The Politics of the Lie Detector
Hausknecht, Murray
In his recent quarrel with the U. S. Army over Schine & Cohn, Senator McCarthy suggested that everyone concerned be subjected to a lie detector test. This proposal, which for the time at least...
...Yet while men spend a good part of their time consciously or unconsciously evaluating other men, such judgments present constant difficulties...
...As a result there is a devaluation of the self which of course makes the individual easier to control by those who wield power...
...Subsequent analysis of this debate by writers of both right and left paid little attention to this curious proposal...
...When McCarthy made his suggestion for the use of the lie detector, it was this chain of trust and confidence that he was attacking—a chain of trust and confidence, by the way, that would have to exist in any democratic society...
...Few mentioned the fact that he had made the same suggestion during the 266 • DISSENT • Summer 1954 Malmedy investigation or that Richard Nixon, then in the House of Representatives, had proposed the use of the lie detector during the Hiss affair...
...If, however, one cannot expect people to establish social relations on some basis of mutual trust, then the only choice is to enforce unity through brute coercion...
...To be a dupe is to be a gull, one who is easily deceived...
...Medicine is a highly specialized field, and to discriminate intelligently among doctors - would presuppose some knowledge of the field...
...Choosing a stenographer is no great problem since the criteria are relatively simple...
...This proposal, which for the time at least has dropped out of political sight, followed upon a similar suggestion by McCarthy during the debate over the confirmation of Charles Bohlen as Ambassador to Russia...
...Sawbones operations were successful last year...
...Faced with such problems the layman may prefer to remain ill...
...Self-criticism" in this case makes the individual periodically lay himself open to inspection by the group...
...Summer 1954 • DISSENT • 269...
...Secretary of State Dulles testified to both his competence and "loyalty...
...There are at least two polar ways of adapting to this situation...
...An important difference between these two cases is the degree of uncertainty and risk inherent in each situation...
...most of them treated it as just another amusing vagary of the McCarthy mind...
...Torture is the infliction of bodily pain in order to induce an individual to speak or act contrary to his desires...
...The search for certainty soon becomes both cause and consequence of suspicion and distrust...
...and many were undoubtedly gullible...
...Lack of concern with privacy and integrity of the personality makes such institutions as "Bolshevik self-criticism" possible...
...The Bohlen affair, despite its rather special setting, typifies a common problem: the evaluation of the fitness of a person for a given post...
...The problem is, Why the lie detector...
...Torture is 268 • DISSENT • Summer 1954 permitted only in those societies which define individuals as objects, and where there is no value placed upon the privacy and integrity of the person...
...Granted such knowledge, there is still a vast area of disagreement about what makes one doctor more competent than another...
...The Nazi yardstick for the evaluation of individuals was "race...
...And there is the further difficulty of obtaining reliable information about the various candidates: how many of Dr...
...and most important of all, the person making the choice does not have to have any expert knowledge of shorthand and typing...
...How can one be sure that the criteria one employs are valid...
...The problem here is not whether the lie detector works...
...he prefers such uncertainty and risk to a certainty of which the price is to regard his neighbor as a beast in the jungle...
...Our objection to the "methods" of the McCarthys is not that they violate the legal norms of the society, but that their violation of these norms implies a definition of the person which is antithetical to the requirements of a social order in which individuals exist as persons...
...If our evaluations are uncertain, then, no matter what our tentative conclusion about an individual, we must treat him with suspicion...
...If there is uncertainty in evaluating technical competence, consider the degree of uncertainty bound to be present in trying to evaluate a person's "moral character" or "loyalty...
...The lie detector is one such yardstick...
...The choice of Bohlen rested on Dulles' own assessment of Bohlen, and this in turn was determined, presumably, by Dulles' decision to trust the judgment of others...
...for the sake of argument we may assume that it can do everything it is supposed to do...
...In such a society people are inclined to give others the "benefit of the doubt...
...The unchecked use of the "methods" of a McCarthy and their acceptance by the society means the growth of a view of man which helps prepare the atmosphere for totalitarianism...
...Exactly what these terms mean, much less how to measure the qualities they are presumed to signify—does anyone know...
...When we demand certainty, and we refuse to extend trust based on acceptance—or at least recognition—of uncertainty, then we have turned the world into a Hobbesian jungle in which only brute force can preserve us in the face of the hazards of life...
...The individual is perceived as a biological organism...
...Or to put it in somewhat academic terms: What does the perceived appropriateness of the use of the machine tell us about certain orientations to the problems of men and society...
...it also turns them into beasts in the sense that it actually strips them of their distinctly human qualities...
...Once the infallible yardstick has been found—and the totalitarian mind always claims to have found it—there is no necessity for even considering the individual as a person until the yardstick has been applied...
...and all other qualities which distinguish him as a human being are ignored...
...The lie detector functions as a yardstick of the same order, for it too converts the individual into an impersonal object...
...But an investigation process which constrains persons publicly to damage their self-esteem is a process which shows itself insensitive to the need for respect of the privacy and integrity of the person upon which a democratic social order rests...
...The man choosing a doctor is more uncertain about the correctness of his choice than the man choosing a stenographer...
...He is successful when he has forced the body to "betray" the ego, and thereby destroy the integrity of the individual...
...a trap which many liberals, despite their indignation, have not succeeded in avoiding...
...there is a necessity for tolerating others...
...Precisely this emphasis on the lack of dogmatism and the necessity for tolerance in the face of uncertainty is a fundamental premise of a democratic society...
...This public self-denigration, which is an invariable element of Stalinist "self-criticism," is also an inherent consequence of the "methods" of our native loyalty investigators...
...But not only does the quest for certainty transform others into beasts who are seen as a threat to one's self-preservation...
...To employ these standards means that one overlooks or discards those qualities which make an individual the unique person he is...
...The device focuses attention on those aspects of the personality which are beyond the control of the individual...
...when a person lies the normal organic reaction patterns are upset...
...Was he "loyal...
...The impersonality of the process is brought out more clearly if we note its resemblance to torture...
...measurement is not complex...
...That is, such standards are deliberately not concerned with those aspects of his personality subject to his control, but focus entirely upon the individual as an impersonal object...
...Many witnesses who appear before Congressional committees to testify about previous "links" with the Stalinists have felt constrained to label themselves "dupes" as a means of showing their present sincerity...
...The person who lives by democratic values chooses to live with uncertainty and risk—it would be foolish to deny this...
...The theory behind the machine is based on the fact that psychological and physiological processes are interdependent...
...The torturer is a subversive agent who sets one part of the person warring against the other...
...Some cases pose a minimum of difficulties...
...On what grounds should an individual be evaluated...
...the Russians use "class origin...
...Two questions were raised about Bohlen: Was he competent...
...he becomes a possible enemy...
...it is a process which makes the person's ego public property...
...Contrast this with the problem of choosing a doctor...
...In his recent quarrel with the U. S. Army over Schine & Cohn, Senator McCarthy suggested that everyone concerned be subjected to a lie detector test...
...Summer 1954 • DISSENT • 267 By contrast, it is the constant search for certainty and the accompanying suspicion of larger and larger segments of the world that marks the totalitarian mind...
...And as we become aware of the "deeper" significance of such behavior our awareness may help guard us against the danger of adopting the orientation of the adversary...
...Or, since our judgments are uncertain, we must not be dogmatic...
...It is these physiological changes that the machine detects and measures...
Vol. 1 • July 1954 • No. 3
