Observations and inanities by a second-shift assistant supervisor in the Puppy-Grinding division of the Evil Atheist Conspiracy® (our motto: "Sure it's cruel, but think of the jobs!"), your host, Brent Rasmussen.
Just how long . . .
Ah, great - the military has a new techno gizmo to use in the Global War on Terror: a hand-held lie detector! From the article:
FORT JACKSON, S.C. - The Pentagon will issue hand-held lie detectors this month to U.S. Army soldiers in Afghanistan, pushing to the battlefront a century-old debate over the accuracy of the polygraph.
The Defense Department says the portable device isn't perfect, but is accurate enough to save American lives by screening local police officers, interpreters and allied forces for access to U.S. military bases, and by helping narrow the list of suspects after a roadside bombing. The device has already been tried in Iraq and is expected to be deployed there as well. “We're not promising perfection — we've been very careful in that,” said Donald Krapohl, special assistant to the director at the Defense Academy for Credibility Assessment, the midwife for the new device. “What we are promising is that, if it's properly used, it will improve over what they are currently doing.”
Of course, there are all kinds of problems here. let's just start with the next paragraph in the story:
But the lead author of a national study of the polygraph says that American military men and women will be put at risk by an untested technology. "I don't understand how anybody could think that this is ready for deployment," said statistics professor Stephen E. Fienberg, who headed a 2003 study by the National Academy of Sciences that found insufficient scientific evidence to support using polygraphs for national security. "Sending these instruments into the field in Iraq and Afghanistan without serious scientific assessment, and for use by untrained personnel, is a mockery of what we advocated in our report."
Furthermore, the only tests which have been conducted on the devices has been done by the company selling them to the military. And that only involved a small group of paid volunteers (226 people, from the same MSNBC story). American volunteers. Here at home. Meaning without taking into consideration either cultural differences or the stress factors of a war environment.
Now, think about that for just a moment. They sold the military a bunch (94) of these units, even though they haven't been tested for the situation where they'll be used. That the military would leap at the chance to use such a thing without adequate data supporting it does not come as any surprise to me. Not at all. But look past the military, at a much larger market, where that data supporting the effectiveness of the devices *would* seem a lot more appropriate: used on Americans, here at home.
Never mind the fundamental problems with any kind of polygraph - that technology is already widely accepted as an investigative tool up to and including being accepted in some courts of law. Never mind that this device is much more limited than a conventional polygraph machine, and doesn't require the operator to have extensive training to use it.
The device is being tested by the military. They just don't know it. And once it is in use, some version of the technology will be adapted for more generalized police use. Just consider how it will be promoted to the law enforcement community: as a way of screening suspects. Then, as a way of finding suspects. Then, as a way of checking anyone who wants access to some critical facility. Then, as a way of checking anyone who wants access to an airplane, train, or bus.
Just how long do you think it will be before you have to pass a test by one of these types of devices in your day-to-day life? I give it maybe ten years. But I worry that I am an optimist.
Jim Downey
(Via this dKos story. Cross-posted to Communion of Dreams.)
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The Ultimate Polygraph
"The machine is never wrong son!" -Sgt. Landsman
Hilarious.
Yeah, I've heard of that actually being done - with a photocopier, just like that. Hilarious.
Jim Downey
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Like Science Fiction? Read *or listen to* my novel, Communion of Dreams, for free.
A reliable polygraph test
A reliable polygraph test wouldn't yield nearly as much power as one that is correct 50% of the time. All that ambiguity gives the test giver room to do whatever they want and reason it any way that they want.
But what about a drug test? There's no ambiguity there. I've been the one processing those urine samples - I know. ;-) Is it within the constitution to administer a drug test? I go back and forth on the topic, but really, what I see is people that are living their lives (yeah, maybe they're fucked up, but they're not hurting anyone) and then a drug test takes away their employment which leads to poverty and depression and more drug use.
It's hard to find the right
It's hard to find the right words to describe malicious idiocy like this.
The damn things DO NOT WORK. It's a scam. Complete bullshit. A ruse to provide more forms of coercion, not evidence. The modest results that polygraphs have given do not compare to the error rate that is inherent in any real situation. While such a ruse could certainly be used in a war situation, it will only work as intimidation for extracting questionable info from weak subjects.
Then there is the potential for domestic abuse. A case could be made for using them as a sneaky war trick, but one evil breeds another. Polygraph testing, although often restricted is still used domestically, despite the fact that they do not work. If police and government agencies are given greater leeway, how long until the courts start to take it more seriously as well? Police can already lie to and threaten suspects to obtain a confession. They don't need an endless fountain of fake evidence. Government agencies and private employers can refuse to hire anyone; they don't need fortune-telling machines that ruin careers for no reason.
Polygraphs are nothing more than expensive theater props.
Their continued use, in any setting, is inherently dishonest. We might as well consult a Magic 8-Ball and give our military, police and courts unlimited powers.
It's just a tool...just an indicator, that's all...
It just supplies probable cause, that's all.
If someone fails this test in Iraq it'll just be an indicator to send in the person for a more intensive examination using...other tools. And, hey, if those tools should result in a confession, then they'll know this device works. Perfectly scientific! Then they can depend on the detectors to root out the enemy, and act accordingly when anyone fails.
Did they, I wonder, test the devices out on a subject with a squad of heavily armed foreigners aiming weapons at them? Doubtless they were sure to give a strong electrical shock for lying during the test, just for that element of danger?
Seriously, though, you're going to arrest a guy in Afghanistan and ask him 20 questions with these wires attached to his hands? Do they think nobody has seen pictures from Abu Ghraib that they're going to let our soldiers attach electrodes to them? And do a stress test?
But I can sure see it becoming one of those things for which refusal means you automatically get your car searched here in the states.
Did anyone else notice this nugget in the story?
"Congress has already scaled back its oversight of the polygraph. Five years ago it eliminated a requirement that the Defense Department produce an annual report on polygraph use."
Imagine that. The Republican congress decided they didn't need no stinkin' polygraph oversight just about the time we invaded Iraq.
Steve "No, officer, I have never been a member of the Taliban." James
What could go wrong?
This whole thing is obviously a horrible idea, even when I assumed they had been tested this sounded like a horrible idea. Especially when you throw in the slippery slope argument of how soon till you get pulled over and a cop holds one of these up before he asks for your ID. My optimistic assumption is that they will be no more useful than the soldiers gut instinct which is probably pretty well honed to liars after their third tour of duty. the optimistic part is that they realize the tool is worthless and toss them aside and the whole thing fades into obscurity for a while.
The only thing I'd argue is with Brent's reply, can you really ask any piece of technology to be infallible? So long as we realize that these are tools, they are evidence, they are not the final decision makers then they might be useful, but will probably just create a scapegoat for people who would rather not be the decision makers.
It's Just Engineering
You need to read The Truth Machine to see what I'm getting at here. If our universe is indeed materialistic, then the mind of a human being can ultimately be reduced down to it's component physical parts.
After that, it becomes just an engineering problem. Throw enough money and manpower at it, and the problem of determining whether or not a person is telling the truth - with 100% accuracy - can be solved.
I mean, why not? The only stumbling block I can see is if there turns out to be an ineffable supernatural component to the human mind that is inaccessible to our technology.
I don't believe that to be the case, myself. Do you?
But what, precisely is a lie?
After all, people convince themselves of some astounding things. That's the trouble with investigation by lie detector. It doesn't measure truth.
Also, of course, it doesn't measure lies. It measures physiological indicators which can, but need not, be associated with intentional lying.
As long as the right questions are asked and the subject hasn't been trained to fool the machine and the operator knows what he's doing, etc.
It can't really ever be anything more than that until the shape of truth can be discerned indside another human mind. And even then, it's only what the subject believes.
How many people could pass a polygraph test about whether their god exists?
Depends on which physics model.
Well, yes. And no. Depends on which physics model you want to use - a simple mechanistic one (Newtonian) or a probabilistic one (quantum mechanics). If the latter, then you run into some real issues in achieving a 100% accuracy level - no God required. ;)
Jim Downey
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Like Science Fiction? Read *or listen to* my novel, Communion of Dreams, for free.
Thanks
I don't know quantum mechanics other than to know that it's very strange. The only reply I would have had was that we're only starting to understand the mind and while Brent may me correct that eventually a fool-proof lie detector could be built it is still a long long way off. Jim's answer was way better, go quantum physics!
If the company that made them also did the testing...
Did they "strap one on" and ask each other if they actually believed these things would work? I'd bet the results would be most interesting.
The Truth Machine Cometh
Have you read "The Truth Machine" by James A. Halperin? (And yes, before you ask, it's same guy that runs Heritage Auctions.)
The novel is pretty naive, and utopian, but it reads really well. I enjoyed it a lot.
The point is that in order for a concept like "hand held lie detectors" to work you would need to make absolutely sure that they are 100% infallible.
Otherwise, it'll just make things worse, not better for our soldiers.
The polygraph is not the answer. It must be something completely new, completely unheard of. A new breakthrough or technology. The polygraph is a broken-down whiff of a dream of a promise. It has never worked reliably, and it never will.
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