Technically, no, since another defining characteristic of torture is that it is done for the purpose of eliciting information and/or confession, or as a punishment.

This is a dodge worthy of me, actually, but let me press the point further.  I would not be surprised if, as part of the SERE training exercise, the subjects are pressed to confess to committing some act that everyone knows that didn't do.  The intent, obviously is to give the subject something to resist during the training.  So there, your technicality has evaporated.

But putting the technicalities aside for a minute, the real question is do the service members who are subjected to this treatment suffer the same psychological effects during and after the experience as do true torture victims?  Does the fact that these individuals have a reasonable expectation that they are not going to actually be allowed to drown mitigate the effects to the point where the act is no longer crossing the line into the realm of torture?

So again, do you believe that we are torturing our own military personnel when we put them through the waterboarding phase SERE training?  And if not, why not?

However, I think it is blindingly obvious that the reason some military personnel undergo SERE training is to prepare them for the terrible treatment they could receive in the hands of the enemy.

I would agree and I have argued similarly in the past.  But I think it is also blindingly obvious that we don't take the training to the point where we are legitimately torturing our own people.  So how do we take the terrible treatment they may receive at the hands of the enemy and make it into something that is not torture by definition?

We probably establish guidelines for things like the duration and the frequency of the treatment.  We establish strict protocols for things like the positions the subjects have to be in during the treatment and requirements to have medical personnel on hand during the treatments.  Does any of this sound familiar?

To claim that this somehow condones the techniques endured as OK is simply laughable.

I simply disagree.  I believe my description above makes my counter to this very clear.  Unless you are willing to admit that we are purposefully torturing our own personnel, clearly subjecting detainees to a comparable level of treatment that we would subject our own people to cannot be considered torture.  A certain level of treatment either crosses the line into being torture, or it does not.  Friend or foe does not matter in that determination.

The difference between us and our enemies in this regard is that we don't do anything to them that we aren't willing to do to ourselves.  They are not so limited or restrained in their application of things like this which is what makes it OK vs. not, IMHO.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if actual SERE training involves being subjected to techniques much worse than waterboarding, techniques that I am fairly sure even you would consider torture.

I don't know one way or the other, but I am pretty certain that they are not chopping off limbs or beheading people in the SERE training.  I AM pretty sure that whatever they are subjected to the clear expectation is that (a) they will survive it, and (b) they will not be harmed by it (barring accidents, of course).  As such whatever they are subjected to I wouldn't be willing to call it torture.  I simply refuse to believe that we would intentionally take official training exercises to the point of actually being torture.

Thanks to Pavlov, Kantor, and others we now know that there are definitely psychological components to some reflexes .

OK, thanks for the pointer.  It is an interesting read although I did not wade through the entire thing.  In this case we are talking past each other a bit, so let me clarify my original meaning.

I will accept and acknowledge that some aspects of reflex actions can have a psychological component to them given that some reflexes are nothing more than conditioned responses.  Pavlov ringing his bells for his dogs would be a good example.  To the extent that we might consider something on the order of ringing a bell causing dogs to salivate to be an involuntary response and, therefore, akin to a reflex then fine.

Clearly there is a spectrum of things that can fall within this category though.  Some border more on the purely physiological like the patella reflex you mentioned earlier.  Others border more on the purely psychological such as Pavlov's salivating dogs.

So I guess the question is, when it comes to drowning what is the actual reflex we are talking about?  In my mind it is something akin to the gag reflex.  Basically involuntary with not a lot of conditioning involved to create it, and it is pretty much universally seen as common to the majority of individuals in the sense that they will all exhibit a similar reaction given the same stimulus.  I argue that the psychological component of the reflex in question is minimal and does not rely on higher order brain function or even awareness to kick in.

For example, I believe that relatively young babies will instinctively cough to expel water from their lungs even though they spent a reasonable part of their 9 months in the womb breathing fluid to begin with.  It's not like they had to observe a drowning person to figure that out.  It is basically involuntary and autonomic.

I would be surprised if you disagreed with any of the above thus far, but please let me know if you do.

So the final question becomes, does simply triggering that autonomic response constitute torture in and of itself?  Does the subject in question suffer all of the psychological effects that one would expect of someone who had truly been tortured?

If you say that it does then this must be the point where we disagree.  Because if you believe this then you must also believe that Mancow must now be suffering from all of the psychological problems that a torture victim suffers from, and personally I don't agree.

If we subjected a detainee to nothing more than what we just watched Mancow go through, would you call that torture?

Meta: This post is a serious comment.

Not at all, not even remotely so, not even in the same universe, not once a ounce of water goes down your nostrils and your brain goes into extreme panic mode and screams at you, that you are about to die. There's not an override switch. The threat of drowning isn't the set up to it, it's when water is being poured down on your mouth and some goes into your nose

So I assume that you must be of the opinion that when the US military trains our soldiers and subjects them to the technique of waterboarding that we are actually torturing those soldiers then?  Is that correct?  In fact, you would be of the opinion that Mancow has now been tortured, correct?

Your definition of torture could allow for artificially stimulating parts of the brain to make it feel completely real lthat one is being stretched on a torture rack, when they are not "physically" being stretched.

No, it doesn't.  Stop trying to put words in my mouth.

Feeling like you are going to drown is a worse feeling than you're out of breath and cannot breath. That feeling is the same regardless of whether one thinks they are going to drown or be saved from drowning.

Yep, I agree.  The feeling will be the same in both cases.  But in neither case will there be "severe physical pain".  Whether or not there is "severe mental suffering" depends on whether you believe that you are going to die, or not.  If you have a reasonable expectation that you are not going to be allowed to die the suffering is reduced.

Again, just because I don't consider this to be torture doesn't mean I am claiming it is a walk in the park or a pleasant experience by any measure.

Did the "approved" protocol for waterboarding put the lungs higher for comfort of the detainee, or to protect the interrogators from  causing  laryngospasms?

I can't say for sure, I am not an expert.  My assumption here is that this is done so that the involuntary reaction can be triggered without actually risking that the subject will drown in the process.

You seem to be arguing that the "feeling of drowning" is torture in and of itself.  I simply disagree.  That is not to say that the "feeling of drowning" is not unpleasant or discomforting.

Meta: This post is a serious comment.