Why There Are No BaldFaced Lies

1
Why There Are No Bald-Faced Lies

• J. E. Mahon
• Washington and Lee University

2
Lie vs. Deceive

• Deceive is a success verb
• Lie is not a success verb
• To lie is not to deceive
• Question Is to lie to attempt to deceive?

3
Dictionary Definitons

• n a false statement made with the intention to
  deceive vi to make a false statement with the
  intention to deceive (Chambers Dictionary)
•  
• (intr) to speak untruthfully with intent to
  mislead or deceive n an untrue or deceptive
  statement deliberately used to mislead
  (Times English Dictionary)
•  
• n. a false statement made with deliberate intent
  to deceive v.i. to speak falsely or utter
  untruth knowingly, as with intent to deceive
  (Random House Dictionary)
•  
• v to say something which is not true in order to
  deceive (Cambridge International Dictionary of
  English)
•  
• n. an intentionally false statement used
  with reference to a situation involving deception
  or founded on a mistaken impression (Oxford
  American Dictionary)
•  
• To utter falsehood with an intention to deceive,
  or with an immoral design (American Dictionary)
•  
• a false statement made with intent to deceive
  (Oxford English Dictionary)
•  
• n. A false statement deliberately presented as
  being true a falsehood Something meant to
  deceive or give the wrong impression. To
  present false information with the intention of
  deceiving. (American Heritage Dictionary)
•  

4
American Heritage Dictionary

• The American Heritage Dictionary defines
  bald-faced lie as an undisguised lie. If lying
  requires an intention to deceive, then lies must
  be disguised. If lying requires an intent to
  deceive, then lies must be disguised. Thus
  the first mystery about bald-faced lies is
  semantic Why isnt bald-faced lie a
  contradiction in terms? Why, instead, is the
  bald-faced lie the most obvious kind of lie?
• - Sorensen, Bald-Faced Lies! Lying Without the
  Intent to Deceive, Pacific Philosophical
  Quarterly 88 (2007) 252

5
Problems with Dictionary appeal

• If a bald-faced lie means lie without intention
  to deceive, then it contradicts Dictionarys own
  definition of lie
• Dictionary defines bold-faced as Imprudent
  brazen, and gives as example a bold-faced lie
• a bold-faced lie is not one without intention
  to deceive
• Is there any difference between a bald-faced
  lie and a bold-faced lie?

6
Iraqi doctor example

• How many soldiers have you admitted today? I
  ask a doctor.
• There are no soldiers here, the doctor says.
• But they are wearing uniforms?
• I see no uniforms, he says, and pushes me out.
  You must go now, do you hear?
• Seierstad, A Hundred and One Days A Baghdad
  Journal, trans. Ingrid Christophersen. (NY Basic
  Books, 2003) 262

7
Anton Rubinstein example

• Once when the pianist Anton Rubinstein was
  practicing, the telephone rang inconveniently.
  His servant François picked up the phone and
  reported to the female caller that the maestro
  was not home. She objected But I hear him
  playing. You are mistaken, Madame insisted
  François I am dusting the piano keys. (253)

8
Isenberg on euphemisms

• For example, the words She is not at home,
  delivered by a servant or relative at the door,
  have become a mere euphemism for indisposition or
  disinclination. Since the author of the message
  knows that the recipient will interpret it as a
  polite way of saying, It is inconvenient for me
  to see you now, there is no intention of making
  him believe something that she (the author) does
  not believe a polite lie is often no lie at
  all.
• Arnold Isenberg, Deontology and the ethics of
  lying, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research
  24 (1964) 473.

9
Cargiles Chicken Thief

• One morning, a young man is leaving his
  father-in-laws chicken coop carrying two hens
  whose necks he has just wrung. He has been
  stealing from his father-in-laws coop for
  several months. This morning his father-in-law is
  waiting outside with a shot gun. There is an
  embarrassed silence, and then the young fellow
  says, I was checking to see how things were in
  the coop and I found these two hens, theyre
  still warm. My coming by must have frightened the
  thief away.
• Since it is 5 a.m. and the son-in-law lives two
  miles away, the old man sees through the story.
  He knows his son-in-law is a chicken thief. But
  does the young man know that he has been found
  out? Well yes, he knows his father-in-law is too
  smart to fall for his shaky story. But the old
  man, for the sake of family unity, is going to
  pretend not to know. And the son-in-law is able
  to recognize this. But does the old man know that
  his son-in-law realizes that he has seen through
  his story? Yes, he can tell from the young mans
  manner. And does the son-in-law see that his
  father-in-law not only sees through his alibi but
  also sees that the son-in-law is going to try to
  face it out even though he has been caught?
  Again yes.
• James Cargile, A Note On Iterated Knowings,
  Analysis 30 (1970) 154.

10
Lying to each other?

• I was checking to see how things were in the
  coop and I found these two hens, theyre still
  warm. My coming by must have frightened the thief
  away.
• Im glad you frightened him away. He probably
  wont be back here again.

11
Lying to oneself Russell (?)

• I hated the stuffiness involved in supposing
  that space and time were only in my mind, I liked
  the starry heavens even better than the moral
  law, and could not bear Kants view that the one
  I liked best was only a subjective figment. In
  the first exuberance of liberation, I became a
  naïve realist, and rejoiced in the thought that
  grass is really green, in spite of the adverse
  opinions of all philosophers from Locke onwards.
• Bertrand Russell, My Philosophical Development
  (London Allen Unwin, 1959) 61-2.

12
Lies to oneself Haidar (?)

• So when I was seventeen we understood that we
  were not free, that we lived in danger. I learned
  how to behave like a good Iraqi in other words,
  to lie. Always and everywhere, I have been a liar
  ever since. The tyrant has gone and I need lie
  no longer. But for thirty years I have lived
  under the skin of a liar. Now I must free
  myself.
• Seierstad (2003 306) date wrong in text

13
Kenyons Cynical Assertions

• Example 1 An elected official says at a press
  conference, Our policies have improved the
  quality of life for all citizens.
• Example 2 A corporate accountant addressing a
  public inquiry says, I had no knowledge of
  fiscal improprieties within our company.
• Tim Kenyon, Cynical Assertion Convention,
  Pragmatics, and Saying Uncle, American
  Philosophical Quarterly 40 (2003) 242.

14
A lie?

• Let us imagine that there is some company in
  desperate straits that cannot be bailed out by
  the government if it transpires that the
  accountants in the company carried out any fiscal
  improprieties. Imagine that everyone all
  parties involved and the general public knows
  that the accountants in the company did indeed
  carry out fiscal improprieties. However, imagine
  that everyone wants this company to be bailed out
  by the government in spite of this. Imagine that
  the only way to do this is for the accountants to
  make untruthful statements like I had no
  knowledge of fiscal improprieties within our
  company before a public inquiry, without any
  intention to be believed, and for the people
  conducting the inquiry, and the rest of the
  public, to simply say nothing. Kenyon does say
  that Such speakers are really just going
  through the motions.
• Kenyon (2003) 242.

15
Carsons murder witness

• Suppose that I witness a crime and clearly see
  that a particular individual committed the crime.
  Later, the same person is accused of the crime
  and, as a witness in court, I am asked whether or
  not I saw the defendant commit the crime. I make
  the false statement that I did not see the
  defendant commit the crime, for fear of being
  harmed or killed by him. It does not necessarily
  follow that I intend that my false statements
  deceive anyone. (I might hope that no one
  believes my testimony and that he is convicted in
  spite of it.) I do not intend to deceive the
  jury in this case, but it seems clear that my
  false testimony would constitute a lie.
• Thomas L. Carson, The Definition of Lying, Noûs
  40 (2006) 289.

16
Carsons cheating student

• a college Dean has a firm, but unofficial,
  policy of never upholding a professors charge
  that a student cheated on an exam unless the
  student confesses in writing to having cheated.
  The Dean is very cynical about this and believes
  that students are guilty whenever they are
  charged. A student is caught in the act of
  cheating on an exam by copying from a crib sheet.
  The professor fails the student for the course
  and the student appeals the professors decision
  to the Dean who has the ultimate authority to
  assign the grade. The student is privy to
  information about the Deans de facto policy and,
  when called before the Dean, he (the student)
  affirms that he didnt cheat on the exam. He
  claims that he was not copying from the copy
  sheet. He claims that he inadvertently forgot to
  put his review sheet away when the exam began
  and that he never looked at it during the exam.
  The student says this on the record in an
  official proceeding and thereby warrants the
  truth of the statements he knows to be false. He
  intends to avoid punishment by doing this. He may
  have no intention of deceiving the Dean that he
  didnt cheat.
• Carson (2006) 290.

17
Sorensens definition

• Sorensen defines lying as follows
• Lying is just asserting what one does not
  believe. (256)
• This definition stands in need of a definition of
  assertion.

18
Chisholm and Feehan

• L lies to D df.There is a proposition p such
  that (i) either L believes that p is not true or
  L believes that p is false and (ii) L asserts p
  to D.
•  
• The definition of assertion that Chisholm and
  Feehan provide is as follows
•  
• L asserts p to D df.L states p to D and does
  so under conditions which, he believes, justify D
  in believing that he, L, not only accepts p, but
  also intends to contribute causally to Ds
  believing that he, L, accepts p.
• Roderick M. Chisholm and Thomas D. Feehan, The
  Intent to Deceive, Journal of Philosophy, 74
  (1977) 152.

19
Charles Fried

• A person lies when he asserts a proposition he
  believes to be false.
• to assert X is to utter X in a context such that
  the utterance is intended to cause belief
• To make an assertion is to give an assurance
  that the statement is true.
• Charles Fried, Right and Wrong (Cambridge, Mass.
  Harvard University Press, 1978) 55-7.

20
Sorensen on assertion

• All assertions must at least have narrow
  plausibility, because we need to figure out what
  the speaker means. What would it be like for the
  assertor to be speaking from knowledge? Once we
  have the meaning of the assertion in the
  foreground, we can test it against our background
  knowledge and against future evidence.
• To qualify as an assertion, a lie must have
  narrow plausibility. Thus, someone who only had
  access to the assertion might believe it. This is
  the grain of truth behind Lying requires the
  intention to deceive. Bald-faced lies show that
  assertions do not need to meet a requirement of
  wide plausibility, that is, credibility relative
  to ones total evidence. (255)

21
Assertive force?

• Much of what we say does not constitute
  assertion. We signal lack of assertive force by
  clear falsity (as with metaphor) or by
  implausibility. When there is doubt about whether
  we are asserting, we can clarify the
  illocutionary force of the remark I am not
  kidding, I was describing the consequences, not
  threatening, and by adopting a straight face and
  sober tone to evince sincerity.
• Bald-faced liars will clarify the assertive
  status of their remarks. There will be no nod
  or wink to show that this is a game. Only
  assertion will do the trick. (256)

22
Williams on assertion

• A utters a sentence S, where S means that P,
  in doing which either he expresses his belief
  that P, or he intends the person addressed to
  take it that he believes that P.
•  
• Bernard Williams, Truth and Truthfulness An
  Essay in Genealogy (Princeton, NJ Princeton
  University Press, 2002) 96.

23
statement vs. assertion

• Lie df.conscious expression of other than what
  we believe.
• Warren Shibles, Lying A Critical Analysis
  (Whitewater, WI The Language Press, 1985) 33.
• Shibless definition allows for lying to
  absolutely no one.
• Can I make an assertion, according to Sorensens
  account of assertion, to no one (not even to
  myself)?
• If so, then I may lie to no one (not even
  oneself). However, surely one may not lie to no
  one (not even oneself).
• If not, then why not? What does it mean to make
  an assertion to a person, as opposed to (merely)
  making a statement to a person?