This is philosophy bites with me David Edmonds and me Nigel Warburton.

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There's a ticking bomb and the only way the police can find out how to

diffuse it is to torture the terrorist who's planted it. Thousands of lives are at stake.

In such a scenario is torture legitimate. Many philosophers now

enjoy debating such questions, but not Ray Gator, professor of philosophy at

King's College London.

Society, he says, is defined in part by what it refuses to debate.

And he regrets that the question of whether torture is ever legitimate has even been raised.

Raygator, welcome to Philosophy Bites.

Thank you very much for having me on.

The topic we want to focus on today is torture,

specifically the justification of torture by states.

I wonder if you could tell me how you got into thinking philosophically about the topic of torture.

Well it began when a man called Alan Dershevitz, who was an academic lawyer at Harvard, wrote a book in which he

defended the idea that we should torture, suspected terrorists in certain kinds of circumstances.

First of all, I was horrified.

But I was also struck by the fact that a lot of people were horrified, but also

incredulous. And I was interested in the nature of that incredulity because a lot of them

seem to be saying that there are some things that should

be unthinkable.

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