SOC203H1 Lecture Notes - World War I
Document Summary
Weber vs durkheim: torture: some recent examples. Us military actions in iraq: torture as a concept. We are talking about the practice of torture by states, not criminal torture (sadistic individuals). Torture might either be psychological or physical: can torture be justified. Amnesty international is opposed to all forms of torture, no matter the case. Ticking bomb argument - police has a suspect in custody, authorities have reason to believe that an attack is going to take place in a pre-determined place. They also believe that the suspect knows about the attack, and if the information can be extracted from the statistic, the police can prevent the attack and save innocent lives. In practice, it is not likely that the prisoner will ever have this information. 100% sure that the suspect actually has the information: a weberian argument. State definition - they have monopoly control over the means of violence.
