#55 has 12 pages of notes “concerning” the already destroyed tapes, and is dated a week after the January 2008 announcement of the investigation into the destruction.

I don’t want to rehash anything that has already been said, but if “investigation” is treated special, I can’t see how this one wouldn’t apply.

I think there was some illegitimate testing by illegitimate scientists, because they wanted illegitimate results.

These guys knew they were applying techniques designed to break people — not to get legitimate information.

Obtaining illegitimate info would be a deliverable. So would an illegitimate message (a la Phoenix Program). And building an illegitimate methodology by which they could continue to do this illegitimate work would be yet another deliverable.

In some ways, this is the very content they were seeking with their “tests”; could they get all of this out of their efforts?

We can see they weren’t doing real science, but acting as if it was.

We can see they weren’t doing real “lawyering”, but acting as if it was.

We are caught up in whether it was real or not real, when what they were really doing was none of the above.

Why would anyone make a pretense of real science or “lawyering”? Because they only want the appearance of these things — they were really working on something else.

First principles — it is what it is, on the face of it. It is torture, it is an attempt to cover torture, and the torture is designed not get information, not to get reliable data.

What else is it, on the face of it?

Anyway, Bob… do you really think I would make a case for the science of these people? If you’re not getting my point, I’ll take responsibility and assume I’m not doing a good job of expressing myself.

Naw, we’re OK now. I was just making sure. *g*

Best wishes,
Bob in AZ

I thank rmadelson for the clear explanation re privilege. (Others may have said it just as clear, just that I get it this time.) It lends some credence to those of us that have been arguing that failure to present scientific evidence they had on hand about torture techniques to OLC demonstrates CIA’s bad faith, and their foreknowledge that they knew what these techniques would do, and were using the attorneys as a cover for their crimes. I think it could be proved in court, but here, my naivete may be getting in the way, and I have to bow back towards our many excellent legal analysts.

Oh, and as an aside, a scientific experiment doesn’t have to be a controlled experiment. That is only one kind, and only appropriate when you can truly control the conditions. Other kinds of naturalistic observations, and manipulation of data therefrom, or partially controlled experimental interventions, are quite common in the biological sciences, psychology, and medicine.

But controlled experiments are still the gold standard. And are you alleging that the experimenters in this case did not have control? Naturalistic observations? Are you kidding me? These conditions were about as unnatural as I can imagine.

I am quite aware of attempts to conduct research under naturalistic conditions in the social sciences. That’s what I’ve been trying to do for the past 20 years or so.

What the torturers and their supervisors was doing was not scientific. I agree with cinnamonape @ 78.

Bob in AZ

The only thing the SOL does not apply to is murder.

Well, its clear from what has been discussed here that murder– or at least negligent homicide– was committed by the CIA and its contractors.

Bob in AZ