Ack, I'm Experiencing Kidney Failure!

No, I am not experiencing kidney failure, and I never have, nor have I felt the failure of any of my other internal organs.  I hope, and expect (one case notwithstanding), neither have you.  I also know there aren't many nerves in the organs, so even if an organ did fail, one wouldn't feel it, but only the secondary effects of not having a functional portion of one's system for living.

I only mention this to remind people that what the Bush administration did, in their famous torture memo, was say that it is only torture if "equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death." 

How many American torturers had experienced organ failure, and so could at least relate to their instructions at some level?  I assume none had experience "death," so it useless to guide them to avoid the feeling of "even death."