Chapter 1
PROBLEMS WITH PROBLEMS
Can you force anyone to be honest? You can’t force everyone to be honest and it is difficult to persuade them; but we
can always avoid being dupes. Common
sense? A few words of warning: the
unfamiliar may accompany feelings of
skepticism but you may also recognize an elemental truth. The reader is invited to exercise skepticism
and that is even recommended as proof of what is written. Common sense is a poor guide, and if you
become uncomfortable, you would do well to analyze exactly what it is that
bothers you. The opposites that are
intended and experienced in assertions are not in fact contradictory, and the
reasons why are illustrated and explained.
Like the philosopher Bernard
Williams[i], we
believe in truth and honesty and we do so because credibility is our aim; but
perhaps unlike him, we do not expect to find it, not even professionally - even
though our profession is different from his.
Our stance is descriptive and reflective. In life, it is usually not possible to
explain to others the complexities of our arrangements or belief systems and we
expect others to suffer the same limitations as we do. We adapt to informants - as we must when
speaking to children, for example. More
generally, the recognition of a need sometimes to communicate ideas and
situations - at whatever level of complexity - in fact imposes moral
imperatives. Philosophers who need
credibility from critical audiences had better be right and honest if ridicule
is to be avoided; but for the wider perspectives of life, of knowledge, and of
religion, there is a complementary need for understanding what is being offered
in the form of assertions. If I want to
be believed here, I had better say it honestly; but I am also reflecting on the
limitations of this approach for the philosophical parts of normal man or woman
in the wider perspective.
We shall illustrate how, from the
Law of Universal Mendacity, propositional calculi are abstracted by a process
of closure. The abstraction of geometry
creates propositions that are simply true or simply false. Operating beyond this type of abstraction,
the Law of Universal Mendacity is not a physical law; but it results from the
way, in nature, we are informed about states of
affairs. Its model is not the
knowledge of geometrical theorems based on axioms, whether self-evident or
contrived; rather the opposite as will become evident.
The book attempts a state of mind
that will help in answering several questions experienced by thinking people of
our time. What can you believe? What is
a lie? Are white lies
reprehensible? Can honesty survive? Is cynicism the trait of the fittest? Is morality immature or out-of-date? These questions underlie our great trauma -
one that continues to subsume many of the best movie stories. How did the second world war occur? How were so many deceived? How did allegedly civilized people do such
barbaric things to each other? Has
anything changed? Because of space and
time constraints I offer only a constructive attitude; the next step is yours.
***
CHAPTER 2
THE LAW OF UNIVERSAL MENDACITY
Words contain real meanings that oppose their intended meanings. The Law reflects back on itself with a double
opposite: in opposing reality, words have
intended meanings. Rightly understood,
these assertions are not contradictory.
In the fact of assertion, an
intended meaning is one part of the whole.
Strictly, the Law applies to assertions and not to statements of
propositions[ii]. As we understand them, propositions are
either true or false; but there is always some truth in the opposite of an
assertion and often the context supplies a stronger and contrary truth than was
intended. When you read Universal
Mendacity, capitalized, we are referring to this Law.
Did you ask what is meant by
“intended”? Why did you ask? Your intention is your reason for speaking or
asserting.
You can review where we’re headed
by scanning the contents page. In a later chapter we’ll consider the paradigm
of knowledge, in science, and we’ll elaborate subsequently with further
examples and implications.
2.1 Nowhere are the contradictions inherent in assertions more
celebrated than in public life. When the
president says “We’ll get ‘em,” you note his
determination but ask, “When? Where? Can he? Ever? And the weapons of mass
destruction?” Many political promises,
perhaps even most, have been broken because they were too wishful - for
speakers and l