St Athanasius, meeting his persecutors, who ask if Athanasius
is nearby: He is not far from here; rather than Hes nowhere
near.
Slide 3
There is no sexual relationship rather than we have never had a
sexual relationship.
Slide 4
Slide 5
I had coffee with him yesterday not Hes fine
Slide 6
Why should one method of deception be morally better than
another? I will argue that the preference is a mistake: Holding all
else fixed, acts of misleading are not morally better than acts of
lying. Except in very special circumstances, we might as well just
go ahead and lie.
Slide 7
Nope, no peanuts NOT morally better than Its totally safe for
you Does it have peanuts? I have a deadly allergy.
Slide 8
Treat this as an extreme case. Make a weaker claim: Misleading,
except in certain special circumstances, is better than lying.
Slide 9
I will argue that even the weaker claim cant be justified. The
weaker claim: Misleading, except in certain special circumstances,
is better than lying.
Slide 10
When you are lied to, the liar bears total responsibility for
your false belief. When you are merely misled, you bear part of the
responsibility. This makes lying morally worse than
misleading.
Slide 11
Athanasius says Athanasius is not far from here. This is true.
But audience infers to a false proposition: that the man in front
of them is not Athanasius. Audience is partly responsible for their
own deception. If Athanasius had said Athanasius is far away, he
would have said something false. Audience is not at all responsible
for their deception.
Slide 12
That audience is more responsible for their false belief in
mere misleading case. I will argue that this does not make lying
morally worse. Key reason: We dont think that the victim bearing
partial responsibility for something bad makes the act less
bad.
Slide 13
Reckless: walks through dangerous area, late at night, money
hanging out of pockets. Careful: only walks through safe areas in
the daytime, money carefully concealed. Both are mugged. Reckless
bears partial responsibility, careful doesnt. This doesnt make the
mugging less bad, or the mugger less culpable.
Slide 14
Lying is more of a breach of faith than misleading, because
audiences have a right to expect that what is said is true. They
dont have the same right with respect to what is otherwise
conveyed.
Slide 15
I will argue its not always true that audiences lack a right to
expect that what is merely conveyed, not said, is true. My focus:
conversational implicature. In cases of conversational implicature,
audiences have every right to expect that what is merely conveyed
is true.
Slide 16
Claims that are conversationally implicated are ones that the
audience must assume the speaker to believe to understand them as
cooperative. Example: Letter of reference for PhD candidate says
nothing but Cedric has nice handwriting. Implicates that Cedric is
not a very impressive student.
Slide 17
My office heater is fine, but last year it was not, and I had
to order USB gloves to keep warm.
Slide 18
Does your office heater work? I had to order USB gloves to keep
warm. In order to see my as cooperative, audience is required to
assume me to be implicating that my heater doesnt work. They have
every right to expect this claim to be true.
Slide 19
Sometimes we have a legitimate need to deceive. This need
generates a norm of conversation that truthfulness is more
important with respect to what we say than what we otherwise
convey. This norm of conversation acquires moral force (Adler).
Promising. But why this norm? Why not simply have a lessened demand
for truthfulness when one has a morally good reason to
deceive?
Slide 20
Merely misleading is not morally preferable to lying. But
decisions to lie or mislead are often morally revealing. And under
certain special circumstances, merely misleading is morally
preferable to lying.
Slide 21
A decision to merely mislead may reveal an admirable desire to
mitigate the wrong of ones deception. Or a decision to mislead
could reveal a desire to maintain deniability for a bad act. A
decision to lie might reveal that one doesnt care about morality.
Or a decision to lie could reveal that one is willing to take the
most direct route to a morally important goal.
Slide 22
Legal context: witnesses are required to truthfully answer
precisely the question put to them, and lawyers are expected to
make sure that everything important is explicitly spelled out.
Since this rule is known to all, and accepted by all, lying is far
worse than merely misleading. Have you ever burned a cross on the
lawn of an interracial couple? No. [Had tried to get it to light
but failed.]
Slide 23
Other contexts that are relevantly like courtroom: possibly
adversarial political interviews. Contexts where an agreement has
been made to avoid lying, but not mere misleading.
Slide 24
Suppose you feel the need to deceive. Unless youre in a special
context, theres no need to carefully merely mislead. If you do
choose to carefully merely mislead, you should not think that you
are doing something better. If you have been convinced by my
arguments, that choice is no longer an admirable one for you: you
no longer think that you will thereby minimize wrongdoing. So if
youre going to deceive-- go ahead and lie.