I’m more of value-free guy, so I am torn between a couple lines of thought here:
He didn’t actually hurt anyone, and didn’t violate the NAP. Thus, he should be left alone. People should be free to bear arms, or to prarie dog high explosives.
He planned to kill hundres of people, so equivalent force can be brought to bear on him. E.g., severing limbs is acceptable if it has a good chance of extracting information and saving others’ lives.
What would a PDA do?
Suppose PDA #1 captured and tortured him according to standards that it customers are happy with. If I’m against torture can I hire PDA #2 to break in and rescue him?
Torture is no-go for private defense contractors. I believe the owner of one of the biggest PMCs (closest thing, in our world today) said in a book that private military companies must have very high standards to maintain their commercial reputation.
As for hiring a second company to break him out: no-go, either. That second company must maintain its commercial reputation. It will refuse to provide security support in this situation, if the first company is understood in the market to be legit. And vice versa, if the two companies are reversed.
Sony cannot raid Panasonic’s offices; nor can Panasonic raid Sony’s offices. Why should private providers of security do this: if they are really private, and not political or bandits, then they cannot attack each other no more than any other two companies.
For interrogation:
It is OK, however, to put Mr. Suicide Bomber in a room.
Play Hilary Clinton’s or Leonid Brezhnev’s speeches.
But bearing arms can constitute aggression… example: owning a nuclear weapon cannot possibly be used for legitimate self defense because many innocents will die. Similarly I think carrying a bomb onto a plane constitutes at least a weak form of aggression, since the only way he can use it is by blowing up a plane full of (presumably) innocent people.
PDAs would do the cheapest thing to satisfy their customers… waterboarding is cheap so they might do that if it satisfies your sense of justice or yields good information.
PDA’s cannot water-board; else they risk bad public image in most market conditions. They know this. They, as private companies, must limit dis-advertising.
But they will figure out something else. Of course.
First most probable course of events: someone just shoots the guy in flight, when his possession of explosives is discovered. Perfectly legitimate self-defense regardless of whether he actually meant to harm anyone or not. If not…
Second most probable course of events: the offender’s Liability Insurer decides, according to its rules, whether his act is punishable. If so, negotiations with the carrier begin to specify the amount that it would take for the carrier t forgive the offender. Negotiations succeed, the offender find himself unable to pay newly calculated premium rates and is denied civilized contact with other people. He could be shot by anyone, without any consequence to the shooter. If not…
Third most probable course of events: air carrier sets forth rules for passengers boarding its planes. These rules would almost surely touch upon the issue of whether carrying live explosives on board is an offense, and if so to what extend it can be punished. As long as such rules are made available before boarding (or even booking) to passengers, the carrier can do what it pleases to the offender. If not…
Fourth most probable course of events: no such rules exist or none have been furnished beforehand. Offender and carrier appoint an arbitrator or each appoints one of his choice, and the two arbitrators choose a third. A decision id meted out. If not…
Fifth most probable course of events: offender and/or carrier don’t agree to put their case in he hand of arbitrators. Offender is either apprehended by the carrier or escapes. In each case, the reputation of both of them would suffer or be boosted by the acts they undertake. The carrier goes bankrupt or earns some free publicity, the guy is left alone or is denied civilized contact from anyone else. If not…
The thing happens in the . He turns out to be a paid intelligence agent. is attacked, is attacked, is attacked, is attacked, formally secedes, WW3 breaks out.
Torture is not useful for finding the truth: If does not know anything, i.e. he is innocent, he can not tell you anything. If he does know something, but is not really convinced, he will tell you everything he already knows at the perception of torture or punishment. If he knows much but is very convinced of his ideas, i.e. he is a fundamentalist, he will tell you never anything.
Three centuries of torturing “witches” and alleged heretics taught us torture is the worst possible method of obtaining information. Plea bargaining is much more effective as is old fashioned bribing.
He attempted to detonate the device, which is as good as pulling the trigger in my opinion.
I say allow him to complete his mission. Fix his panty bomb. Take him to an isolated location. Let him detonate the device the proper way. In his state of mind he might need some assistance.
Other option is to take him to 30,000 feet and “let him be free.”
A PDA would react in the manner the market decided for these types of crimes. Hard to speculate, but I imagine it would be relatively quick and cost effective. I doubt torture would be applied. At some point they might even have the capability to wipe the guy’s memory and have him serve time in a useful function to the injured parties. In the case of this situation, I’m sure we’d be talking about multiple PDAs negotiating a solution.
But here’s the question: Would the airline’s PDA not have done a better job at preventing the situation from occurring in the first place?
I forgot one thing. It depends if you consider torture as mean to obtain information or as punishment. In the former case my comment above still stands: torture is not an effective way of obtaining information. In the latter case you should consider if the law allows torture: for example in Plantagenet England torture was forbidden as an interrogation “aid” but was part of the punishment for many crimes against the Crown. Also you should ask yourself: what can be defined as torture? For example according to the laws of Joseph II torture (forbidden in his domains) was described as any treatment that could cause death. Twenty lashes or cane strokes were seen as perfectly acceptable since they would not have caused death. Can waterboarding also be not considered torture because it’s closely monitored and so isn’t technically lethal?
That’s what I’ve heard too. At which point I guess you could say whether or not being an incompetent dipshit is a good justification for waterboarding someone.
I think the most significant thing about this incident is the fact that his father informed on him. If the goal is make people safer then he should be treated well in order to make it more likely that others will follow suit and volunteer information. People are much less likely to inform on their crazy kin if they think it will get them tortured like animals.
In fact I would work out a deal where he would serve his time in Nigeria to send a signal that if you inform on someone close counter-concessions will be made and better terms granted.
