by Morgan Philpott

Created on: July 06, 2008

Imagine a world that is blissfully free of Nazis inquiring after our Jewish neighbours, where no one commits the painful indecency of petitioning another's "honest opinion" of a dress or poem; in such a place the truth is unquestionably safe and holds no fear for the righteous. There the categorical imperative of truth-telling is neatly unexceptionable and this discussion need go no further.

Of course, since reality is necessarily messy and complicated, applied ethics requires the anticipation of situations where cherished principles conflict and difficult decisions must be made. I choose to begin by establishing a hierarchy of sorts, in which I give precedence to those things that commend themselves to my reason as superior values. In simple terms, this comes to something like to the following:

For the first, I consider the Other, namely his life, property, knowledge of the truth, and spiritual security (in that order). Where there is indecision as to the beneficiary (i.e., between my killing a murderer or passively allowing an innocent person to die), I would favour the individual who has done nothing - as far as my knowledge extends - to forfeit his right to live.

I generally place a person's well-being on a higher tier than my own virtue; consequently, I am willing to kill and deceive so long as my own profit or protection is not the primary motivation. In my mind, I incur more moral fault by allowing preventable evil to happen, than by staunchly clinging to the rulebook that would bid me do nothing. Though its precepts are undeniable sound, it is their spirit and not their letter that I choose as my guide.

An issue that becomes problematic in a discussion of positive ethics is that the negative commandments are so heavily weighted that one forgets the potential evil of passivity. (Man's inhumanity to man is more often his apathy and ignorance than his active cruelty - the silence of a thousand is the allowance of one tyrant.) While I believe that "Do no harm" ought to top the list, "Do good" must follow close behind - together, these jointly contain and reinforce the second-order principles of justice, honesty, generosity and gratitude.

To return at last to the subject of cruel or inconvenient honesty, I will say that I have little patience with a degree of sensitivity that indirectly begs me to lie on a trivial issue. I have assumed an obligation to do no harm, and furthermore to do good (so long as it is in my power). I am so placed that honesty is likely to cause a degree of emotional or social hurt and lying to supply a questionable benefit. Now, a sensible individual refrains from entering into this situation (passivity is sometimes the best option). If asked directly on a subject where frankness would necessarily hurt, I cannot go so far as to give utterly false flattery (besides, given that I lie very badly, it would sound entirely unnatural), but I will soften or redirect my answer for kindness' sake (claim incapacity to judge - which is often the case with me, make a truthful and pleasantly irrelevant reply, or feign death and thus avoid social friction).

Would that I lived in the ideal world, where constructive honesty is received as gladly as flattery is in this!

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