jdanton

I'm watching a show the other night, and all the people in the lab had to take a polygraph test.

Postal inspectors use them frequently.

We can't use them in court.

I continue to wonder why, when interrogating prisoners of war, we don't start with the simple lie detector.

It's far more humane than waterboarding, and probably more reliable.

__________________
Author: Memoirs of a Sleepless Mind, a book you CAN judge by its cover.

Sean

Yeah but it's far more fun to beat information out of people because you know that the only real way to make them tell you what you want to hear.

jdanton

There's an underlying question here that I neglected to express.

If they are not reliable enough to use on prisoners of war and such, why the hell would we EVER use them on our own citizens?

__________________
Author: Memoirs of a Sleepless Mind, a book you CAN judge by its cover.

CosmicRocker

they are an "investigative tool" when used by police.
but not an "admission" of guilt

__________________

Traveling Wilburys (l to r)

Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty, George Harrison, Roy Orbison

jdanton

I think you misinterpret my question.

If you've got some "bad guys" and you THINK they are terrorists and maybe there's a plot moving forward, could the polygraph not help determine if your beliefs are correct and have a BETTER shot at learning what is happening than waterboarding would have?

I ask this in great sincerety. If it's so damned unreliable we can't use it on people captured, why would we EVER allow it to be used for any reason on our own people?

If it is, say 80% reliable, and you've got 3 suspected terrorists, I would think educated quesioning of all three hooked up to a polygraph would give one a pretty good idea as to what was going on.

__________________
Author: Memoirs of a Sleepless Mind, a book you CAN judge by its cover.

CosmicRocker

^ OK
Sure. it makes sense to me to do that. I'm sure it's already done though

__________________

Traveling Wilburys (l to r)

Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty, George Harrison, Roy Orbison

jdanton

I'm not.

Wonder how we can find out.

__________________
Author: Memoirs of a Sleepless Mind, a book you CAN judge by its cover.

CosmicRocker

^ HA HA we can't !!
Patriot act - National Security - the whole black ops thing

__________________

Traveling Wilburys (l to r)

Bob Dylan, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty, George Harrison, Roy Orbison

Dawnling

like placebos, lie detectors do not work unless the person beleives that
they work.

We could start a thread for "humane torture".

The USA USED to be the the persons who gave a prisoner food and shelter and rest so much that the prisoner fell in love with the USA and would cooperate.
YES. We DID used to be them

jdanton

I always thought I'd run a prisoner of war camp the enemy would want to break IN to.

Catch more flies with honey.....

I'm really curious about the polygraph thing. Suppose they didn't know they were connected? Is that even possible.

__________________
Author: Memoirs of a Sleepless Mind, a book you CAN judge by its cover.