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Publicado: 10 de agosto de 2012
Ly ing
Sam Harris
Digital Honor Code: This ebook has been copyrighted and cannot be resold or excerpted without permission. However, you are welcome to share digital and/or physical copies of it with others. If you received your version of LYING for free, and want to pass it along to family, friends, and colleagues, I simply ask that you purchase one copy before doing so. Thank you for yoursupport. —SH
© Sam Harris, 2011
Contents
1 Introduction 4 What is A Lie? 10 The Mirror of Honesty 13 Two Types of Lies 16 White Lies 27 Trust 30 Faint Praise 32 Secrets
36 42 45 47 52 54 56
Lies in Extremis Mental Accounting Integrity Big Lies Conclusion Acknowledgements Notes
1
Introduction
Among the many paradoxes of human life, this is perhaps the most peculiar andconsequential: We often behave in ways that are guaranteed to make us
unhappy. Many of us spend our lives marching with open eyes toward remorse,
regret, guilt, and disappointment. And nowhere do our injuries seem more casually self-inflicted, or the suffering we create more disproportionate to the needs of the moment, than in the lies we tell to other human beings. Lying is the royal road tochaos. As an undergraduate at Stanford I took a seminar that profoundly changed my life. It was called “The Ethical Analyst,” and it was conducted in the form of a Socratic dialogue by an extraordinarily gifted professor, Ronald A. Howard.1 Our discussion focused on a single question of practical ethics:
Is it wrong to lie?
At first glance, this may seem a scant foundation for an entire collegecourse. After all, most people already believe that lying is generally wrong—and they also know that some situations seem to warrant it. What was so fascinating about this seminar, however, was how difficult
www.samharris.org
2
it was to find examples of virtuous lies that could withstand Professor Howard’s scrutiny. Even with Nazis at the door and Anne Frank in the attic, Howard alwaysseemed to find truths worth telling and paths to even greater catastrophe that could be opened by lying. I do not remember what I thought about lying before I took “The Ethical Analyst,” but the course accomplished as close to a firmware upgrade of my brain as I have ever experienced. I came away convinced that lying, even about the smallest matters, needlessly damages personal relationships andpublic trust. It would be hard to exaggerate what a relief it was to realize this. It’s not that I had been in the habit of lying before taking Howard’s course—but I now knew that endless forms of suffering and embarrassment could be easily avoided by
simply telling the truth. And, as though for the first time, I saw the consequences
of others’ failure to live by this principle all around me.This experience remains one of the clearest examples in my own life of the power of philosophical reflection. “The Ethical Analyst” affected me in ways that college courses seldom do: It made me a better person.
www.samharris.org
3
What Is a Lie?
Deception can take many forms, but not all acts of deception are lies. Even the most ethical among us occasionally struggle to keep appearancesand reality apart. By wearing cosmetics, a woman seeks to seem younger or more beautiful than she otherwise would. Honesty does not require that she issue a continual series of disclaimers—“I see that you are looking at my face: Please be aware that I do not look this good first thing in the morning...” A person in a hurry might pretend not to notice an acquaintance passing by on the street. Apolite host might not acknowledge that one of her guests has said something so stupid as to slow the rotation of the earth. When asked “How are you?” most of us reflexively say that we are well, understanding the question to be merely a greeting, rather than an invitation to discuss our career disappointments, our marital troubles, or the condition of our bowels. Elisions of this kind can be forms...
Sam Harris
Digital Honor Code: This ebook has been copyrighted and cannot be resold or excerpted without permission. However, you are welcome to share digital and/or physical copies of it with others. If you received your version of LYING for free, and want to pass it along to family, friends, and colleagues, I simply ask that you purchase one copy before doing so. Thank you for yoursupport. —SH
© Sam Harris, 2011
Contents
1 Introduction 4 What is A Lie? 10 The Mirror of Honesty 13 Two Types of Lies 16 White Lies 27 Trust 30 Faint Praise 32 Secrets
36 42 45 47 52 54 56
Lies in Extremis Mental Accounting Integrity Big Lies Conclusion Acknowledgements Notes
1
Introduction
Among the many paradoxes of human life, this is perhaps the most peculiar andconsequential: We often behave in ways that are guaranteed to make us
unhappy. Many of us spend our lives marching with open eyes toward remorse,
regret, guilt, and disappointment. And nowhere do our injuries seem more casually self-inflicted, or the suffering we create more disproportionate to the needs of the moment, than in the lies we tell to other human beings. Lying is the royal road tochaos. As an undergraduate at Stanford I took a seminar that profoundly changed my life. It was called “The Ethical Analyst,” and it was conducted in the form of a Socratic dialogue by an extraordinarily gifted professor, Ronald A. Howard.1 Our discussion focused on a single question of practical ethics:
Is it wrong to lie?
At first glance, this may seem a scant foundation for an entire collegecourse. After all, most people already believe that lying is generally wrong—and they also know that some situations seem to warrant it. What was so fascinating about this seminar, however, was how difficult
www.samharris.org
2
it was to find examples of virtuous lies that could withstand Professor Howard’s scrutiny. Even with Nazis at the door and Anne Frank in the attic, Howard alwaysseemed to find truths worth telling and paths to even greater catastrophe that could be opened by lying. I do not remember what I thought about lying before I took “The Ethical Analyst,” but the course accomplished as close to a firmware upgrade of my brain as I have ever experienced. I came away convinced that lying, even about the smallest matters, needlessly damages personal relationships andpublic trust. It would be hard to exaggerate what a relief it was to realize this. It’s not that I had been in the habit of lying before taking Howard’s course—but I now knew that endless forms of suffering and embarrassment could be easily avoided by
simply telling the truth. And, as though for the first time, I saw the consequences
of others’ failure to live by this principle all around me.This experience remains one of the clearest examples in my own life of the power of philosophical reflection. “The Ethical Analyst” affected me in ways that college courses seldom do: It made me a better person.
www.samharris.org
3
What Is a Lie?
Deception can take many forms, but not all acts of deception are lies. Even the most ethical among us occasionally struggle to keep appearancesand reality apart. By wearing cosmetics, a woman seeks to seem younger or more beautiful than she otherwise would. Honesty does not require that she issue a continual series of disclaimers—“I see that you are looking at my face: Please be aware that I do not look this good first thing in the morning...” A person in a hurry might pretend not to notice an acquaintance passing by on the street. Apolite host might not acknowledge that one of her guests has said something so stupid as to slow the rotation of the earth. When asked “How are you?” most of us reflexively say that we are well, understanding the question to be merely a greeting, rather than an invitation to discuss our career disappointments, our marital troubles, or the condition of our bowels. Elisions of this kind can be forms...
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