Before I begin responding to a few of the more substantive issues you raise, The Breeze, I'd like to first address one complaint you have later on in your post:
Quote:I have met a small bunch of intelligent people who are amazing hipocrites, repeating and tediously dissecting each statement instead of engaging in independent thought... And to all three guardians and hopeful keepers of the flame, what is with the endless and tiresome isolation and analysis of individual sentences? This is poor communication at its worst.
The reason I single out particular sentences and short passages in quotes and then respond to them is simply for ease of reading, and to make doubly sure that the reader knows to what portion of the post I am responding. I'm sorry you feel like it's niggardly parsing to do so, but it's how I've always done it both here and on other web bulletin boards.
Quote:I have got to hand it to you guys, it only took me 48 hours to be completely unimpressed with the integrity of this site. As you have figured out by now, I am a Detective from a mid size SW dept asked by my Sheriff to figure out the polygraph/voice stress/interview question and give him options.
What question did your Sheriff ask? Are you here seeking information on the reliability and accuracy of the polygraph for potential use as an investigative tool in criminal matters, or as an additional tool in the screening process of potential new hires, or in the post-conviction/probation/parole arena...?
Quote:We had in the past sent out cases for polygraph but needed different cost effective solutions. I came here for intellectually honest discussion and maybe some pro's and cons. Knowing where I was I knew what I was getting into, but knowing something of the players I felt that honesty and objectivity was still possible.
Speaking of honesty and objectivity, why did you feel it necessary to obfuscate and mislead us as to the true nature of your visit here, starting with your very first post? Your initial questions/observations surrounded the use of the polygraph as a screening element in the application process of the FBI, and the ethics of potential federal agents 'lying',
not as a criminal investigation tool. Frankly I'm flabbergasted at your rant here now.
Quote:George tells me about the fraud built into the polygraph because on a CQ test the examiner is expecting you to lie, and all I can think of is .....So What? that would mean every ruse that LE uses to solve crimes (undercover, interview techniques etc) renders the court approved tactic of deception in investigation a fraud as well.
The Breeze, you raised an oft-repeated question in the world of polygraphy and countermeasures-- repeated not only by pro-polygraph individuals seeking to shame those who use countermeasures but also by genuinely honest people caught in what they think is a moral dilemma. I for one usually point out several truisms about the polygraph, including:
-Your polygraph interrogator EXPECTS you to lie to the Control Questions, or at least to have great unease over the certaintly/accuracy/honesty of one's responses to the CQ's.
-In return for his deceit and lies about the nature of the test, the polygrapher in turn condemns dishonesty from the test subject--setting up a highly hypocritical situation in which many feel the quote, "Tis no deceit to deceive the deceiver" holds water.
Your original questions and observations NEVER mentioned court-sanctioned lies and trickery to elicit confessions. Had you done so, I doubt anyone here, pro or anti-polygraph, would argue that such tactics are perfectly legal and sanctioned by every court in the US. I'm amazed that you would take our responses and somehow find fault with them because LEO's lie and deceive during the course of an interrogation, or in the course of undercover work. What does one issue possibly have to do with the other?
Yes, The Breeze, the polygraph as it is used today makes a WONDERFUL interrogation prop. You might be interested in reading what one of the original pioneers of the polygraph, John Larson, once wrote:
I originally hoped that instrumental lie detection would become a legitimate part of professional police science. It is little more than a racket. The lie detector, as used in many places, is nothing more than a psychological third-degree aimed at extorting confessions as the old physical beatings were. At times I’m sorry I ever had any part in its development. Quote:And Beech Trees, my suggestion to you would be to carefully read posts before making "I gotcha" statements. I simply told you on 7/31 that I survived a USSS polygraph. Nothing about total numbers of tests at that point. Dont spread yourself so thin, and dont forget to breathe.
What gotcha statement? I merely observed in your first post that you had written you had passed one polygraph, and in a later post you wrote you had passed three. It was a curious thing, that's all. I guess it's a moot point now, since you fabricated your reasons for being here and then took the responses to your false questions about the ethics of lying in order to pass a polygraph and applied them to your REAL reason to be here... which is as far as I can deduce because your boss thinks it would be neat to have a polygraph interrogator on his squad.
Quote:I started out, and remain unconvinced as to the total efficiency of polygraph, but unlike you three and Mr. PD I dont think its quite the modern reading of sheep entrails that you would infer.
It's no inference, The Breeze. Polygraph “testing” is an unstandardizable procedure that is fundamentally dependent on trickery. It is a sham of a psuedo-science that has never, ever, been proven to be more accurate than chance. If you don't believe the regular contributors here (like myself, or Dr. Drew Richardson, or George, or Gino, or Mark Mallah, etc...) then would you please take a moment to read what Professor John J. Furedy of the University of Toronto wrote:
…basic terms like “control” and “test” are used in ways that are
not consistent with normal usage. For experimental psychophysiologists,
it is the Alice-in-Wonderland usage of the term “control”
that is most salient. There are virtually an infinite number of
dimensions along which the R [relevant] and the so-called “C”
[“control”] items of the CQT could differ. These differences include
such dimensions as time (immediate versus distant past),
potential penalties (imprisonment and a criminal record versus a
bad conscience), and amount of time and attention paid to “developing”
the questions (limited versus extensive). Accordingly,
no logical inference is possible based on the R versus “C” comparison.
For those concerned with the more applied issue of evaluating
the accuracy of the CQT procedure, it is the procedure’s in-principle
lack of standardization that is more critical. The fact that the
procedure is not a test, but an unstandardizable interrogatory
interview, means that its accuracy is not empirically, but only
rhetorically, or anecdotally, evaluatable. That is, one can state
accuracy figures only for a given examiner interacting with a given
examinee, because the CQT is a dynamic interview situation rather
than a standardizable and specifiable test. Even the weak assertion
that a certain examiner is highly accurate cannot be supported, as
different examinees alter the dynamic examiner-examinee relationship that grossly influences each unique and unspecifiable
CQT episode. Quote:In other words you have not convinced me that this site is staffed with anything but haters of a tool. I had hoped for more. And George, I read your "book" 11 months ago, its well written but suffers from the problem this site has-a fundamental un-willingness to consider another view.
And what is this other view?
Quote:And finally PD Dreamer....You should of picked someone else to tell that tale to. As a military police officer who now does it as a civilian, I know your story is ridiculous.
So, you're a civilian employee working for a Sheriff? I thought you were a 'Detective from a mid size SW dept asked by my Sheriff to figure out the polygraph/voice stress/interview question and give him options'?
So, to summarize, you've been a military police officer, a Detective, a SWAT officer, and now a civilian employee of a Sheriff's office?
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My FBI Poly (Used Countermeasures and Passed) (Read 67751 times)
