate” here refers to

cognitive systems whose essential properties are largely pre-determined by the inherent structure of the mind, but whose ontogenetic development must be triggered and shaped by appropriate experience and can be impeded by unusually hostile learning environments. (source)

Perhaps it’s evolution that has wired moral grammar into our neural circuits. Social living requires constraints on behavior and those constraints can be favored by natural selection because of their survival value.

Noam Chomsky

This theory is similar to the linguistic claims made by Chomsky about universal grammar and about the fact that even very young children seem to have the ability to apply grammar rules that they obviously haven’t been taught. Analogously, we know moral rules without having learned them, and this knowledge is universal across cultures.

For example, 3–4-year-old children use intent or purpose to distinguish two acts that have the same result. They also distinguish ‘genuine’ moral violations (e.g. battery or theft) from violations of social conventions (e.g. wearing pajamas to school). 4–5-year-olds use a proportionality principle to determine the correct level of punishment for principals and accessories. 5–6-year-olds use false factual beliefs but not false moral beliefs to exculpate*. (source)

Indeed, even animals have feelings of empathy and expectations of reciprocity.

The UMG can help to explain some universal and cross-cultural intuitive judgments in moral thought experiments such as the Trolley Problem (almost universal acceptance) or Fat Man and Surgeon (almost universal rejection). These universal judgments are best explained by the existence of stable and innate intuitions and tacit knowledge of rules and concepts because the judgments are quick, unreflective, difficult to justify and identical across demographic groups (including children).

Many people cannot articulate the foreseen/intended distinction [between these moral dilemmas] …, a sign that it is being made at inaccessible levels of the mind. This inability challenges the general belief that moral behavior is learned. For if people cannot articulate the foreseen/intended distinction, how can they teach it? (source)

None of this excludes the possibility that a lot of what we think we know about morality comes from teaching, nurturing, our own reasoning or even our self-interest. Furthermore, innate dispositions, if they exist, can be developed or blocked. Hence, the UMG theory is not necessarily deterministic or self-sufficient, and can accommodate other types of moral cognition as well as the less than universal factual morality of mankind (if UMG were all that mattered and if it were as deterministic as it often sounds, then there wouldn’t be immoral acts).

What does all this have to do with human rights? Those rights are outside of the UMG, partly because they are too specific. UMG is more about very abstract and general rules, such as intent, proportionality, people as ends instead of instruments etc. However, some human rights may be a part of UMG: do not kill, rape or steal are universal moral rules and are part of the UMG that even children know, and they are also translated into human rights.

More importantly, however, the existence of a UMG belies cultural relativism and can support the construction of a detailed universal morality. And finally, elements of UMG, such as the notions of intent and proportionality in moral condemnation and of moral exculpation based on false factual beliefs, have important ramifications for criminal justice and hence for human rights. Human rights restrictions on criminal punishment can be independently supported by UMG.

More posts in this series are here.

* For example killing someone because you mistake the person for a deer, as opposed to killing someone because you believe killing is OK.

(image source)

What is a Moral Dilemma?

We have a long running series on this blog asking people to tell us what they think about particular moral dilemmas. However, since this is (in part) a philosophy blog, it’s useful to take a step back and ask ourselves what we are talking about. What precisely is a moral dilemma?

Definition of moral dilemma

Well, it’s obviously a conflict of some sort. If you’re stuck in a moral dilemma you have some good moral reasons to do each of two different things (“dilemma” comes from the Greek for “double proposition”). The problem is that you can’t do both. You do either one or the other, and by failing to do one you fail morally. A moral dilemma condemns you to moral failure. You have an unpleasant choice to make between two moral duties and therefore you’re forced to violate one duty.

Plato

It’s important to note here that both the moral duties are equally important. When it’s clear that one of the conflicting moral obligations easily overrides the other, we don’t have a moral dilemma. For example, you have the moral duty to repay your debts, but giving back a borrowed weapon to a deranged friend will make you an accomplice in murder. (That’s the classic example in Plato’s Republic). This isn’t really a dilemma since the obligation to prevent murder clearly overrides the obligation to honor your debts.

Because the two (or more) options in a dilemma are (or seem to be, see below) equally important, a dilemma presents you with an impossible choice. Hence the typical characteristic of a dilemma: you can’t get out of it. A dilemma is inescapable and inevitable. You have to make a choice but you can’t. You are thrown from one side to the other: from the obligation to make a choice to the impossibility of making a choice and back again and again.

Moral dilemmas and value pluralism

The equal importance of both (or more) options has to do with value pluralism. There are many important values in life – love, loyalty, honor, freedom, equality etc. – and those are generally – but not specifically – equally important. According to value pluralism – a moral theory I personally accept – there’s no way of establishing a hierarchy between these values so that we know which one to choose in case of conflicts (such as moral dilemmas). Some values are sometimes more important than others, depending on the context (see the example from Plato above). But those others are also sometimes more important.

The same value pluralism is the basis of the theory of balancing human rights. Human rights are basically moral values and they often contradict each other – the privacy of a public figure and free speech of a journalist, for example. It’s not obvious to claim that some human rights are more important than others (although there have been attempts) and therefore you’ll have difficult choices to make between respecting the rights of one person or another.

But let’s get back to the topic of moral dilemmas. Value pluralism is one cause of moral dilemmas, but not the cause. In some cases, moral dilemmas involve only one value. Take the example of Sophie’s Choice: Sophie is instructed by a guard in a Nazi concentration camp to decide which one of her two children will be killed, and if she doesn’t decide, both will be killed. There’s only one value at stake here and no conflict between values. (You could argue that there are a few values at stake: love, life, equality etc. but anyway, there are no conflicts between values, only conflicts between the choice of one child or the choice of another).

Types of moral dilemmas

So this brings us to a typology of moral dilemmas. We can indeed differentiate between types of moral dilemmas. The first distinction is the one described above, between dilemmas involving conflicts between values (usually two) and dilemmas involving a conflict within one value. Some would say that the latter aren’t real dilemmas. Take Sophie’s choice again. The solution is easy: give up one of the two children, no matter which one (assuming that there’s no difference in life expectancy etc.). That’s the best Sophie can do, because the other option – not choosing – will result in the death of both. The choice of which child is morally irrelevant. (Personally, I don’t believe things are as easy as that. We do have a real dilemma here).

Jean-Paul Sartre

Another distinction is the one between so-called epistemic dilemmas and non-epistemic dilemmas. The former are dilemmas created by the absence of knowledge, the latter would exist even with perfect knowledge. Perhaps you’re faced with a choice between participating in a war or staying home and caring for your sick mother (Sartre’s example). This dilemma is caused – in part at least – by the absence of knowledge. If you knew that your participation in the war would have a major effect on the outcome of the war, and if you knew that your mother would be OK without your help, the dilemma would disappear and the choice would be obvious. So in this case it’s the absence of knowledge about the consequences of either choice that creates the dilemma. Some people would say that we don’t have a real dilemma in this case because the provision of knowledge solves the dilemma, and a real dilemma has to be impossible to solve even given perfect knowledge. (Again, I don’t think it’s as easy as that. In real life, knowledge is often missing and it’s useless to say to someone facing a dilemma that knowledge could solve the dilemma).

Another type of epistemic dilemma is the one in which a dilemma appears because of the factual uncertainty about a case. For example, you could be faced with the choice of helping a friend vs informing the police of this friend’s crime. The conflicting values here are friendship/loyalty and your duties as a citizen. However, there’s a dilemma only because you’re unaware of the fact that this “friend” isn’t really a friend and just abuses your trust. Better knowledge would solve the dilemma.

And finally, another type of epistemic dilemma arises when the person faced with the dilemma isn’t sure about the particular moral principles that (should) apply. For example, you may believe that loyalty to a group of criminals is an important moral value but there isn’t any good moral theory available that produces justified moral reasons for such a moral principle. When this “moral principle” conflicts with another, better principle (e.g. snitching), you may find yourself believing that there’s a moral dilemma. Again, better knowledge would solve the dilemma.

Some other distinctions between types of moral dilemmas:

• dilemmas can be self-imposed (making two mutually exclusive promises for example), or imposed by the outside world (Sophie’s choice for example)
• dilemmas can result from your own wrongdoing (again the promises) or by chance (Sartre’s example)
• there can be obligation dilemmas in which more than one feasible action is obligatory (Sartre’s example) or prohibition dilemmas in which all feasible actions are prohibited (Sophie’s choice)
• dilemmas can be within one system of morality or across systems of morality (there can be a conflict between our general moral obligations – e.g. do not be an accomplice to murder – and our role-related obligations – the duty of a priest to protect the secret of confession, even when a murderer comes to confess her crime)
• dilemmas can be single-agent dilemmas (Sartre’s example and Sophie’s choice) or multiple-agent dilemmas (should the US bomb Hiroshima?)
• etc.

By the way, you can still vote on our moral dilemmas here and we’ll add some new ones soon.

Related Articles

• Moral Dilemmas (3quarksdaily.com)
• Dealing with Moral Dilemmas (psychologytoday.com)

Moral Dilemma (12): Greatest Happiness for the Greatest Number

Imagine the discovery of a new type of chair. This chair would produce great happiness and wellbeing to those sitting in it. As we live in a world with limited resources, suppose we would only be able to produce one hundred such chairs. Suppose also that the chair would have to be produced in such a way that sharing the chairs will not work (for example, the production of happiness requires genetically coding the chairs). However, the method of distribution of the chair is undetermined: could be a lottery, could be money, could be only for heads of state etc. That’s not important in the present context. Now, imagine also that a greater total of wellbeing (call it utility if you must) could be produced with the same investment, and by giving each and every individual a very, very small increase in his or her personal wellbeing. For example, we could use the money in order to fit all chairs in the world with a massage function. In total, all these small improvements in wellbeing would produce more total wellbeing than just providing one hundred individuals with great happiness by way of the newly invented happiness chairs.

A similar dilemma was featured here.

More moral dilemmas (which are still open to votes by the way). More on happiness and utilitarianism.

Human Rights and International Law (19): Child Soldiers and the Rights of the Child

[This post is by guest-writer Line Løvåsen].

In 1989, the Convention on the Rights of the Child became the first legally binding international convention to affirm human rights for all children. (Although the other, older human rights treaties and declarations of course didn’t exclude children). The Convention has the highest ratification rates of all major Human Rights Treaties with signatures from 193 States. Only the US and Somalia have yet to give their backing.

The ratification of the CRC was a monumental moment in the fight for children’s rights. With the adoption of the Convention, these rights were no longer an option–they became an obligation under international law. Two Optional Protocols, seeking to strengthen the rights set out in the Convention, were adopted in 2000.

The importance of the rights of children is obvious: our solidarity should be first and foremost with the most vulnerable. Children are more likely to be victims and therefore deserve and require our special care and concern. Their capacities and voices need strengthening. They don’t have the power, education and knowledge to fight for their rights themselves.

Child soldiers

This posts examines a particularly horrendous type of violation of children’s rights: the phenomenon of child soldiers. Here’s an overview of the participation of children and adolescents in armed conflict:

Countries with Child Soldiers fighting in current and recent conflicts (g = government forces, p = paramilitaries, o = armed opposition groups) Africa: Algeria (p,o), Angola (g,o), Burundi (g,o), Chad (g), Congo-Brazzaville (g,o), Congo-Kinshasa (g,o), Eritrea (g,o), Ethiopia (g), Liberia (g,o), Rwanda (g,o), Sierra Leone (g,p,o), Somalia (g,p,o), Sudan (g,p,o), Uganda (g,o) Asia: Afghanistan (g,p,o), India (p,o), Indonesia (p,o), Myanmar (g,o), Nepal (o), Pakistan (o), Philippines (o), Solomon Islands (o), Sri Lanka (o), East Timor (p,o), Tajikistan (o), Papua New Guinea (o), Uzbekistan (o) Middle East: Iran (g,o), Iraq (g,o), Israel/Palestine (g,o), Lebanon (o) Latin America: Colombia (p,o), Mexico (p,o), Peru (o) Europe: Russian Federation (o), Turkey (o), Yugoslavia (p,o). From the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers

In spite of the universal condemnation and prohibition on the use of children as soldiers (see for example articles 6 and 19 of the CRC), children as young as 8 continue to be enrolled in many armed forces and militant groups around the world. (There’s a map here).

Why are there child soldiers?

What drives this? Why are children recruited for warfare? First of all, the proliferation of inexpensive, lightweight weapons has made it easier to use children as soldiers. These small arms are lethal and easy to hide, transport and use with little training. (More data on the arms trade here).

Children are also relatively easy to abduct, subjugate, and manipulate. They are more impressionable and vulnerable to indoctrination, they learn skills and tasks quickly, are fast and agile on a battlefield, more willing than adults to take risks and are seen as more loyal and less threatening to adult leadership. Moreover, it is easier for children to slip through enemy lines unnoticed, making them effective spies and bomb carriers. Children are typically viewed as cheap and expendable labor; they require less food and no payment. In addition, using child soldiers can present a moral dilemma to enemies: should they kill children?

Consequences

Child soldiers are separated from their families, forced to flee their homes and schools, and in many cases, killed, maimed, sexually abused or otherwise exploited. Needless to say this has a devastating impact on their physical and mental wellbeing for the rest of their lives. They are usually forced to live under harsh conditions with insufficient food and little or no access to healthcare or education. They are almost always treated brutally, subjected to beatings and humiliating treatment. Punishments for mistakes or desertion are often very severe. They are forced to engage in hazardous activities such as laying and clearing mines or explosives, using weapons, playing the role of spies, bomb carriers, sentries and human shields.

Girl soldiers are particularly at risk of rape, sexual harassment, abuse and sexually transmitted diseases. They may give birth during their time with combatants and their children are exposed to the same dangers.

Child soldiers suffer enormous emotional, physical, developmental, social and spiritual harm.

Recruitment methods

Patterns of recruitment of children vary according to the context. Although recruitment of children by governments has been less systematic, there are reports of ad-hoc and/or forcible recruitment by groups with the acquiescence of governments such as the previous administration of the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) in Somalia.

In some instances the commanders approach the children directly and use scare tactics or entice them with money. They may also glorify freedom fighters, use gifts such as bicycles or false promises of overseas scholarships to bring the child under the control of the armed group, leaving the parents without any say. In some countries children have been told that killing the enemy is part of the Jihad, and if they die in the effort they will go to heaven. Previously recruited children are also used to recruit other children. If children resist, they are either killed, forced to participate in an assassination or put at the front line with the objective of breaking their will.

What makes children join armed forces? It’s likely to be a mix of desperation, poverty, dysfunctional schools systems, situations of extreme and traumatizing violence, the desire to take control of events, the protection offered by being at the shooting end of a gun, and peer-group pressure.

As much as we should advocate to dissuade forces from using children, the most certain way of preventing the recruitment of children is to stop civil or international conflict from occurring. As explained by a mother of three children who did not join the armed forces or groups, in Monrovia, Liberia:

If these people had not brought war, children would not have joined the fighting forces…

References

• Child Soldiers: Care and Protection of Children in Emergencies. A Field Guide, Mark Lorey, SAVE the Children Federation, 2001, Editors: Amy Hepburn and Tanya Wolfram
• Special UN Representative for Children and Armed Conflict
• Fighting Back: Child and Community-led strategies to avoid children’s recruitment into armed forces and groups in West Africa, Save the Children (funded by Oak Foundation) 2005, UK
• International Law and the Child Soldiers 1987, H. Mann, International and Comparative Law Quarterly, Vol. 36 pp 32-57
• Dr. Radhika Coomaraswamy’s, (SRSG/CAAC) Statement at the Paris International Conference “Free Children from war”, Monday, 5 February 2007

More on child soldiers. Other posts on human rights and international law. More about children’s rights.

Moral Dilemma (10): The Morality of Targeted Killing of Terrorists

The targeted killing of terrorists, either by special forces or by unmanned drone aircraft (aptly named “Predators” or “Reapers“), raises a number of moral questions. Let’s focus here on the drone attacks (and also exclude the cases where there’s an imminent attack, because those can be considered morally easy cases of self-defense). There’s an interesting documentary here. If you can’t watch it in your country, here’s a quote describing it:

A guy gets in his car and drives to work in an office in Nevada. From his office he controls drones in Afghanistan. Occasionally he kills people (who can’t shoot back at him, since he’s 8000 miles away). When he’s done, he gets in his car and drives home to his wife and kids. You can tell the difference between ordinary farmers and insurgents by the way they move across terrain, apparently. (source)

I can think of a few moral dilemmas coming out of this, and I would like to see how you vote on these. So here they are.

1. I know that one of the advantages of drones is supposed to be their effectiveness: compared to normal, long distance bombing (such as the shock-and-awe attacks on Baghdad from the Persian Gulf), drone attacks are said to be a lot less indiscriminate. After all, that’s why they are called targeted “killings”. However, to the extent we can judge – there’s no public database of drone attacks – it’s not uncommon to hear about drones mistakenly targeting weddings instead of evil terrorist meetings, or killing bystanders together with the terrorists. It seems that the main reason for using drones is that you don’t endanger your own flying crews, and certainly not your ground troops. After all, once you have identified a target, a drone isn’t more precise than a normal bomber plane. So, if that’s the motive, we can ask if the prioritization of the minimization of risk to soldiers on your own side over the minimization of risk to civilians on the enemy side, is morally acceptable in war.

2. To broaden the point somewhat: is it generally fair or rather cowardly to shoot people who can’t shoot back, or to harm people from such a distance that they can’t harm you back, or is it morally praiseworthy to shoot people while minimizing the risk on your side?

3. Is killing people by way of drone attacks an admissible act of war or a war crime, assuming that the people killed are actually combatants or terrorists (and assuming that terrorists can be treated like enemy combatants in a normal war) rather than innocent civilians, and that the technology is therefore effective?

4. If Al Qaida kills the operators mentioned in the quote, is it an admissible act of war or terrorism?

5. If you have checked the first answer in question #3, do you believe it’s logical to check the first answer in question #4 a well? If not, why not?  Add your reasons in the “other” box.

6. The same question as #4, but slightly modified, and assuming you checked the first answer in question #3. If Al Qaida detonates a bomb that wipes out an entire neighborhood, including the operators mentioned in the quote, can they claim their actions are equivalent to targeted killing by the U.S., given the fact that targeted killing isn’t always very precise either? Or are they wrong and are they in this case not engaging in admissible acts of war but in terrorism?

7. Again, a small modification of question #4, and assuming you checked the first answer in question #3: if Al Qaida detonates a bomb that wipes out an entire neighborhood, believing the operators mentioned in the quote were present, but they actually weren’t present, can they claim their actions are equivalent to targeted killing given the fact that drone attacks are known to have targeted places where terrorists were supposed to be but actually weren’t? Or are they wrong and are they not engaging in admissible acts of war but in terrorism?

More on targeted killings. More on the war on terror. More on just war theory. More moral dilemmas (which are still open to votes by the way).

Moral Dilemma (9): Michael Sandel on the Right Thing to Do

Michael Sandel

If you like our blog series on moral dilemmas, you’ll like this video. It’s a bit long but really worth it. Some of the content:

Part 1 – The Moral Side of Murder: If you had to choose between (1) killing one person to save the lives of five others and (2) doing nothing, even though you knew that five people would die right before your eyes if you did nothing—what would you do? What would be the right thing to do? That’s the hypothetical scenario called the Trolley problem Professor Michael Sandel uses to launch his course on moral reasoning. Sandel also discusses the case of forced organ donation.

Part 2 – The Case for Cannibalism: Sandel introduces the principles of utilitarian philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, with a famous nineteenth century law case involving a shipwrecked crew of four. After nineteen days lost at sea, the captain decides to kill the cabin boy, the weakest amongst them, so they can feed on his blood and body to survive.

Moral Dilemma (8): The Plank Of Carneades

(source)

There are two shipwrecked sailors, A and B. They both see a plank that can only support one of them and both of them swim towards it. Sailor A gets to the plank first. Sailor B, who is going to drown, pushes A off and away from the plank and, thus, ultimately, causes A to drown. Sailor B gets on the plank and is later saved by a rescue team. Can sailor B be tried for murder? Or did B act in self-defense? (source)

More on murder. You can still vote for our previous dilemmas.

Moral Dilemma (7): Saving the Violinist

Imagine a famous violinist falling into a coma. The society of music lovers determines from medical records that you and you alone can save the violinist’s life by being hooked up to him for nine months. The music lovers break into your home while you are asleep and hook the unconscious (and unknowing, hence innocent) violinist to you. You may want to unhook him, but you are then faced with this argument put forward by the music lovers: The violinist is an innocent person with a right to life. Unhooking him will result in his death. Therefore, unhooking him is morally wrong. (source)

More on the right to life. You can still vote for our previous dilemmas.

Moral Dilemma (6): Involuntary Organ Donor

A transplant surgeon has five patients, each in need of a different organ, each of whom will die without that organ. Unfortunately, there are no organs available to perform any of these five transplant operations. A friend of the doctor has the five different compatible and healthy organs and, for another reason, is terminally ill. However, this friend still hopes that he will survive into old age, notwithstanding 99% medical certainty that he will not make it until next month. And he certainly has no desire to sacrifice his life and organs.

More on the organ donations here and here. You can still vote for our previous dilemmas.

Moral Dilemma (5): What Does Justice Require?

Amartya Sen

(source)

This dilemma – part of this series – comes from Amartya Sen. Three children, Anne, Bob and Carla, are arguing who should receive a flute. The arguments they give for getting the flute are not selfish, partial or arbitrary, but based on different theories of justice. Of course, since they are children, they don’t have a well-developed sense of the theories of justice they each adopt and use as a justification for getting the flute, but it turns out that the three of them present a crude version of three of the most common philosophical theories of justice.

• Anne claims that she should get the flute because she’s the only one of the three children who know how to play it (which is correct). It would, in her view, be unjust to deny the flute to the only one who can make proper use of it.
• Bob claims that the flute should be his because he’s poor and doesn’t have anything to play with (which is correct). He could possibly even learn how to play it given the opportunity. It would be unjust to deprive him of this opportunity and to leave him destitute compared to the other children.
• Carla claims the flute should be hers because she spent a lot of time making it (which is correct). Taking the flute away from her would be unjust.

All three points of view – or theories of justice if you want – sound persuasive, although some will sound more persuasive to some than to others. In fact, if you’re a utilitarian, you’ll be more persuaded by Anne. If you’re a liberal egalitarian, Bob will have your ear. And if you’re a libertarian, Carla will be the obvious choice. A utilitarian will argue that giving the flute to Anne will produce the highest aggregate utility (or happiness or whatever). After all, it’s better to play the flute than just play “with it”, or simply make it. Even the negative utility for Bob and Carla – i.e. not having the flute – would perhaps not outweigh the positive utility for Anne. And even Bob and Carla can get some utility from the fact that Anne has the flute: they may enjoy her playing it.

Libertarians would strongly support the property rights of Carla, rights which for them override utility considerations. Liberal egalitarians would point to the fact that Anne’s ability to play the flute – the reason for utilitarians to give her the flute – is perhaps the result of a privileged social position, as it the fact that Carla was able to make the flute – the reason libertarians put forward for giving her the flute. Giving the flute to Bob would equalize society, and that is what justice is about for them, not property rights or utility.

More on justice. More on Amartya Sen. And you can still vote on our previous moral dilemmas here.

Moral Dilemma (4): Unequal Human Beings

(updated following comments; the initial version of the poll was confusing)

Another post in our blog series on moral dilemmas. Although on some level, we cherish the equality of human beings and their equal worth, in practice we value people and their lives on the basis of their merit and desert.

More on desert. You can still vote on our other dilemmas here.

Moral Dilemma (3): Sacrificing Your Son

Another dilemma in our blog series. You are an inmate in a concentration camp. A sadistic guard is about to hang your son who tried to escape and wants you to pull the chair from underneath him. He says that if you don’t he will not only kill your son but some other innocent inmate as well. If you do, he will refrain from killing another innocent inmate. You don’t have any doubt that he means what he says and that he will keep his side of the bargain, no matter how cruel he is.

More on the holocaust. You can still vote for our previous dilemmas.

Moral Dilemma (2): The Immortality Pill

A new post in this blog series. Imagine that someone invented a pill that prevents aging and death (source). The problem: the pill costs $150,000, and there is no way to produce a large amount of them. Hence, society cannot drain resources away from other, less rewarding investments, and provide the pill to those who cannot afford to pay $150,000. So only a few, namely those who can afford the pill and are fast enough to get hold of one, can live forever without aging. Assuming that we agree that everyone should have an equal right to immortality,

More on equality of opportunity. More on the free market. More on redistribution. More posts in this series.

Moral Dilemma (1): Stopping a Suicide Bomber

A new blog series. The purpose of this series – contrary to many other series of posts on this blog – is not to inform, to entertain, or to argue for our points of view. What we want to do here is learn what you think. Of course, we have the comment sections for that, but here we want to try to guide your opinions in a more structured way. We will present you with certain moral dilemmas, some of which are well-known in philosophy; others not. Then we ask you to answer a few questions (and you can see how other people have answered). In case the straitjacket of the provided possible answers doesn’t suit you, you can of course go to the comment section and elaborate.

First dilemma: Suppose you spot a suicide bomber walking towards a crowd. There’s no doubt about his intentions. You are the only one who has correctly identified the bomber, and you have no other option but to use deadly force to stop him. You can’t warn the crowd, nor can you ask security forces to intervene. Moreover, the only possible way for you to stop him is by using a flamethrower.

More on targeted killing of terrorists. More on the war on terror. More on suicide bombers. More on the ticking bomb argument for torture.