What is your view of liars.....

[Guest]

and people who don't apologise for deliberately wasting others' time?

[Serial_Apologist]

Funny you should ask this, Lat, as I was just talking to a Polish woman sat on my neighbour's doorstep. She'd turned up to clean his flat, and he ain't there.

At age 10 Mum Dad and I were invoted a few doors up the road to a coffee morning. Speaking to a woman who was there, my mother said, "I do like your hat", and, turning, to me, "Isn't that a lovely hat!", to which I replied, "I think it looks terrible". For telling the truth as I saw it, I was instantly sent home, and, a short while after, told to go back and apologise, which, shamefacedly in both senses, I did.

One learns PDQ at an early age that there's lies and there's lies... and, later on, statistics.

So diplomacy and all sorts come into the equation. It depends what one is lying ABOUT... and to whom. To talk constructively about this subject, one has to discuss the actual, putative lie, surely?

S-A

[Quarky]

[What do I think of liars?

To put it another way, people that can be relied upon always to tell the truth, are few and far between. And often may be regarded as fools.

I think anyone in business will not take statements at face value, but ask themselves "where is he coming from?"

Unfortunately I believe the only redress against a liar is to sue them in the Courts. And probably the liar may have an excellent legal team

So my modus vivendi is always to seek confirmation on an important issue, rather than rely on one person's word for it.

[Serial_Apologist]

The University of Hard Knocks teaches that naivety is not a practicable basis for living, in this world. The difficulties come with those close to one. "Where were you last night?" "What's the matter, don't you trust me then?"

[vinteuil]

Lying is one of the great attributes of being a human being. Not just politics and diplomacy, but art, literature, and - more importantly - normal complex human interreaction are predicated on the human's ability to lie. It is a learnt skill which is a necessary part of the child's development: one of the characteristics of autistic and some Asperger's spectrum children is their inability to understand 'lying' and thus easily take their place in 'normal' society.

[PatrickOD]

My catechism impressed on me that 'no reason or motive can excuse a lie,' I believe that.
But, to tell you the truth, I have not always lived up to that belief. Guilt is the consequence.

[vinteuil]

Patrick - how does the Catechism cope with the standard problem : an assassin asks you if a potential victim is hiding behind a wall - you know said person is hiding behind the wall - the right thing to do here is not to tell the truth???

I seem to recall that the origin of the much-misused phrase ' being economical with the truth ' was with that great Doctor of the Church, S Thomas Aquinas - who used it in terms of approbation...

[and cf John Finnis (Princeton) on Aquinas: "an exercise in what John Henry Newman, following the Alexandrian Church Fathers of the third century AD, called economy: the adapting of exposition to the receptiveness, the state of mind, of one’s expected audience. The idea of economy, in this or related senses, has got a bad name: a recent head of an Oxford college, when he was Secretary of the Cabinet and Head of the UK Civil Service, was pilloried for testifying that he thought it proper in the interest of the state sometimes to be “economical with the truth”. Newman himself was given occasion to write his famous Apologia pro Vita Sua by widely applauded accusations of dishonesty made by Charles Kingsley because that best-selling children’s author and cleric equated economy with deviousness, evasion, deception. But from the outset of his teaching, Newman had insisted on the line separating those vices of dishonesty from a rightly discreet stewardship of the truth by presenting always what is true, withholding no more of the relevant truth than the ignorance or prejudices of one’s hearers would prevent them from properly understanding and assessing." ]

[salymap]

Surely there are vindictive lies, boastful lies, white/kind lies, diminishing in harm done to either party.

[Serial_Apologist]

I can't recall in which of his books now, but RD Laing made an interesting spin on the old existentialist truism about truth being disclosure - that one can find out all that is possible to discover by means of eg scientific or evidential verification, yet never know directly the contents of another person's thinking. He made the point that children brought up to believe that their lies are transparent - eg to adults or, ultimately, God - make a vital step towards personal autonomy when they realize this to be... untrue. Why one would lie is a different order of question.

S-A

[PatrickOD]

The question was 'What is your view of liars?'. Mine is that it is wrong to lie.
As S_A has indicated, it is impossible to know what is in another person's mind, so the onus is on that person to be true to himself.
The Catechism is not the only authority to demand the truth; the Law requires you to swear to tell 'the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth', thereby hoping to rule out the economical factor.
Lying, to me, is deliberately deceiving others, and the reason or motive does not excuse it. Reasons and motives are great for exercising debate, but the bottom line is - a lie is a lie.

[scottycelt]

My catechism impressed on me that 'no reason or motive can excuse a lie,' I believe that.
But, to tell you the truth, I have not always lived up to that belief. Guilt is the consequence.

Is not the motive for telling a lie the all-important factor here, Patrick?

If, as in Vinteil's example, telling a lie to prevent a potential wrongdoer from committing a far greater crime, is that not actually praiseworthy never mind acceptable?

Deliberately misleading others for purely selfish advantage is obviously wrong, but doing the same to prevent another committing murder etc is a different thing entirely, surely ?

My catechism taught me that to commit a grievous sin a person had to be knowingly aware he/she were guilty of wrongdoing. If the person telling the lie sincerely believes by doing so he/she is doing the right thing, then, as no sin has therefore been committed, there is absolutely no need for a guilty conscience!

That's what I was taught as a wee boy be the Jesuits, who, in those days at least, were hardly renowned for convenient 'escape clauses'...

[Serial_Apologist]

Is not the motive for telling a lie the all-important factor here, Patrick?

If, as in Vinteil's example, telling a lie to prevent a potential wrongdoer from committing a far greater crime, is that not actually praiseworthy never mind acceptable?

Deliberately misleading others for purely selfish advantage is obviously wrong, but doing the same to prevent another committing murder etc is a different thing entirely, surely ?

My catechism taught me that to commit a grievous sin a person had to be knowingly aware he/she were guilty of wrongdoing. If the person telling the lie sincerely believes by doing so he/she is doing the right thing, then, as no sin has therefore been committed, there is absolutely no need for a guilty conscience!

That's what I was taught as a wee boy be the Jesuits, who, in those days at least, were hardly renowned for convenient 'escape clauses'...

I am relieved to be told that some Catholic views on these matters would appear to be more "liberal" than civil Law, which blankly states that ignorance is no excuse.

But the point I was making above was that I think it is important for a child to be able to tell a lie, without being threatened that the contents of one's mind are per se transparent. It is understandable that adults freak out the moment they discover their offspring's capacity for deceipt; but the ability to conceal or deceive is as important developmentally as learninhg about consequences, I believe. As an atheist, of course, I could be wrong, , but I would still rather feel free to lie, however dubious the motive, and THEN learn - through punishment or ostracism, if need be - about taking responsibility for so doing.

S-A

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

My parents brought me up telling lies. They told me there was an old man dressed in red and white, wth a white beard, who drove a sleigh pulled by a reindeer across the sky and brought good boys and girls presents on Christmas Day. When I lost my first tooth... you know the rest.

But I survived, and they never told me the one about the stork.

[scottycelt]

I am relieved to be told that some Catholic views on these matters would appear to be more "liberal" than civil Law, which blankly states that ignorance is no excuse.

But the point I was making above was that I think it is important for a child to be able to tell a lie, without being threatened that the contents of one's mind are per se transparent. It is understandable that adults freak out the moment they discover their offspring's capacity for deceipt; but the ability to conceal or deceive is as important developmentally as learninhg about consequences, I believe. As an atheist, of course, I could be wrong, , but I would still rather feel free to lie, however dubious the motive, and THEN learn - through punishment or ostracism, if need be - about taking responsibility for so doing.S-A

The view I expressed has little to do with 'liberalism' or 'conservatism' although quite naturally it might be labelled as one or the other by non-believers.

Here we are asked to pronounce on 'Liars' as if everyone who tells a lie is the same ... ie bad.

To kill another person is rightly regarded as wrong and if one deliberately does that he/she is guilty of murder.

However if I kill another person in an act of self-defence should I also be branded as a 'killer' or 'murderer' ?

To mislead another person(s) in the hope that it will avoid evil and avoid suffering to others is quite different from lying for gain or expediency.

I totally disagree with your last paragraph. Children should always be taught at home that lying is wrong ('special cases' are hardly relevant there) and have plenty of time to learn about 'moral dilemmas' and very rare exceptions to the rule later in life.

[PatrickOD]

Fortunately, scotty, there are not many assassins around asking you to finger a victim hiding behind a wall. But if there happened to be one, I would argue that the situation would not be one which required the truth - a greater obligation would be on you.
I find it difficult to imagine that a person can sincerely believe that lying is 'the right thing'. They might choose to lie as the lesser of two evils, which is what I think we may all do from time to time. But again, you have to look into your own soul and question your own reasons. Only you can tell.
Och, scotty, that is all too heavy.
Try this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voRQ9fm_bRQ