Lies, Cons,and the American Way

[LuckyR]

Perhaps. But really, what is that to you and I?

If we have opportunity, we may wish to prevent such violations of morality. If we do not, we cannot. But either way, the thing we really have to attend to is not who THEY are being, but the persons YOU and I are being. It is to the care of our own souls that we must attend first. Nothing is morally achieved by our joining the corrupt in their corruption.

Oh, I'm not saying that these "violations" are to be avoided as evidence of moral failure.

Well, that's what they are. A "violation," by definition, is a "failure" to follow a rule. Of course, it may also be a "decision" not to follow a rule. But it's certainly a species of moral failure, if the rule in question is, itself, morally imperative.

I'm saying that simple rules do not (for most folks) accommodate the various nuances, details and circumstances common in Real Life that lead to (legitimate) exceptions to rules of all types, including moral codes.

Well, this is the difference between obedience to a commandment and obedience to the spirit of the commandment. A commandment itself does not necessarily speak to specifics; instead, it gives a general axiom, a compass point toward which decisions must be made. But once the axiom is given, one is still obligated to figure out, in the hurly-burly of real life circumtances, what is the best way to honour that axiom.

So, for example, if we take the axiom, "It is wrong to lie," we still need to figure out what constitutes a "lie," and how we can legitimately avoid telling one. So we might puzzle over whether such marginal cases as allowing an error to persist, or refusing to speak or to offer information can be construed as "lying." However, what we need not be in doubt about is the moral direction that should instruct our judgment: namely, that to lie is wrong.

And then there is certainly a hierarchy of moral values, as well. To love one's friends is a universal value; but what to do when one's family comes into conflict with one's friends? Then, one often has to make a decision about which value is to be prioritized, in which circumstance, and why. And if one doesn't have a given hierarchy of values, that's impossible to do.

But "exceptions" are quite a different thing. An "exception" would imply that it's okay to do immoral things under certain circumstances. So again, you'd probably have to give me a specific case before I could puzzle out what the right values would be, and what the right consequent action would be. Got one?

Well there was a reason I put violation in quotation marks, because that was your wording, but I was implying the meaning of exception.

You are correct to address again (since I alluded to it previously) that an individual's set of moral codes may come into conflict with one another. I obviously agree that the prioritization of these codes is helpful to guide one's actions, but to be honest even in the absence of such priorities either choice can be morally defended.

Exceptions (which as above I was addressing) are commonplace, we've already reviewed the shopworn example folks trot out when the subject of truthtelling is concerned: the Gestapo scenario.

[Immanuel Can]

I obviously agree that the prioritization of these codes is helpful to guide one's actions, but to be honest even in the absence of such priorities either choice can be morally defended.

No, I don't mean "prioritization of codes." I mean something much more straightforward. Not "your code against my code," but rather, within my code or your code are values that need to be ranked.

For example, which of these would you prioritize: right to free speech, right to life, or freedom of choice, right of conscience? In a given ethical situation, you'd have to make a choice about which came first, and which might be secondary. That implies that moral values have to be fitted into a hierarchy of some kind. We could argue about how that hierarchy should look, but we couldn't avoid the necessity of having such a hierarchy.

Exceptions (which as above I was addressing) are commonplace, we've already reviewed the shopworn example folks trot out when the subject of truthtelling is concerned: the Gestapo scenario.

Well, except I don't see that as any "exception." It's pretty obvious the person involved would have alternatives to lying. Silence would certainly be an obvious one.

[Walker]

The rule oriented notion that lies are always wicked because "Satan is the father of lues" seems not only simplistic, but also contradictory to the Christan ethos.

To not think that lies are always wicked makes all causation subject to the limitations of human understanding, rather than making all causation subject to the Totality that includes what lies beyond human knowledge, a totality that includes the future.

To always speak the truth and not cause harm requires great awareness. Great awareness is unobstructed awareness. It requires impeccable mindfulness. It requires knowing what constitutes harm. There are few spiritual practices, if any, that can energize awareness in such a positive way.

Bach signing his compositions with SDG is an acknowledgment of all causation being subject to the Totality rather than the limitations of human understanding.

[Alexiev]

The rule oriented notion that lies are always wicked because "Satan is the father of lues" seems not only simplistic, but also contradictory to the Christan ethos.

To not think that lies are always wicked makes all causation subject to the limitations of human understanding, rather than making all causation subject to the Totality that includes what lies beyond human knowledge, a totality that includes the future.

To always speak the truth and not cause harm requires great awareness. Great awareness is unobstructed awareness. It requires impeccable mindfulness. It requires knowing what constitutes harm. There are few spiritual practices, if any, that can energize awareness in such a positive way.

Bach signing his compositions with SDG is an acknowledgment of all causation being subject to the Totality rather than the limitations of human understanding.

I'd suggest that we generally use the word "cause" to refer to a handle we humans can manipulate. Germs "cause" disease because we can kill them or avoid them. Yet we know that some people infected with germs get ill others do not. The variable in an experiment is identified as the cause, yet innumerable other conditions must also be present for the effect to occur (of course this is reiterating what you wrote, with an emphasis on how we use language).

[Alexiev]

...you haven't responded to the example of the writer who ficitonalizes a story which is presented as true to entertain, enlighten snd elucidate.

I must have missed that part of the discussion: I don't think you said it to me. Can you point me to where you said it, so I can speak about it?

Perhaps the Saint should refrain from lying and aspire to perfection.

Is "perfection" required in order not to lie? I don't think so. All one really needs is a commitment to truth. Honest errors are not, per se, lies. Lies involve deliberate deception; so refraining from deliberate deception would be good enough to answer the "Thou shalt not lie" bell.

We should think not only about what is best for OUR souls, but also about what promotes happiness and well-being for others.

Why not both?

I suggest that the person who gives no attention to the state of his soul cannot possibly do very much good for the well-being of others.

The enlightened person (or saint) may not have to obsess about the state of his soul. His goodness comes naturally to him. He has stopped thinking about SELF.

When Jesus was asked about taxes, he said "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesars, and unto God...." This allowed him to avoid lying through (let's face it) trickery or deception, since everything is "God's". Most of us may not be clever enough to avoid both lies and punishments with that facility.

[LuckyR]

I obviously agree that the prioritization of these codes is helpful to guide one's actions, but to be honest even in the absence of such priorities either choice can be morally defended.

No, I don't mean "prioritization of codes." I mean something much more straightforward. Not "your code against my code," but rather, within my code or your code are values that need to be ranked.

For example, which of these would you prioritize: right to free speech, right to life, or freedom of choice, right of conscience? In a given ethical situation, you'd have to make a choice about which came first, and which might be secondary. That implies that moral values have to be fitted into a hierarchy of some kind. We could argue about how that hierarchy should look, but we couldn't avoid the necessity of having such a hierarchy.

Exceptions (which as above I was addressing) are commonplace, we've already reviewed the shopworn example folks trot out when the subject of truthtelling is concerned: the Gestapo scenario.

Well, except I don't see that as any "exception." It's pretty obvious the person involved would have alternatives to lying. Silence would certainly be an obvious one.

Sorry for misleading you. I meant exactly the concept you outlined in your first paragraph. Having said that, I stand by my comment that while optimal behavior requires your hierarchy, reasonable behavior can be attained without it.

As to your second paragraph, while your observation that there are (I would argue: significantly less practical, if you know anything about the actual Gestapo) alternatives, this observation is irrelevant, since the question is: is lying to a Gestapo officer an exception to a moral code against lying? The presence of suboptimal alternatives does not negate the optimal status of lying.

[Immanuel Can]

...Having said that, I stand by my comment that while optimal behavior requires your hierarchy, reasonable behavior can be attained without it.

Oh, well...as J. Peterson has correctly pointed out, hierarchy is just a feature of reality, one produced by the use of any criterion at all, for anything. The minute we decide to value, say, athleticism, it's instantly the case that some people are more athletic than others. The minute we decide intelligence is a good thing, we find that there are people who are lower in that game, too. Or if we value honesty, confidence, beauty, charitability...it doesn't matter what: we're always instantly into a hierarchical situation.

And morality's no exception. The minute we set a standard...say, "Do no harm," we are into the problem of what to do when "harms" are uneven. Should I "harm" my kid by making him do his homework when he'd rather play computer games, or would failing to make him do his homework ultimately "harm" him more? Should I "harm" my body with exercise, by tearing down my muscle tissue, or would being overweight "harm" it much more? And so on.

As to your second paragraph, while your observation that there are (I would argue: significantly less practical, if you know anything about the actual Gestapo) alternatives, this observation is irrelevant, since the question is: is lying to a Gestapo officer an exception to a moral code against lying? The presence of suboptimal alternatives does not negate the optimal status of lying.

There's no reason to believe that lying is "optimal" in that case at all.

I agree it looks expedient. I agree it looks easier. I agree it looks more pleasant and less painful. I don't agree it's "optimal." For a thing to be genuinely "optimal," I would say, it has to not require you to become a bad person yourself. The care of the body is important, but the care of the soul is priority. (Hierarchy again, of course.)

[Alexis Jacobi]

Our mythology suggests that the "American Way" is dilligence and hard work, which will be rewarded financially (and is morally admirable). This mythology is promoted by the Capitalists who fruitlessly wish that it were true.

In fact, if there is an "American Way" or an "American Dream" it resides in the quick score. It sent our ancestors scrambling to California and the Klondike in Gold Rushes that impoverished the vast majority of the rushers. It is reflected in our election of the con-man Donald Trump as President. Lottery tickets sell well.

It seems your initial premises are off the mark.

One, the American Way or Dream cannot quite be called a mythology since, in fact, the N American continent within the American States actually provided a supreme opportunity for so many who came. A myth is something unreal which is believed in for various reasons. What America offered was anything but a myth. If you retort by saying "Well, it didn't turn out that way for everyone" I would have to agree. But it would not invalidate what I am saying.

It is not 'capitalists who fruitlessly wish it were true' but a bona fide fact. And it was not promoted by capitalists but rather became, in those first centuries, a known and circulated fact. People who came here and made something of themselves communicated their success to others.

It is false to associate the "American Way" or an "American Dream" with a quick score. Simply because millions and millions took more careful and persevering routes to gaining success and wealth. The few who didn't, who looked for the easy route, ended up finding out that it impoverished them. However, it is true that there are many quick score stories associated with success in America.

Even if Donald Trump really is a 'con-man' -- and I believe that I understand why someone would say that and they refer to a real thing, not a contrived thing -- it does not change the fact that he has upended the political and social world and set things in motion. A movement that is highly critical of entrenched corruption at the heart of the US system. Even if he fades away what he set in motion will not fade away.

[Immanuel Can]

...you haven't responded to the example of the writer who ficitonalizes a story which is presented as true to entertain, enlighten snd elucidate.

I must have missed that part of the discussion: I don't think you said it to me. Can you point me to where you said it, so I can speak about it?

Perhaps the Saint should refrain from lying and aspire to perfection.

Is "perfection" required in order not to lie? I don't think so. All one really needs is a commitment to truth. Honest errors are not, per se, lies. Lies involve deliberate deception; so refraining from deliberate deception would be good enough to answer the "Thou shalt not lie" bell.

We should think not only about what is best for OUR souls, but also about what promotes happiness and well-being for others.

Why not both?

I suggest that the person who gives no attention to the state of his soul cannot possibly do very much good for the well-being of others.

The enlightened person (or saint) may not have to obsess about the state of his soul. His goodness comes naturally to him. He has stopped thinking about SELF.

Very Buddhist. But not very realistic.

The truth is that "saintly (sic.) goodness comes naturally" to none of us. Show me the man who has stopped thinking about himself, and I'll show you a dead man.

When Jesus was asked about taxes, he said "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesars, and unto God...." This allowed him to avoid lying

It enabled Him to tell the truth without accepting the perverse terms the Pharisees were hoping to inflict on them, actually. What He did (and this is so astute), is to reject their false dilemma. His answer goes this way:

You think that money is what God wants. But on the back of a coin, it is not the image of God you see, but only of an emperor who regards himself as a god. But what does Torah say? It says, that man and woman were "created in the image of God." So human beings bear the likeness (not merely a physical one, but a spiritual one) to God. His "stamp and impression" is on man. So give to Caesar his taxes, since they already have his stamp and authority on them; and give your entire self to God.

It's a brilliant answer, and not a bit evasive. It's about as far from the concept of a "lie" as you can get. We would have to say that the only "lie" implicated was that one owed God only as much as one owed a human authority -- which was the Pharisees' suppositional lie.

Most of us may not be clever enough to avoid both lies and punishments with that facility.

That is true. We are not gods, far less God. But morality is always aspirational, not merely crassly practical. We are still morally responsible for things we, in point of fact, fail to do. Our practices give us no excuse.

So if I steal, it does not get me off the hook to say, "Well, I'm only human, and human beings are only irregularly moral." I'm still a thief. Morality teaches me what the right standard is, even when I have fallen short of it. That's what I mean when I say it's "aspirational"; it doesn't just teach us what we DO do, but what we OUGHT to have done, even when we didn't do it.

And that's what the Bible teaches: for it says, "...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." (Rm. 3) It seems we agree with Him on that.

[Will Bouwman]

...that's what the Bible teaches: for it says, "...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." (Rm. 3)

As I understand your views on abortion, personhood begins at conception. What sin is a fertilised egg guilty of? What glory does it fall short of?

[Alexiev]

I must have missed that part of the discussion: I don't think you said it to me. Can you point me to where you said it, so I can speak about it?
Is "perfection" required in order not to lie? I don't think so. All one really needs is a commitment to truth. Honest errors are not, per se, lies. Lies involve deliberate deception; so refraining from deliberate deception would be good enough to answer the "Thou shalt not lie" bell.

Why not both?

I suggest that the person who gives no attention to the state of his soul cannot possibly do very much good for the well-being of others.

The enlightened person (or saint) may not have to obsess about the state of his soul. His goodness comes naturally to him. He has stopped thinking about SELF.

Very Buddhist. But not very realistic.

The truth is that "saintly (sic.) goodness comes naturally" to none of us. Show me the man who has stopped thinking about himself, and I'll show you a dead man.

When Jesus was asked about taxes, he said "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesars, and unto God...." This allowed him to avoid lying

It enabled Him to tell the truth without accepting the perverse terms the Pharisees were hoping to inflict on them, actually. What He did (and this is so astute), is to reject their false dilemma. His answer goes this way:

You think that money is what God wants. But on the back of a coin, it is not the image of God you see, but only of an emperor who regards himself as a god. But what does Torah say? It says, that man and woman were "created in the image of God." So human beings bear the likeness (not merely a physical one, but a spiritual one) to God. His "stamp and impression" is on man. So give to Caesar his taxes, since they already have his stamp and authority on them; and give your entire self to God.

It's a brilliant answer, and not a bit evasive. It's about as far from the concept of a "lie" as you can get. We would have to say that the only "lie" implicated was that one owed God only as much as one owed a human authority -- which was the Pharisees' suppositional lie.

Most of us may not be clever enough to avoid both lies and punishments with that facility.

That is true. We are not gods, far less God. But morality is always aspirational, not merely crassly practical. We are still morally responsible for things we, in point of fact, fail to do. Our practices give us no excuse.

So if I steal, it does not get me off the hook to say, "Well, I'm only human, and human beings are only irregularly moral." I'm still a thief. Morality teaches me what the right standard is, even when I have fallen short of it. That's what I mean when I say it's "aspirational"; it doesn't just teach us what we DO do, but what we OUGHT to have done, even when we didn't do it.

And that's what the Bible teaches: for it says, "...all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." (Rm. 3) It seems we agree with Him on that.

In "Reflections on Gandhi" Orwell asserts that not all of us aspire to sainthood. The notion that we all try but fall short is, he thinks. Incorrect. Most of us aspire to love our wives and children more than we love others, as unsaintly as this may be. So even aspirations may not be objective.

In addition, although to the Christian morality may be objectively determined by God, God's will is not always objectively apparent. The Bible is a complicated and difficult book, subject to many interpretations. Even seemingly direct commandments (like the ten) are subject to interpretation. Kill? Murder? Is first degree manslaughter prohibited?

So, perhaps, the supposedly objective nature of Christian morality differs but little from subjective morality, because the objectivity is beyond our human ken.

[Alexiev]

Our mythology suggests that the "American Way" is dilligence and hard work, which will be rewarded financially (and is morally admirable). This mythology is promoted by the Capitalists who fruitlessly wish that it were true.

In fact, if there is an "American Way" or an "American Dream" it resides in the quick score. It sent our ancestors scrambling to California and the Klondike in Gold Rushes that impoverished the vast majority of the rushers. It is reflected in our election of the con-man Donald Trump as President. Lottery tickets sell well.

It seems your initial premises are off the mark.

One, the American Way or Dream cannot quite be called a mythology since, in fact, the N American continent within the American States actually provided a supreme opportunity for so many who came. A myth is something unreal which is believed in for various reasons. What America offered was anything but a myth. If you retort by saying "Well, it didn't turn out that way for everyone" I would have to agree. But it would not invalidate what I am saying.

It is not 'capitalists who fruitlessly wish it were true' but a bona fide fact. And it was not promoted by capitalists but rather became, in those first centuries, a known and circulated fact. People who came here and made something of themselves communicated their success to others.

It is false to associate the "American Way" or an "American Dream" with a quick score. Simply because millions and millions took more careful and persevering routes to gaining success and wealth. The few who didn't, who looked for the easy route, ended up finding out that it impoverished them. However, it is true that there are many quick score stories associated with success in America.

Even if Donald Trump really is a 'con-man' -- and I believe that I understand why someone would say that and they refer to a real thing, not a contrived thing -- it does not change the fact that he has upended the political and social world and set things in motion. A movement that is highly critical of entrenched corruption at the heart of the US system. Even if he fades away what he set in motion will not fade away.

The word "myth" is used in different ways. The notion that Americans aspire to enrich themselves through diligence and hard work is doubtless true for some Americans. But not for most. The hordes rushing off to California or Alaska in search of gold wanted the quick score. And very few of them got it. The percentage of losers in these quests was well over 90%.

Nonetheless, in Breton's history of the Klondike gold rush, for which he interviewed many participants 50 years later, revealed that most of them had no regrets. The adventure and excitement was reward enough.

I never claimed that the quick score worked. I claimed it represents the American DREAM, not the reality.

[Impenitent]

What sin is a fertilised egg guilty of? What glory does it fall short of?

=Imp

[Will Bouwman]

Granted that's a sin deserving of an eternity of torture, but it is very unlikely either of those eggs is fertilised.

[Immanuel Can]

What sin is a fertilised egg guilty of?

You mean, "Does an in utero human being have a nature disposed to sin?"

Just wait. Ask that question again during "the terrible twos."