The Ethics of the Lie

Lying is a common social manifestation that is fraught with contradictions: we lie quite frequently, but we hate liars, and we detest above all being lied to. We know that most politicians lie (hoping they lie reasonably, as it were) but when they are caught in the act, their careers are ruined. The common root of these phenomena goes back to the paradigmatic figure of the paradox: I am lying but I tell the truth when I say that I am lying. In "The Ethics of the Lie" Jean-Michel Rabaté examines the web of lies spun by the media, turns the microscope on the U.S. presidency, explores the dynamics of family lies, and even analyzes Hollywood's role in reenacting these dilemmas. Do we live in an age when the disinformation has reached such a fevered pitch that we can dismiss everything presented as "fact" or "news"? In questioning this widespread skepticism, Rabaté deconstructs the pathology of lies and their logical mechanisms, leading us back to the continuing debates of the great philosophers - Plato, Nietzsche, and Aristotle - and their philosophical foundations.