Why is lying worse than misleading? Linguistic communities and their relation to the self

Hyun Park

Yale University

I argue that the intuition we have that lying is worse than merely misleading is due to a self-preservation instinct, similar to why we think suicide is worse than self-harm.
First, I refute standard views. It is not worse to lie because it leads to worse outcomes—there’s no difference between saying “I didn’t put in nuts” and “It’s safe for you to eat” to a nut-allergic friend who asks about a dish cooked with peanut oil, when it comes to consequences. Furthermore, Kant is wrong to say that lying weakens assertions for everyone, because lying happens all the time and people as a whole still trust assertions.
Then, I ascertain the rule violated by lying. A correlation between what is asserted and what is believed is not enough. Finger crossing is not part of what is asserted but is considered a valid defense against accusations of lying in truth-warranting contexts, because it opens up the possibility of others knowing the truth. This points to an underlying rule, revised from Berstler’s convention of Truthfulness (itself taken from Lewis): speakers assert x if they believe p, provided they do not signal via other conventions they do not believe p. I’ll call this Truth*. We can define lying as a violation of Truth*, as Truth* includes irony, metaphor, etc and excludes bald-faced lies, which have no conventionalized way of revealing lack of belief.
I argue that deviating from Truth* harms the community by the consequences of deviation, but that deviation as an isolated action harms only the liar. The liar is harmed in two ways: (1) she is spurned by her community when it realizes the liar spurns its conventions; and (2), the liar now has increased skepticism that others obey Truth*. A fraudster who lies to people and boasts about it to their friends may not be hurt by (1) but will be hurt by (2). A fool who never considers that others could lie to him may not be harmed by (2) but will be harmed by (1). Finally, I comment on bullshit’s relation to Truth*.

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