There are unequivocal points to be made within the debate now raging in the United States over the Bush administrations use of what it described in its sanitized parlance as 'enhanced interrogation techniques' to wring information from detainees suspected of terrorism - techniques better described as torture.rnDespite plausible-sounding talk about 'states of induced dependency' and the like, there is no scientific basis for asserting that techniques such as waterboarding, or slamming people against a wall, are fast or effective ways of getting at the truth (see Nature 445,349; 2007). Indeed, it is hard to imagine any ethical way a controlled study on that question could be carried out. What is known to work - and surprisingly rapidly, according to field anthropologists, investigative journalists, police detectives and others with practical experience at getting information from reluctant or hostile sources - are the 'soft' methods of building rapport and trust.
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