Michael Levin's "The Case for Torture"" argues that there are various reasons for allowing torture to exist in the United States of America (1). Levin would love to see society change its negative views on torture so that, under certain circumstances, torture would be permissible. The article starts off with a very brief description of how he believes society views the subject of torture as a negative thing. He opposes that way of thinking, and provides three cases in which he believes torture must be administered with various reasons attempting to support his thoughts. .
The hypothetical cases Levin uses range from very extreme situations, to a situation which we may sometimes see on the news. Levin makes it clear to the audience that he does not agree with torture as a punishment, and focuses on exactly what it should be used for. He also stresses that there is an important difference between terrorists, and victims, and he believes it would stop the talk of terrorist's "rights. Levin also writes on his belief that most terrorists do their crimes for publicity, and because of that, terrorists should be fairly easy to identify, and later be tortured. He closes the article by saying torture would cause little danger to western democracies, and predicting what he believes will happen in the future.
.
After reading Levin's article, my opinion is his argument about torture was not valid. Because of lack of good logic and reasoning, most of the reasoning he gives is heavily based on pathetic appeals. But in my opinion, the force of pathos he puts into the reader is very compelling, but does not fulfill the argument. Levin uses three main points to convince readers why torture should be used. The first major point includes three hypothetical cases as big reasons to why it ˜s important. His second point explains the reason for the need of torture. Finally, he states who gets to receive the torturing, and briefly describes what the outcome may be.
