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Letting Sleeping Truths Lie
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2020
Extract
Half-truths lie notoriously at the heart of publicly indulged instances of rationalization and excuse-making. Politicians and administrators, for example, explain away failed policies or even overt malfeasance by snatching at some particle of truth, some ostensibly saving grace. A halftruth articulated – the nominal truth – covers what I shall henceforth refer to as a sleeping truth – a truth that can lie in both senses of the word. We let a sleeping truth lie undisturbed, without proper examination or scrutiny, and sometimes we let it lie (prevaricate) in the matter of helping underwrite a deception: the policy or malfeasance was not, after all, that bad. Even when we discern the sleeping truth, we let the halftruth stand, because the one proffering it is like us – fallibly human, pressed for time perhaps or an unfortunate victim of circumstance. Sometimes the effort of calling a spade a spade may be forgone simply because there is not enough morally at stake.
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References
1 In espousing a strong distinction between justification and excuse, I follow Woodruff, Paul ‘Justification or Excuse: Saving Soldiers at the Expense of Civilians,’ Canadian Journal of Philosophy 8 (1982), 159–76.Google Scholar
2 For example, see Gross, Hyman A Theory of Criminal Justice (New York: Oxford University Press 1979).Google Scholar Nearly half this work is devoted to excuse and exculpatory claims.
3 The Works of Joseph Butler (London: The English Theological Library 1900) 2, 122; Butler is, of course, speaking of ‘self-deceit,’ but in my view a similar averting of the eyes pertains to the akratic person at the moment of action, though not for long thereafter.
4 Glover, Jonathan ‘It Makes No Difference Whether or Not I Do It – I,’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 49 (1975), 171–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar
5 This claim may be disputed by readers who maintain that intra- and interpersonal standards are identical; neither is higher nor lower than the other. Though I do not think such plumping for parity undercuts the objection or my answer to it, I do wish to point out that in the Christian tradition at least, there does seem to be a clear forwarding of higher standards for private (spiritual, if you will) morality. According to the Catholic doctrine of penance, for instance, lying to another person may be merely a venial sin, whereas lying in the confessional is always a mortal sin. Grounding any true act of contrition is the capacity of being honest before God, a necessary condition of which, it would seem, is being honest with oneself. (On the status of certain lies as merely venial. consult St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, II, ii, Q. 110, art. 4.)
6 Fingarette, Herbert Self-Deception (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul 1969)Google Scholar
7 This man's policy covers the fact that he reacts to the faults because of jealousy, not because of the truth of the faults. Similar faults in another man might not evoke a reaction at all.
8 For three contrasting positions on this issue, see R.M. Hare, ‘Assenting to a Value Judgment’ (excerpted from Chapter 2 of The Language of Morals); Patrick Gardiner, ‘On Assenting to a Moral Principle’; and H.J.N. Horsburg, ‘The Criteria of Assent to Moral Rule.’ All selections are contained in Geoffrey Mortimore, ed., Weakness of Will (London: Macmillan and Company 1971).