Here is David Luban's nice discussion of the ticking-bomb example that motivates many pro-torture arguments, a version of which was in last months Harper's. It's a nice paper and I'll summarize.
Following a discussion of how the ticking bomb example garners appeal within liberalism in light of the history of torture and ideological foundations of the liberal abhorence of cruelty, Luban makes us confront the discomforting utilitarian calculations that the ticking bomb example forces, where we weigh the real suffereing of a suspect that might be innocent against statistical probabilities of saving lives.
Next, Luban argues that the ticking bomb example ignores the way that torture can become institutionalized and normalized. Of the five motives for torture Luban identifies intelligence gathering is identified as the uniquely liberal motive, but with illiberal consequences. Basically, Luban argues that the one-time exception ticking bomb cases are used to justify more expansive institutional torture that has a way of getting out of control.
Luban's argument is an effective way of meeting the ticking bomb intuition for torture exceptions, which I share. Indeed, the fact that many of the Guantanamo detainees that have received "torture lite" likely had nothing to tell reinforces Luban's claim that "in a world of uncertainty and imperfect knowledge, the ticking-bomb scenario should not form the point of reference. The ticking bomb is the picture that be-witches us."
But perhaps the lesson is not merely to ignore the picture and instead to just not be bewitched by it. In an article titled "If torture works. . ." in Prospect Magazine Michael Ignatieff accepts that there is a cost to the prohibition of torture in increased risk. Though the cliche "freedom isn't free" is most often repeated by right-wing rhetoricians, they are the people that seem least willing to confront the tough possibility that in the case of torture (and analogous cases) it may well be the case that our lives are less secure in order to protect our way of life. In the long run, however, our "lives" as we conceive, as the lives of free citizens imagined by liberalism, them are not secure unless our way of life is too, as Franklin pointed out.
If-Then Knots