IT PAYS to be sceptical about the significance of opinion polls. Depending on what questions the pollsters ask, and how, the most ridiculous or startling results may be generated. But some polls throw up genuinely disturbing information. According to one conducted for the BBC and released on Thursday October 19th, nearly a third of respondents (some 27,000 people were questioned in 25 countries) consider the use of torture acceptable under certain circumstances. Another published last November by the Pew Research Centre found that nearly half of all Americans think torturing terrorist suspects could, at times, be justified. Those results tallied with other Pew polls of the past few years.

Divining the significance of such data is not easy. The various pollsters, for example, apparently left it to respondents to define what they meant by torture. But the results are morbidly fascinating and give clues as to why some people are more willing to contemplate torture than others. Although a clear majority, worldwide, opposes even the occasional use of torture, there are significant groups willing to say they favour it.

Those with an especial fear of terrorism seem most inclined to support its use. Thus 53% of Israeli Jews, according to the BBC poll, would allow terrorist suspects to be tortured for the sake of trying to get information that could save innocent lives. (Only 16% of Israeli Muslims would agree.) Large minorities in the Philippines, Indonesia, Kenya and Russia—where terror attacks have also repeatedly claimed lives—would also tolerate its use.

But fear of terrorists is not the only factor. General attitudes to human rights count, too. Thus in many places where the death penalty is outlawed, as in the European Union, few would consider the use of torture even in extreme circumstances. In Britain and Spain, each the site of a large terrorist attack in the past couple of years, only a small proportion would contemplate it. In contrast in terrorism-free China, where authorities use the death penalty with enthusiasm, more than a third of those questioned say torture might also be ok.

Ignorance apparently matters too. Last year's Pew survey showed that the general public in America is far more enthusiastic about the occasional use of torture than are security experts, academics or military leaders. It is tempting to conclude that experts who may have a better idea whether torture is likely to prove useful are less inclined to support its use.

But evidently some do believe that it, or something close to it, could be useful for states fighting terrorists. Israeli security officials say they have prevented terrorist attacks with information gleaned from “coercive interrogation” of suspects. On October 17th George Bush signed into law the Military Commissions Act which (though he denies it would sanction torture) allows CIA investigators to use tough, physical, interrogation methods against terrorist suspects. According to Amnesty International, the torture and ill-treatment of prisoners continue to be recorded in many countries.

Those who think it could be useful may not, therefore, be swayed by moral or legal arguments. All big human-rights agreements concluded since the end of the second world war contain absolute bans on torture, with no exceptions. No domestic system officially allows it. Nor can anyone be sure they are only torturing the guilty. Argentina's junta, for example, justified the use of torture against leftist groups that led to the execution of thousands of innocent people between 1976 and 1983.

A more telling argument, instead, may be that torture is often counterproductive. A desperate prisoner may say anything to bring his pain to an end, leaving interrogators with useless or distracting information. In addition, governments using torture are likely to provoke popular resentment and more embittered opponents. France's brutal methods against those fighting for independence in Algeria ended up dividing French domestic opinion and strengthening its enemies. Routine abuse of Palestinian prisoners by Israel's security service, Shin Bet, did nothing to dissuade Palestinian fighters and suicide bombers. Even America's closest allies say they are appalled by treatment of terrorist suspects that amounts, too often, to something near to torture. In too many cases, it seems, terrorist suspects are subjected to cruel treatment not for the sake of obtaining information, but for the purposes of punishment or humiliation.