Coercion to Gain Information

Is coercion, for example torture, good for getting information, and if so, is it even desirable? I make a distinction between 4 kinds of people: the ignorant innocent, the ignorant guilty, the knowledgeable innocent, and the knowledgeable guilty.

The ignorant innocent is the trivial case. The vast majority of people fall into this category, and it is clear that coercion in this case is both futile and ethically undesirable.

The ignorant guilty are those who have committed a crime or atrocity, and yet they possess no knowledge of the information that is being sought after. Criminals and villains know most of the details of their own actions, but most likely don't know anything about the details of unrelated actions and their perpetrators. Coercion in this case will at best yield information about a subject that is unrelated to the subject in question, and that information itself will be totally useless without further context. Coercion is this case is futile and undesirable.

The knowledgeable innocent are those that have done nothing wrong, and yet they possess knowledge of the information that is being sought after. Family members and associates of criminals and villains may know the details of the actions and perpetrators in question without otherwise having any connection to them. Coercion in this case may yield all the information about the subject in question. It's interesting to note that in the US it is not legal to coerce the accused to incriminate themselves, but it is legal to coerce in a limited manner a material witness to testify against the accused. However, with regards to interrogation techniques, it is clearly unethical to use the more severe interrogation techniques against the innocent, and a case can be made that all attempts at coercion in this case are undesirable.

The knowledgeable guilty are those that have committed or aided the action in question. They presumably know most of the information that is being sought after. Coercion in this case may yield all of the information in question. For the moment, we'll assume that all types of coercion are ethically acceptable in this case (that's a pretty big assumption).

The first task when detaining and interrogating people should be determining which of the 4 categories the detainee falls under. That's a difficult task in itself. In the US criminal justice system, all criminal detainees are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law by a jury of peers due to a preponderance of evidence indicating guilt. And because of that fact, coercion of the accused is strictly prohibited. With regards to non-US citizens detained in a foreign country, normally international law, specifically the Geneva conventions, sets the standards of how detainees should be treated. However, for the moment we'll assume that the detainees in question don't fall under the protections of the Geneva conventions due to some technicality or other (another big assumption). So barring any rule of law to dictate how detainees are placed into one of the 4 categories, it must be done on a case-by-case basis by the captors, without specific training or infrastructure and without broad oversight.

Let's make another large assumption that the captors are able to completely determine which of the 4 categories each detainee falls under, that they're able to tell when a detainee is innocent or guilty and whether or not they possess specific desirable knowledge. Let's also assume that they play it ethically safe and just interrogate those that are both guilty and knowledgeable. Now, there is a chance that they could get all of the information they hope to get from this filtered-down subset of detainees, but there's also a chance that they don't get any information at all, and still another chance that they get information that is either completely useless or full of deception. When considering these possibilities, it is instructive to remember other historical instances of extreme coercion, such as during the Spanish Inquisition. The Spanish Inquisition used extreme coercive techniques usually resulting in death to get the information they wanted, but in the end, it was really irrelevant what the accused knew/believed or what they related to their captors. Given the intractability of determining the veracity of information acquired through coercion, it is ethically difficult to justify coercion in this case.

Let's make one more enormous assumption that all information gathered through coercion is correct and useful, and let's also assume that the information in question is so important that it could mean the difference between the destruction of the Human race and its survival. Is coercion, extreme or otherwise, ethically and morally justified in this case? In this fantastical case, it might very well be justified, but look at the assumptions it took to get here: the detainees don't fall under US-national law, international law, or international treaties; the detainees are perfectly categorized; only the guilty and knowledgeable are interrogated using coercive techniques; all the information gathered through coercion is correct and useful; the information is not only life-or-death vital, it is vital on a catastrophic level; and the biggest assumption of them all, that coercion, extreme or otherwise, is ethically and morally justified. If any of these assumptions are wrong, then there are serious ethical problems with using coercion to gain information. To me, that's enough to say with confidence that all forms of coercion to gain information are at base unethical and undesirable.