A Twist on the Liar's Dilemma

6 points by charleshmorse 10 years ago | 3 comments

A Twist On The Liar's Dilemma

The liar's dilemma basically implies that a liar is not incentivized to reveal himself as liar. However, there is a twist to this which takes into the time of evaluation, t, of any proposition, x, that a liar would purport. Basically, as t increases a liar is further incentivised to lie. In fact t approaching infinity could be considered a non-sequitur. So if there exists the potential to introduce non-sequiturs, your statement can not be evaluated, and therefore you have a continuing incentive to lie and any cumulative lies thereafter have no impedance to their creation. One non-sequitur based lie provokes another, provokes another, ad infinitum (reflect on thoughts of religion or many political stances). *This is actually represented in first order logic simply as False->False = True.

What a large t also does, is give a liar the ability to evaluate the value of proposition x given to another person and change p(x) - where p(x) is the probability of actually changing the value of x from false to true before evaluation is performed by the other person. In other words, actually doing what you said you would do in proposition x. This is an immense power. For you can actually decide the value of your next move based on the a response to proposition x from the other person without having to actually do x. Also, the value of x that is found (if past the 'doability' threshold) can actually dictate the level of quality (and therefore the amount of time required) in which you perform the acts to turn x from false to true.

This is the basis for selling a product before it's built to evaluate the market demand, 'alias' writing, and many other such things which require value evaluation prior to execution or attribution. So consider this fact the next time you are thinking of lying. If t is considerably small, then don't do it. However if t is fairly large, lie like a rug and use the results to your advantage.

insoluble 10 years ago |

> lie like a rug and use the results to your advantage

I have seen and witnessed this proposition in many areas of society. In my opinion, this stance is based on the idea that a given person's lifetime is all that matters. It has completely no concern for the future of humanity or the sustainability of the greater system.

You may not be discovered on your deceptions now, but the effects of them have lasting detriments. And sometimes those lies may come back to bite your children, your nation, your race, your species, or even your planet in the long run. In the social sense, you are a representative of any group in which you affiliate. In the flesh sense, you are a representative of your genes. In the practical sense, you affect the world around you.

charleshmorse 10 years ago | |

Good points, and I am not advocating sweeping lies in every instance. There's also the assumption that lies always take on a negative form, there are many positive forms of lies. The most obvious example being white lies in conversation to not insult people, when the truth can only be interpreted as insulting (the 'Do I Look Fat In This?' Dilemma).

And then there is also the consideration of the lies lifespan. If the effect of a lie is momentary, its residual effects could only last mere moments, instead of continuously into perpetuity (the ripples of water from a rock thrown into a pond only last for so long). It's chain of causality could die-off - now continuous lying is another matter all together.

My points in this blurb merely show that a rational economic member of society should use lies in some cases; for it is a best response in many common instances - but of course not all and, if avoidable, not for the wrong reasons.

insoluble 10 years ago | | |

I certainly understand your point about certain things having insignificant effects. Positive actions too can be insignificant. There is a certain noise level which makes the little things inaudible. On another note, everything a person does, bad or good, should be understood in terms of magnitude. For this reason, the use of derogatory labels over categorical actions can be very harmful to society.

A fair part of what you are referring to seems to be a cultural thing. From what I have heard, in places like the UK and Japan, white lies are often considered polite. But in places like Germany, white lies may be considered rude and inconsiderate. The "Does this make me look fat?" is a curious classic example of a white lie solicitation. Perhaps it's something of a game with an understood message of "Do you love me enough to tell me what I want to hear?". It could also be rephrased as "I'm feeling hungry. Would you kindly feed my ego?".

Back in the day I knew a compulsive liar who for each new person he would meet would make up a new and elaborate backstory of himself and his friends. The majority of what he would lie about could be considered white lies since they were primarily for showing off or for entertaining. The harm may be small, but it nevertheless does exist: A person's worldview and understanding of reality is based in part on the stories he or she comes across. By being exposed to false tales, his victims were being given a false account of reality, which is almost guaranteed not to help them in the long run. They were investing time into learning a lie.

A similar phenomenon which occurs in the tech world is when someone who happened upon lucky fame goes on to tell everyone else how to make it big quickly -- but happens to leave out the details of the 10 failed startups and any uncertainty in the current undertaking. This gives people a false account of reality, which is sure to lead more people down bad paths than good ones.

Another case, which has been scarily common is when someone who was supposedly diagnosed with cancer or something tries some random remedy, sees a remission six months later and goes on to write a bunch of blog posts or even a book about this miracle cure -- but then you never hear from the person again. Hmm, one has to wonder, did the cancer really go away like this person told everyone? Or did the person speak too soon, and now out of shame avoids telling everyone that the advice was unfounded after all. I would like to believe that the harm here is obvious.

The three examples above have two things in common: They all involve a person trying to gain more popularity and self esteem; and they all involve implicitly giving others bad advice about life and reality. Hence, the liar gains while the greater society suffers.

BTW: I appreciate that you have brought up this overall topic. On many sites it is very difficult to find worthwhile discourse on important social topics.