4 ms·

Lies are a bad thing and a big deal. Reality is all we have; lying to people means taking that away from them. So in that sense, lying seems to be up there with

Lies are a bad thing and a big deal. Reality is all we have; lying to people means taking that away from them. So in that sense, lying seems to be up there with depriving someone of their freedom, or physically harming them. Fortunately, it's pretty hard to figure out what the exact damages are, so the combination of cultural norms against lying, plus penalties for fraud ("fraud" being, basically, "a lie whose cost you can quantify,") will have to do.

mixmax 17y ago
Not all lies are evil. You lie to your kids when you tell them the tooth fairy and Santa Claus exist to make them happy. You lie to the guy robbing you when he asks whether you've got more money on you You lie to your cancer stricken grandmother when she asks you whether she'll survive. If you don't I'd say you were a heartless bastard ;-) Life isn't as simple as you make it appear in your comment.
- byrneseyeview 17y ago
  All of which applies very neatly to the other examples of generally evil stuff: You send your kids to their room if they've misbehaved, which doesn't mean it's acceptable to lock a stranger up in their home. You can injure or robber (or not particularly care if he gets injured), which doesn't mean you should feel justified in clobbering a stranger. You pull the plug on a relative in an irreversible coma, even though starving her to death under normal circumstances would be frowned on. These are all cases in which violence -- a bad thing -- is used to prevent worse things. The fact that you give specific examples of when lying is a good plan should be evidence to you that it often isn't. Which doesn't prove that it's evil, just that it could be.
- fnid 17y ago
  The only one not evil in that case is the lie to the guy robbing you.
  - mixmax 17y ago
    According to you maybe. What if I have different values? See what I'm getting at?
gaius 17y ago
"Does my bum look big in this?" "Is she prettier than me?" "What are you thinking right now?" If you can answer any of those with 100% honesty, every time, well you're a braver man than I, my friend :-)

mixmax 17y ago

Not all lies are evil. You lie to your kids when you tell them the tooth fairy and Santa Claus exist to make them happy. You lie to the guy robbing you when he asks whether you've got more money on you You lie to your cancer stricken grandmother when she asks you whether she'll survive. If you don't I'd say you were a heartless bastard ;-) Life isn't as simple as you make it appear in your comment.

byrneseyeview 17y ago
All of which applies very neatly to the other examples of generally evil stuff: You send your kids to their room if they've misbehaved, which doesn't mean it's acceptable to lock a stranger up in their home. You can injure or robber (or not particularly care if he gets injured), which doesn't mean you should feel justified in clobbering a stranger. You pull the plug on a relative in an irreversible coma, even though starving her to death under normal circumstances would be frowned on. These are all cases in which violence -- a bad thing -- is used to prevent worse things. The fact that you give specific examples of when lying is a good plan should be evidence to you that it often isn't. Which doesn't prove that it's evil, just that it could be.
fnid 17y ago
The only one not evil in that case is the lie to the guy robbing you.
- mixmax 17y ago
  According to you maybe. What if I have different values? See what I'm getting at?

gaius 17y ago

"Does my bum look big in this?" "Is she prettier than me?" "What are you thinking right now?" If you can answer any of those with 100% honesty, every time, well you're a braver man than I, my friend :-)