The problem with Yvain’s reply is that he omits the main reason why lying is a bad idea. Yvain compares lying to violence. I don’t think this is a good comparison. It’s acceptable to respond to violence with violence. It’s not a good idea to respond to lies with lies.
Eliezer touched on this issue in his post here where he pointed out that one problem with lying to support a cause is that you’d better be absolutely sure that all your beliefs about the cause and what to do for it are in fact correct. However, the problem is even worse, there is a vicious cycle here since a cause that frequently lies is much more likely to acquire incorrect beliefs.
Think about it this way: suppose you believe that your cause justifies lying, so you lie about it. Your lies attract people to your cause who believe those lies. They in turn make up further lies (that they think are justified based on the lies they believe to be true). And so no until your cause’s belief system is full of falsehoods and anti-epistomology. Your cause may ultimately “win” in the sense that it’s followers acquire power, but by that point said followers may no longer care about your original goal. Even if they do, they’re likely to have so many false beliefs that what they do to accomplish it is likely to be counter-productive and probably have other unpleasant side effects.
Note that the above argument applies to lying but not to violence. Thus in some sense lying for your cause is in fact worse than committing violence for it.
One implication of this is that we can develop heuristics for how bad different lies. The basic idea is that lies that likely to spread (especially if their effectiveness depends on them spreading) are particularly bad. Especially if they’re likely to spread within your movement (note lies used to increase support for your movement count here, since they’ll bring in new recruits who believe them).
Note: that using these heuristics we can see that the classic example used to justify lying: “There are no Jews in my basement” is in fact much less bad then Yvain’s example: “A man is more likely to be struck by lightning than be falsely accused of rape.”
First, I’m not sure what it means to say that “There are no Jews in my basement” is unlikely to spread. In a sense it’s a “pre-spread” lie, since the lack of Gestapo breaking down your doors implies that they are all already fairly confident of the falsehood; you’re just lying to decrease the probability that they’ll stop believing it.
Second, to add my own hypothetical: I can see an isomorphism (in terms of how the lie spreads) between “There are no Jews in my basement” and “There are no embezzled charity funds in my basement”. Obviously this isomorphism doesn’t extend to the morality of the lies, which makes it hard for me to see a connection between spreadability and immorality.
First, I’m not sure what it means to say that “There are no Jews in my basement” is unlikely to spread.
The Gestapo member is likely to have forgotten all about that specific lies by the time he finishes asking everyone on the block.
I can see an isomorphism (in terms of how the lie spreads) between “There are no Jews in my basement” and “There are no embezzled charity funds in my basement”. Obviously this isomorphism doesn’t extend to the morality of the lies, which makes it hard for me to see a connection between spreadability and immorality.
Disagree, the lies themselves are comparable, the difference in morality comes from the difference between the goals the lies are being used for.
The problem with Yvain’s reply is that he omits the main reason why lying is a bad idea. Yvain compares lying to violence. I don’t think this is a good comparison. It’s acceptable to respond to violence with violence. It’s not a good idea to respond to lies with lies.
Eliezer touched on this issue in his post here where he pointed out that one problem with lying to support a cause is that you’d better be absolutely sure that all your beliefs about the cause and what to do for it are in fact correct. However, the problem is even worse, there is a vicious cycle here since a cause that frequently lies is much more likely to acquire incorrect beliefs.
Think about it this way: suppose you believe that your cause justifies lying, so you lie about it. Your lies attract people to your cause who believe those lies. They in turn make up further lies (that they think are justified based on the lies they believe to be true). And so no until your cause’s belief system is full of falsehoods and anti-epistomology. Your cause may ultimately “win” in the sense that it’s followers acquire power, but by that point said followers may no longer care about your original goal. Even if they do, they’re likely to have so many false beliefs that what they do to accomplish it is likely to be counter-productive and probably have other unpleasant side effects.
Note that the above argument applies to lying but not to violence. Thus in some sense lying for your cause is in fact worse than committing violence for it.
A pithy way of summarizing the above comment:
If someone tells you his cause is so important that lying for it is justified, assume he’s lying.
This wins my personal “rationality quote of the decade” award.
One implication of this is that we can develop heuristics for how bad different lies. The basic idea is that lies that likely to spread (especially if their effectiveness depends on them spreading) are particularly bad. Especially if they’re likely to spread within your movement (note lies used to increase support for your movement count here, since they’ll bring in new recruits who believe them).
Note: that using these heuristics we can see that the classic example used to justify lying: “There are no Jews in my basement” is in fact much less bad then Yvain’s example: “A man is more likely to be struck by lightning than be falsely accused of rape.”
Would you elaborate?
First, I’m not sure what it means to say that “There are no Jews in my basement” is unlikely to spread. In a sense it’s a “pre-spread” lie, since the lack of Gestapo breaking down your doors implies that they are all already fairly confident of the falsehood; you’re just lying to decrease the probability that they’ll stop believing it.
Second, to add my own hypothetical: I can see an isomorphism (in terms of how the lie spreads) between “There are no Jews in my basement” and “There are no embezzled charity funds in my basement”. Obviously this isomorphism doesn’t extend to the morality of the lies, which makes it hard for me to see a connection between spreadability and immorality.
The Gestapo member is likely to have forgotten all about that specific lies by the time he finishes asking everyone on the block.
Disagree, the lies themselves are comparable, the difference in morality comes from the difference between the goals the lies are being used for.