Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-tf8b9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T01:22:37.987Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Analyzing the Wrongfulness of Lying: A Defence of Pluralism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2017

ARIANNA FALBO
ARIANNA FALBO*
Affiliation:
Brown University
*
*<[email protected]>
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Extant accounts, both old and new, of the wrongfulness of lying are all inadequate. The common problem with each consists in its unitary structure. Such analyses presuppose that all lies are wrongful in the same way, for the same unifying reason. This assumption, however, does not do justice to the phenomena of lying. This is because lying can be morally objectionable in diverse ways. Thus, I argue for a dialectical shift towards a pluralist approach to the wrongfulness of lying. We should not force unity upon the moral structure of lying when there is actually diversity.

Les explications de ce pourquoi mentir est mal sont toutes inadéquates. Leur problème commun se situe dans leur structure unitaire. Ces analyses présupposent que tous les mensonges sont mauvais pour la même raison unificatrice. Cette supposition ne rend cependant pas justice au phénomène du mensonge, et ce, parce qu’on peut s’objecter à l’acte de mentir de différentes façons. Ainsi je suggère qu’il faut un changement dialectique en direction d’un traitement pluraliste de ce qui est mauvais dans le mensonge. Il ne faut pas forcer une unité sur la structure morale du mensonge lorsqu’il y a en fait pluralité.

Keywords

normative ethicspluralismlyingbald-faced lieswrongfulness of lying
Type
Canadian Philosophical Association 2017 Essay Prize Winners
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 56 , Issue 3 , September 2017 , pp. 431 - 454
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Arico, Adam, and Fallis, Don 2013 “Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics: An Empirical Investigation of the Concept of Lying.” Philosophical Psychology 26 (6): 790–816.Google Scholar
Augustine, St. 1952 “Lying.” Treatises on Various Subjects. Volume 16, New York: Fathers of the Church.Google Scholar
Bok, Sissela 1978 Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life. New York: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Carson, Thomas 2010 Lying and Deception: Theory and Practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Coleman, Linda, and Kay, Paul 1981 “Prototype Semantics: The English Word Lie.” Language 57 (1): 26–44.Google Scholar
Cummings, William 2017 February 16, “Trump Falsely Claims Biggest Electoral Win since Regan.” USA Today.Google Scholar
Darwall, Stephen 2013a Honor, History, and Relationship: Essays in Second-personal Ethics II. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Darwall, Stephen 2013b Morality, Authority, and Law: Essays in Second-Personal Ethics I. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Fallis, Don 2014 “Are Bald-Faced Lies Deceptive after All?” Ratio 28 (1): 81–96.Google Scholar
Faulkner, Paul 2011 Knowledge on Trust. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Frankfurt, Harry 2005 On Bullshit. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Fricker, Miranda 2007 Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Graham, David 2017 January 22, “Alternative Facts: The Needless Lies of the Trump Administration.” The Atlantic.Google Scholar
Kant, Immanuel 2012 Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. Trans. Gregor, Mary J. and Timmermann, Jens. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Korsgaard, Christine 1996 “The Right to Lie: Kant on Dealing with Evil,” in Creating the Kingdom of Ends. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 133–158.Google Scholar
Lackey, Jennifer 2013 “Lies and Deception: An Unhappy Divorce.” Analysis 73 (2): 236–248.Google Scholar
Mahon, James Edwin 2016 “The Definition of Lying and Deception,” in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2016 Edition), Ed. Zalta, Edward N., URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2016/entries/lying-definition/>.Google Scholar
Martelle, Scott 2017 May 25, “The New American Politics: Bald-faced Lies and Body-slammed Journalists.” Los Angeles Times.Google Scholar
McMyler, Benjamin 2011 Testimony, Trust, and Authority. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meibauer, Jörg 2014 “Bald-faced Lies as Acts of Verbal Aggression.” Journal of Language Aggression and Conflict 2 (1): 127–150.Google Scholar
Mill, John Stuart, and Bentham, Jeremy 1987 “Utilitarianism by J.S. Mill” in Utilitarianism and Other Essays. Ed. Ryan, Alan. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin, 272–339.Google Scholar
Moran, Richard 2006 “Getting Told and Being Believed.” Philosophers’ Imprint 5 (5): 272–303.Google Scholar
Moran, Richard 2005 “Problems of Sincerity.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 105 (1): 325–345.Google Scholar
Ross, Angus 1986 “Why Do We Believe What We Are Told?” Ratio 28 (1): 69–88.Google Scholar
Ross, W.D. 1930 The Right and the Good. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Saul, Jennifer 2012 Lying, Misleading, and What is Said: An Exploration in Philosophy of Language and in Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Scanlon, T.M. 1998 What We Owe to Each Other. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Shiffrin, Seana 2014 Speech Matters: On Lying, Morality, and the Law. Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Sorensen, Roy 2007 “Bald-Faced Lies! Lying Without the Intent to Deceive.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 88 (2): 251–264.Google Scholar
Spicer, Sean 2017 January 21, “Statement by Press Secretary Sean Spicer,” The White House. The United States Government.Google Scholar
Stokke, Andreas 2013a “Lying and Asserting.” Journal of Philosophy 110 (1): 33–60.Google Scholar
Stokke, Andreas 2013b “Lying, Deceiving, and Misleading.” Philosophy Compass 8 (4): 348–359.Google Scholar
Stroud, Sarah 2017 “Lying as Infidelity: A Quasi-Rossian Account,” in Oxford Studies in Normative Ethics. Ed. Timmons, Mark. Vol. 7. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 73–97.Google Scholar
Strudler, Alan 1995 “On the Ethics of Deception in Negotiating.” Business Ethics Quarterly 5 (4): 805–822.Google Scholar
Thompson, Michael 2004 “What is it to Wrong Someone? A Puzzle about Justice,” in Reason and Value: Themes from the Moral Philosophy of Joseph Raz. Ed. Pettit, Philip, Scheffler, Samuel, Smith, Michael, and Wallace, Jay. New York: Oxford University Press, 333–384.Google Scholar
Uberti, David 2017 January 23, “Bald-faced Lies Are the New Normal Under President Trump.” New York Daily News.Google Scholar
Wallace, Jay 2007 “Reasons, Relations, and Commands: Reflections on Darwell.” Ethics 118 (1): 24–36.Google Scholar
Watson, Gary 2004 “Asserting and Promising.” Philosophical Studies 117 (1–2): 57–77.Google Scholar
Williams, Bernard 2002 Truth and Truthfulness: An Essay in Genealogy. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar