To lie is to make an untrue statement with the intent to deceive. In a play, actors make untrue[1] statements, but the audience is in on it, so there is no int

To lie is to make an untrue statement with the intent to deceive. In a play, actors make untrue[1] statements, but the audience is in on it, so there is no intent to deceive, and indeed no one ends up deceived. Some professions like police officers, firefighters, doctors, military officers, etc might wear uniforms/special clothing and act in a certain way too. No one actually believes that you change into a different person when you put on a uniform, so again no deception takes place. Back in the 90's it was simply assumed everyone used a pseudonymous persona [2], so again no intent and no deception. Many people still use pseudonymous personas to this day! The Author of this article DOES take things a bit far. I'd definitely want to be a bit careful recommending their approach. If you want your persona to interact with the real world, then all the aspects relevant to the interaction do need to be true. For example: depending on context, it may or may not be fine to have a persona who claims to be university professor, but if you start falsely using that credential for real world gain, you may have crossed a line. [3] So in the end I think it's ethically ok to use personas, provided there is no intent to deceive. -- [1] Arguably: untrue in this world, but perhaps true in the world of the play? [2] "on the internet, no one knows if you're a dog" [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essjay_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essjay_controversy