(no subject)

[deckardcanine]

Okay, I need some clarity here. On one forum, more than one person has a different understanding of the word "lie" from mine. I've always thought that a lie was a deliberate untruth. They think it's any untruth. My dictionaries back me up, but if enough people come to think differently, later editions will change the definition.

What do you think? I'd much prefer to keep the more specific meaning as possible, lest an accusation of "lies" be taken the wrong way.

Comments

[hyperion90.livejournal.com]

A lie is a deliberate untruth, that is what separates it from accidental untruths and misinformed untruths. =|

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

It has always been a useful distinction, but its weak point is this: When a person tells a lie, other people who hear it and believe it can repeat it while being honest, but it is still a lie. Just not a lie of their own. So there is a further distinction to be made between "That's a lie" and "You are lying."

Also, the problem of willful ignorance and choosing to believe things in the face of contrary evidence muddies the waters of what is "deliberate".

[ccdesan.livejournal.com]

You could call it either way. I tend to come down on the side of deliberate deception. If I go crazy and start believing that I'm Napoleon, I'm not lying when I tell people about my promotion to General - because I believe it.

To insist that any falsehood is a lie makes a liar out of the entire world's population, because all of us believe and relate things that may not necessarily be true, simply because we have incorrect information.

[nefaria.livejournal.com]

It's hard to define what a lie is when the definition of truth is equally nebulous. Some people think all truth is subjective, some think all truth is objective and everything not objective is a matter of opinion or taste. There's also the question of whether a valid conclusion derived from invalid logic can be considered truth or not.

It's a deep philosophical question, no easy answer available as far as I can tell.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

I would go with your dictionaries, frankly. Attempts to change the meanings of "truth" and "lie" in recent times do not impress me much, and the rendering vague of previously understood definitions makes conversation difficult.

A lie is deliberate, it seems to me. A simply lie is asserting something when you believe the opposite to be true.

A more complex lie is intentionally causing the other person to believe something falsely, even if you did not say it. That one often lets people skate away from it. This is often called a more "artful" way to lie.

Perhaps the best version of it is to state the truth in such a way that a person believes the opposite, taking cues from your behavior (and his own) instead of the actual statements. That is the most artful of all, perhaps; it allows an "I told you so!"

===|==============/ Level Head

"Lies"

[akktri.livejournal.com]

The way things are going these days, I'm surprised that it hasn't changed to "the bible".