Lies are a dangerous sin to commit because they threaten and distort perceived reality. To tell a lie and be believed is to convince the believer that what is real is unreal, or that the unreal is real. While a lie may never be found out, any unreal event housed within the real necessarily calls attention to itself by having no referent.
The best way to avoid being caught in a lie is to have nothing to lie about. The best way to keep a secret is to have no secrets to keep – alternatively, never, ever tell anyone.
Because of the natural chain of events that is cause and effect (that same chain which necessitates that all events be the same infinite event), any false or unreal event introduced into that chain is easily traced backward to its source – the liar. A thorough, deductive investigation of the chain of events which led to the unreal event, will inevitably uncover the liar because the unreal event seems to have an inappropriate cause or no cause at all. In order to conceal a lie well, one must then concoct further lies which support it, masking the flaws in the chain of events.
Naturally, the more lies one tells, the more unlikely that the chain of real events will cohere with the lie, and then it will be discovered. However, some will not delve as deeply into the chain as others, leaving the lie to persist.
As such, there are cases where a lie cannot be easily discovered by deductive reasoning, and the person who believes it will continue to live as though the lie were true. This is dangerous, because it introduces a false or unreal event into the chain of future real events, such that the unreal event becomes a factor in determining what will be real in the future.
This is all not to mention the emotional effects of a lie. For the liar - if the liar is not a sociopath - there will nearly always be pangs of guilt for having told the lie, which may or may not be bearable. There is guilt for having lied, and further guilt for having done or been involved with whatever thing caused the lie. Even in cases where no guilt is felt, it is highly likely that the liar will experience paranoia with regard to being found out.
For the person lied to, there is more often than not suspicion, and in such cases suspicion is sufficient cause for feelings of betrayal, regardless of whether those suspicions have been validated. If the lie is discovered, the feelings of betrayal and suspicion are validated, turning to anger, disappointment, and depression. This is before whatever truth that the lie replaced is discovered, and in some cases, the discover of the truth will cause further anguish.
As it is rarely advantageous to be the receptor of negative emotions (least of all, one’s own), it is rarely advantageous to lie. As stated, the lie is almost inevitably discovered, making the negative response and effects of altering the chain of events just as inevitable. In this sense, lies are in almost every case as much a self-destructive behaviour as they are an outwardly destructive behaviour.
Furthermore, the act of lying in conjunction with the true event which seemed to require the lie has an additive effect, which results in more negative response than would originally have been encountered were the event alone discovered. To an extent, this relationship mirrors western karmic theory, because in lying, negativity is visited back on the liar two-fold.
Great post. Yes, the web of lies follows the initial lie. What I have noticed is not only the self-destructive tendencies of the liar but also the destructive chain of the lie. People fall like dominoes as the effect of the lie's unreality pervades a whole family or a whole society.
ReplyDeleteBetrayal is the worst human sin, according to Dante. It is punished at the innermost circle of his Inferno, not with fire but with ice. Does that suggest a lie is a cold calculated act as opposed to an act of passion?
UL: Yes, that domino effect, and the web of lies is exactly what I was getting at. This life, and this reality are all we've got, and it doesn't serve anyone well to pepper it with lies.
ReplyDeleteI'm with Dante on this. I equate a lie with a betrayal (it's kind of wishy-washy to suggest they're different) - and I would definitely say it's one of the worst offences you can commit.
Interesting that he punishes it with ice rather than fire (I actually started reading the inferno many years ago, but never finished it - I was probably too young to handle the prose).
"Lie of passion" seems like such an alien phrase. A lie MUST be calculated, because it involves imagining an unreal alternative to the real. A lie of omission must be calculated because of the need for a conscious decision not to tell the truth.
I wonder if your interpretation isn't exactly what Dante had in mind?
I just posted "Sweet Little Lies Redux" and linked to this excellent clarification of what a lie is and what it does. Thank you for this! Also linked this post on DA.
ReplyDeleteExcellent post Rab. To embrace fully what you are saying, though, requires a belief in absolutes.
ReplyDeleteDante's view is that of a medieval man embittered by the events he went through and sustained by religious faith, as such a belief.
If you put "truth" and "lie" on a gradient not only do you see their connection you can also see that sometimes what separates them is only a few degrees. There are times when you dont want the truth, it might actually be counterproductive to tell the truth. At the end of the day the best thing is to evaluate each case individually and establish, pragmatically, what works best. What is true according to your world view may not be true according to mine. Rather than condemning each other's value systems as untrue we might work towards coexisting and eliminating the possibility of a conflict over my version or your version of the truth.
BTW re Dante. He was an extremely vindictive man and his Inferno was more often than not an elaborate way of giving vent to his desire for revenge by imagining his enemies being tortured.
Every person who ever lived, lied. I lie, you lie. As we do with other actions, we must take into account the intent of the lie. We sometimes lie to our children, boss, mate, IRS. A lie to protect an innocent from harm may actually be a positive moral decision. Any lie you make to increase your own standing in life or relationship is a harmful lie.
ReplyDeleteJohn Dodds:
ReplyDeleteYes, yes. Many people lie. I don't lie much. I don't have many opportunities to lie - nor any desire to.
What good reason could there be to lie to your children, boss, mate, or the IRS?
This is just me being an absolutist and martyr, but, if I were an innocent in danger of harm, I would rather suffer in the name of truth than escape harm in the name of a lie.
While we have a responsibility not to lie, every person has a responsibility not to harm others (but most do anyway), just as lying in any case ought not to occur (but does anyway). So lying to protect someone else ought not to ever occur - but probably will, eventually.
Hatebunny. Thanks for the reply. I do agree that lying should be avoided as much as can be humanly possible. I found that mostly in their early stages of development, my children were not mentally advanced enough to understand many adult problems. I do believe that children and specially-challenged adults do need protection at times. I don't think one should lie to anyone fully capable of reasoning.
ReplyDelete"It's not a lie if you believe it. --George Costanza
ReplyDelete<3
Megs
Back to Alex and the idea that there could be a continuum of lying/truth-telling. Not sure, having been both the liar and the lied to, that this is true. The betrayal of reality inherent in lying is absolute, isn't it? One is either telling the truth or a version of the truth, or one is not. Having said that, I would never agree that, for example, the existence of Santa Claus is a lie. There are different types of reality, each one just as "true" as the others.
ReplyDeleteAs eluded to, to lie is to be human. To purposefully deceive is common to most intelligent species, but man's unusual heights of self-awareness, coupled with our might of intelligence, leads to the icky notion of empathy, icky because empathy can make us feel bad. One can make a decent argument that lying is best performed on a communal scale, where lying to those of significant social value is a sin but lying to those outside of the community is acceptable to laudable. Before I am flamed, consider the act of the sale. Both seller and buyer engage in practices of prevarication in order to exact the better deal at the detriment of the other. Those negotiators of great skill are applauded by our society. Consider a nation's great ambassadors, men of genius in their capacity to apply perfectly timed deceit in order to better their nation AKA expanded community. To this day Otto von Bismarck is the high water-mark of duplicity, a man venerated for his capacity to lie to people's faces to the advantage his great Prussia. I personally do my best to tell the truth, but were I to have the capacity to tell a greater lie it would be no great leap for me to strive to be the next great American Bismarck.
ReplyDeleteGenruk of badnatured.com