The Ticking Time Bomb: When the Use of Torture Is and Is Not Endorsed

Abstract

Although standard ethical views categorize intentional torture as morally wrong, the ticking time bomb (TTB) scenario is frequently offered as a legitimate counter-example that justifies the use of torture. In this scenario, a bomb has been placed in a city by a terrorist, and the only way to defuse the bomb in time is to torture a terrorist in custody for information. TTB scenarios appeal to a utilitarian "greater good" justification, yet critics maintain that the utilitarian structure depends on a questionable set of hidden assumptions. Three experiments were conducted to investigate endorsement of torture when these hidden assumptions were violated. In Experiment 1, results indicated that endorsement varied as a function of the success likelihood of torture and its alternatives. In Experiment 2, people found torture to be more acceptable, less wrong, and more obligatory when the suspect in custody was described as a "terrorist" than when he was described simply as an individual, and when he was described as culpable as opposed to innocent. These results are more consistent with retributive justice than utilitarian "greater good" concerns. The results of Experiment 3 indicated that utilitarian decision profiles were not associated with lower levels of empathic concern but were instead associated with personal distress and the ability to transpose oneself into a fictitious character's experience. Across the three experiments, deontologists were more likely to reject torture than utilitarians.

Divergent roles of autistic and alexithymic traits in utilitarian moral judgments in adults with autism

“…As mentioned before, alexithymic traits were predicted to be associated with increased utilitarian profile 41 42 due to reduced empathic concern 33 34 39 42 , while autistic traits were expected to be associated with reduced utilitarian tendency on account of increased personal distress 62 63 64 65 66 68 69 once shared variance between these two traits 28 29 30 31 32 was controlled for. Additionally, we included SPM as a measure of intelligence since our correlation analyses showed that association between SPM and moral evaluation differed across groups and thus might index developmentally acquired, rule-based compensatory strategy to evaluate moral behaviour on hypothetical cases in ASD 6 10 72 73 .…”

“…Alternatively, it is also possible that utilitarian inclination due to alexithymic traits was counterbalanced by non-utilitarian inclination due to autistic traits. Severity of autism is associated with increased personal distress during demanding social situations 62 63 64 65 66 67 , which persists even after accounting for co-occurring alexithymia 64 , and this increased personal distress leads to withdrawal from engaging in personally carrying out harmful actions 68 69 . Thus, the nature of between-group differences in utilitarian moral judgment in a given study may depend on these within-ASD-group interactions between autistic and alexithymia traits that exert mutually opposite influence on utilitarian moral judgments.…”

“…We made following predictions for moral judgments in autistics on personal moral dilemmas: ( i ) alexithymic traits in the ASD sample would be associated with increased utilitarian inclination 41 42 to endorse harmful sacrificial actions due to reduced empathic concern 33 34 35 39 74 75 76 77 78 79 ; while ( ii ) autistic traits would be associated with reduced tendency to endorse utilitarian solution due to increased negative emotional arousal stemming from personal distress 68 69 experienced by autistics while facing demanding social environments 62 63 64 65 66 67 . Note that although one may expect affective empathy (empathic concern and personal distress, i.e.)…”

Will I Regret It? Anticipated Negative Emotions Modulate Choices in Moral Dilemmas

“…Previous literature showed that the disposition to feel empathic concern and personal distress in front of the suffering of others was inversely associated with the endorsement of the utilitarian option (Gleichgerrcht and Young, 2013; Sarlo et al, 2014; Spino and Cummins, 2014; Patil et al, 2016). Personal distress, in particular, predicted the percentage of utilitarian choices in Footbridge-type, but not in Trolley-type dilemmas (Sarlo et al, 2014).…”

Divergent roles of autistic and alexithymic traits in utilitarian moral judgments in adults with autism

“…Alternatively, it is also possible that utilitarian inclination due to alexithymic traits was counterbalanced by non-utilitarian inclination due to autistic traits. Severity of autism is associated with increased personal distress during demanding social situations [62][63][64][65][66][67] , which persists even after accounting for co-occurring alexithymia 64 , and this increased personal distress leads to withdrawal from engaging in personally carrying out harmful actions 68,69 . Thus, the nature of between-group differences in utilitarian moral judgment in a given study may depend on these…”