I can teach my children that it is wrong to steal with a mostly clean conscience, because it’s been a long time since my preteen shoplifting days. But when it comes to lying, the situation is different. I don’t remember having told any lies in the past week, but I know that if I reviewed a detailed recording of that time I’d catch myself in several. So can I really sincerely insist that I believe it is wrong to lie?The most interesting aspect of this article is the assertion that lying is fundamental to animal communication. In human beings -- children -- the capacity to lie is sometimes taken to be the moment at which a new kind of consciousness emerges. When I can think of my communication as false, and theorize about how you will receive it and whether it will fool you in a way that is beneficial to me, then I'm doing something different from simply trying to convey something to you. I have an idea that you have a mind too, and that mind can come apart from the facts of the world. I can shape how you think.
The truth is, I cheerfully lie to myself about my weaknesses and my abilities every day simply in order to keep myself moving forward. My ambitions would be very modest if they were determined entirely by my past achievements—and many of my achievements were possible only because I believed, with no good reason, that I could accomplish them.
So is that going on with the bird who trails his wing to feign an injury? Or is that just the product of a random mutation? The answer has significant consequences in terms of what kind of being we encounter in the wild.
11 comments:
The most interesting aspect of this article is the assertion that lying is fundamental to animal communication. In human beings -- children -- the capacity to lie is sometimes taken to be the moment at which a new kind of consciousness emerges.
It strikes me as the point at which morality becomes possible, also. If there's no understanding of the difference between right and wrong beyond a mechanical "I get swatted for this, I don't get swatted for that," there's not much chance of behaving morally on purpose--which is to say there's not much chance of behaving morally.
That child becomes capable not only of shaping another person's perception of reality, that child becomes capable of influencing the degree of moral behavior in others.
The capacity to lie also opens a new avenue of communication, presenting new perspectives, which enables a broader understanding of what is right and what is wrong.
Eric Hines
Sounds like Genesis, the Tree, and the knowledge of good and evil to me. The capability and the act are different.
Unrelated point. I work in an acute psychiatric emergency setting. I often instruct newbies humorously "Lying is a high-level skill." Families or community providers will protest "But she's just telling you what you want to hear!" I counter "I have a ward full of patients who can't tell me what I want to hear. If you're organised enough to lie, your problem is no longer an acute psychiatric one."
That's an interesting thought.
For all his talk of lies, I am skeptical he has given much thought to what truth is. He is conflating lying and being inaccurate. To lie requires that one knows the truth, or at least that they don't know something they pretend to.
I'm interested in the notion that it's difficult to tell your kids something's wrong simply because you know you do it, too. Do parents imagine they have to be faultless in order to be moral teachers? Maybe the right message is, "You've had people lie to you, right? Maybe I've done it myself. You hated it, right? Did you think it worked out well for me? Is it behavior you really want to copy?"
That old Golden Rule.
Well, I think the point is more that there may be a positive virtue to lying -- lying to yourself about your capacities being the example. So it's not so much that you do it though you know it's wrong; it's that you believe in a way that it's wrong, but in another way it's demonstrably virtuous (in the sense that a virtue is a capacity to excel, as courage or strength gives you a capacity to excel in certain circumstances, which capacity in this case is derived solely from self-deception).
There are cases where lying is personally expedient, and cases where little white lies may spare someone else's feelings.
But I"m skeptical about lying ever being a virtue. Telling yourself that the outcome wipes out the wrongness doesn't make sense to me.
There's the Golden Rule aspect to telling the truth, but there's also a huge "living in the real world" aspect. I used to tell my sons that one of the problems with lying is that it's far too easy to start believing the lies you tell. When that happens, you're not facing reality.
Not sure why that would be a good thing. Comforting perhaps, but also dangerous.
But AVI's comment is very interesting, too. Just shows what a difference there is between mental competence and good character.
Yeah, I found that fascinating too :)
Though I'd like to say I don't like lying because I'm such a wonderful, moral, honest person I suspect the real truth is some combination of "I'm too danged lazy to keep track of a bunch of lies" and insufficient empathy.
As I've gotten older, I've grown less likely to tell little white lies. I think you can be truthful without being tactless or hurtful. Example: "Does that dress make you look fat? Well, I think your blue or pink dresses are more flattering."
Or, "I prefer you in [insert style] - that really accentuates your [insert best feature here]".
Yes, no doubt brutal honesty is sometimes called for, but far less often than we probably suppose. It's a little like surgery.
But I only wish I could claim that I never lie except out of charitable tact! More often I don't want to face facts, or consequences. I try not to do it. It does make a mess of one's life: confusion, falseness, and distance.
But I"m skeptical about lying ever being a virtue. Telling yourself that the outcome wipes out the wrongness...
You've hit upon the distinction between ethics and morals. To say something is a virtue isn't to say that it's morally right or wrong: it's to say that it is a capacity to excel. Strength is a virtue because it can be used to do extraordinary things; so too courage. But these things can be right or wrong.
So the claim here is that there's a wedge of sorts: lying seems, the author claims, to be a virtue in the sense that it creates a capacity to excel. The example is 'lying to yourself,' but it could be lying to others: say you encourage a friend about his novel even though you think it's terrible and doesn't deserve to succeed, but it ends up being wildly successful (perhaps just because it is terrible; maybe people have bad taste). The lie you told him -- "Your book is great, I'm sure it will do well" -- created this capacity in him to excel.
So we have a case (and not the only case) where virtue comes apart from morality. Does that suggest, then, that lying isn't always wrong? It's not always vicious, certainly -- that's proven. But is there some core to it that makes it wrong even when it is virtuous?
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