Bald-faced lies as acts of verbal aggression

Abstract

Several philosophy of language scholars have recently argued that the intention to deceive is not part of a well-defined concept of lying. So-called bald-faced lies, i.e., asserting what is false while speaker and hearer both understand that the speaker does not believe what s/he asserts are provided as evidence. In contrast to these proposals, it is pointed out in this article that lying is necessarily connected to an intention to deceive. Consequently, it is argued that so-called bald-faced lies are not proper lies but acts of verbal aggression. Since bald-faced lies attack the face of the addressee and the viability of the Cooperative Principle (Grice 1989a), they are analyzed as insults. Thus, the traditional idea that lying is connected to the intention to deceive is upheld.

The landscape of impoliteness research

“…white lies). In this vein, Meibauer (2014b) considers the topic of bald-faced lies, which are sometimes considered neither lies nor deception, in a technical sense (Dynel 2011b;Meibauer 2014a), but which may be viewed as acts of overt aggression.…”

Can You Lie Without Intending to Deceive?

“…According to the traditional account of lying, L T , I lie to you if and only if I assert what I believe is false and I intend to deceive you (e.g. Augustine 395; Sartre ; Davidson , ; Derrida ; Williams ; Faulkner , ; Meibauer , , , , ; Keiser ). According to L T , I lie to you if and only if I assert what I believe is false and I intend to thereby deceive you.…”

“…Faulkner (, ) and Meibauer () are proponents of this explanation while Mahon () and Meibauer (, p. 110) argue that this is an implication of Carson's (, ) account of lying.…”

Konzepte des Lügens

“…§ 4 behandelt sogenannte bald-faced lies (Sorensen 2007), die meines Erachtens keinen Fall von Lügen darstellen. Vielmehr handelt es sich um einen speziellen Fall der Beleidigung (Meibauer 2014b). In § 5 stelle ich kurz absichtlich falsches Implikatieren vor, bevor ich in § 6 argumentiere, dass Fälle von Irreführen (misleading), die bei Saul (2012) diskutiert werden, entweder auch falsches Implikatieren oder Missverständnisse sind.…”

“…Furthermore, at least some cases of misleading in the sense of Saul (2012) may be analysed as cases of untruthful implicatures. The latter are considered as a part of the total act of lying (see Meibauer 2005, Meibauer 2011, Meibauer 2014a, Meibauer 2014b, and Meibauer 2014c. In the course of this paper further acts such as so-called bald-faced lies, selfless assertions, and bullshitting are discussed and related to the overall topic of lying.…”