Self-study
Passage A.
P1
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Augustine's view ·
Don't lie to liars
Author's concession ·
Some truth behind Augustine's view
P2
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General opinion ·
Many think lying to liars feels fair
People think that liars forfeit right to be told the truth.
P3
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Two moral questions ·
(1) Does liar have right to be told truth? (2) Are we more justified in lying to a liar?
P4
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Author's view ·
Liar forfeits right to truth, but we shouldn't automatically lie to him
We need to consider potential harm to ourselves and society when considering whether to lie to him.
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P5
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View derived from Kant ·
Acting toward someone as they have acted toward others treats that person as a rational being
P6
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Potential implication ·
Some might think we have a duty to act toward someone as they have acted to others
Author's view ·
Not a duty; but we're authorized to act toward someone as they have acted toward others
If a rational person does something to another person, he authorizes others to do the same to him.
Passage Style
20.
Which one of the following, ██ █████ █████ ████ ████ ██ ████ ███ ██████████ ██ ███████ █ ████ █ ████████ ████████████ ██████ ████ █████ █████ ███ ██████████ ██████████ ██████ ██ ███ ██ ███
a
Responding to pathological ████████ ████ ████████████ ████████ ██ ███████████
The rule in passage B is that if a rational being acts immorally, it’s acceptable to repay that immoral act in kind. So the rule hinges on whether or not the original act was rational or not. It doesn’t matter whether the payback behavior is rational. (A) would be correct if it simply said that pathological behavior is irrational. That’s what (B) says.
b
Rationality cannot be ██████████ ██████████ ██ ████████████ █████████
The rule in passage B is that if a rational being acts immorally, it’s acceptable to repay that immoral act in kind. So the rule hinges on whether the act stems from a rational source. (B) says that for pathological behavior, we don’t have a rational source. This means that in the case of a pathological liar, the rule doesn’t apply. So there’s no contradiction between this rule and the scenario in passage A. They’re compatible.
c
Pathological liars, if █████████ ███████ ██ ██ ███████ ██ ████████ ██████ ██ ███████
This makes the rule in passage B and the suggestion in passage A less compatible. The rule in passage B is that if a rational being acts immorally, it’s acceptable to repay that immoral act in kind. So the rule hinges on whether the act stems from a rational source. (C) says pathological liars should be treated as rational, meaning the rule applies to the scenario in passage A. But this means it should be acceptable to repay pathological liars with lies, which contradicts author A’s suggestion that just because a pathological liar lies, that doesn’t make it acceptable to lie back to him.
d
Having the right ██ ███ ██ █ ████████████ ████ ██ ███ ██████████ ██ ██████ █ ████ ██ ██ ███
The rule in passage B is that if a rational being acts immorally, we have the right to repay that immoral act in kind. Adding in (D) just means that if a rational being acts immorally, we have may or may not have a duty to repay that immoral act in kind (because a right isn’t equivalent to a duty). This doesn’t bring us any closer making the rule compatible with the suggestion in passage A (the suggestion being that just because a pathological liar lies, that doesn’t make it acceptable to lie back to him). As far as we know, given (D), the rule still gives us the right (if not the duty) to lie back to the pathological liar.
e
To model one's ████████ ██ ████ ██ █ ████████████ ████ ██ ██ █████ █████ ███ ██████████
The rule in passage B is that if a rational being acts immorally, it’s acceptable to repay that immoral act in kind. Adding in (E) just means that repaying that immoral act in kind will lower one’s standards. But the rule still tells us that doing so is acceptable. This doesn’t bring us any closer making the rule compatible with the suggestion in passage A (the suggestion being that just because a pathological liar lies, that doesn’t make it acceptable to lie back to him). As far as we know, given (E), the rule says it should still be acceptable (if low in standards) to lie back to the pathological liar.