nonombre wrote on Apr 21^st, 2006 at 11:22pm:



I guess I was assuming that you were bright enough to see the absurdity of that analogy.  Apples/oranges anyone?   

OK, I'll spell it out.  Jumping from the fact that disseminating information on how to "beat" or "pass" a polygraph machine that countless scientists including the NAS have routinely judged to often produce inaccurate/incorrect results, especially when employed as part of a pre-screening process, could also lead to dishonest people using this knowledge to pass a polygraph exam TO a shotgun in the doorway of a schoolhouse and teaching children that antifreeze is very, very bad is not very, very good logic.

The first example imparts knowledge on how to beat a flawed machine.  If you want to argue that the machine is not flawed, that's for another day, and for you to take up with the NAS.  The fact that those with no integrity could use such knowledge to also beat a flawed machine is troubling, I agree, but this very fact should likewise call the effectiveness of the polygraph into more doubt.  To me it's also troubling that good people are rejected from employment because of this machine.

We are talking about a test here--in your two examples you are talking about (1) an illegal action and (2) supplying knowledge to a child in good faith that is later used by the child for ill means.  I fail to see any connection between the CM teaching and (1) or (2).   


Moreover, there's a flip side to your coin, compadre--am I to assume that you feel no responsibility when a polygrapher judges an honest and moral person to be dishonest and/or morally corrupt and thereby ruin that person's dreams of working as a cop or intel analyst?

nonombre wrote on Apr 22^nd, 2006 at 12:04am:


Most agencies kick an applicant to the curb on a failed polygraph with little recourse for the applicant.

Nonombre,
Why would you feel sorry for my children?  Do free thinking, intelligent, honest, respectful, responsible people scare you?  Every arguement you have is completely emotion driven.  You continually change your stories (reminds me of how I change fishing lures).  You never try to use facts, science, or logic to prove anything.  You resort to emotional appeals...oh no...my children couldn't POSSIBLY find their way through this world with all these scary things to avoid.  They couldn't possibly decide for themselves what is right and wrong...

Thank God you are here to protect them from all this dangerous stuff...too bad you'll probably falsely brand them of some immortal sin in a pre-employment test someday and undo all that I have taught them about working hard to earn what you want.

Maybe you should begin a book burning campaign...and be sure to destroy all copies of Fahrenheit 451.  We wouldn't want people to understand why we have a freedom of speech.

nonombre wrote on Apr 22^nd, 2006 at 12:04am:


So how many people did you pass that ultimately turned out to be lying?   

As for your answer above, very few is not very descriptive. What constitutes very few? Was it 5%? 10%? Out of how many?

You seem to be suffering from two cognitive biases. The first is confirmation bias where you're seeking only the data that confirms your preconception. The second is self-serving bias where you claim more responsibility for your successes than your failures...

Regardless of how you try to twist the facts and use logically fallacies to support your argument, the polygraph as a screening tool is completely ineffective because it rests on wholly unscientific principles and is only a fancy version of the Jones and Sigall (1971) bogus pipeline...

retcopper wrote on Apr 24^th, 2006 at 6:14pm:


Is the NAS report sufficiently factual for you?

I didn't find it to be that biased at all.  There were parts of it that supported polygraphy, and parts of their study were quite harsh towards polygraphy.

I didn't say there were a lot of parts friendly to polygraphy

And yes I was referring to the fact that in cases involving specific incidents and a naive examinee the polygraph can achieve greater than chance accuracy.  Again, no one really disputes that it can drag the truth out of the unwitting (sometimes).

Anyways the most interesting part comes on page 144:

"Polygraph practitioners claim that they can detect countermeasures; this claim would be much more credible if there were known physiological indicators of countermeasure use"

Also page 139

"....there is anecdotal evidence of increasing levels of countermeasure use in federal security screening programs."

Or page 101

"The scientific basis for polygraph testing is far from what one would like for a test that carries considerable weight in national security decision making"

Finally I posted a link to a discussion on polygraphplace.com that occurred when the NAS report was released.  As a whole the community didn't take it well.

So please don't confuse me as a supporter of polygraphs for anything other than an interrogation tool.

Interesting.  In famous spook fashion, the conversation inevitably jumps to things most protected and fragile:  the human morale engine and those things 'taboo' from discussion: kids and family.

Wow.  We have some seasoned operators trolling these boards, do we not?

You see, ladies and gents, it's really the first thing they teach you in interrogation school: nothing is out of bounds.  Move to family if you feel your subject is going to leak like a Dutch dam should that topic be approached.  It's the psychological operators first stop: taboo subjects.

Watch out.  The eyes have walls.