ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the cogency of the ethical arguments for the permissibility of torture in extreme circumstances. The main argument for the ethical permissibility of torture in certain circumstances is either the straightforward utilitarian argument that allowing torture will promote the good, for instance by saving many human lives, or a more deontological argument that by planning to commit certain acts the persons involved forfeit their rights not to be tortured. In addition one might adduce a pragmatic legal argument that if torture occurs anyway it is better that it is regulated. Apart from the pragmatic argument both the utilitarian and the deontological argument require certain pieces of knowledge to be in place for the justification of torture to be complete. Ethicists and lawyers should be extremely wary of stating the 'in principle' justification of torture. There is the fallacy of believing that torture can ever be as 'clinical' as Alan M. Dershowitz describes it.
