So let's just stick with unenlightened's notion of commitment. — Moliere
I am fine with your notion of lying. So lying, rather than merely being mistaken, is when you deliberately misrepresent your own belief to yourself. Merely being mistaken is holding a false belief. Since falsity isn't in the notion of lying the two don't even have to relate. — Moliere
We may deliberately misrepresent some true or false belief to ourselves, just depending upon what we believe.
By removing truth, in fact, there is a lot more wiggle room here -- the beliefs need not even have a factual component (EDIT: Or even be truth-apt). They merely need to be misrepresented to ourselves.
I am committed to some belief. I come to believe something that is in conflict with this other belief. Here I can be honest with myself, realize that these two beliefs are not compatible, and try and think through that conflict and resolve it in some way. Or I can be dishonest with myself, act out of fear, and tell myself that the beliefs are not in conflict. — Moliere
However I might accomplish this -- it seems that this dishonesty is really what lying to yourself is all about. You aren't coming to terms with a conflict in beliefs, but rather accepting both beliefs in spite of having the niggling realization that they are in conflict. So you misrepresent your beliefs -- or meta-beliefs? -- by saying they can get along fine. Your commitment and your new belief that said commitment is somehow erroneous (not necessarily false) and your belief that they are not in conflict are all somehow simultaneously preserved. It seems a mental feat which would result in conflict of the self, and indeed I'd say that this is the case -- which really only makes sense if different parts of the self can actually be in conflict, which is easily understood if the mind is divided.
One cannot be tricked into believing something if they know both how they're being tricked, and that they're being tricked.
One who is performing the trickery knows both how and that they're doing it.
One cannot know how and that one is tricking him/herself and not know how and that one is tricking oneself(how and that it's being done).
The same applies to deliberately misrepresenting one's own thought and belief to oneself. It's just plain common sense. It's not at all difficult to grasp. — creativesoul
If you know that they are in conflict, then you cannot believe that they are not. — creativesoul
The mind is divided. However, it is still one mind. It is divided in terms of having/holding conflicting beliefs. Your example is one of cognitive dissonance being ignored. Very common practice hereabouts and everywhere I've ever been. — creativesoul
Removing truth from the notion of thought and belief? Cannot be done. — creativesoul
So if we can have or hold conflicting beliefs -- ignore cognitive dissonance, as you put it -- then we can both know that two beliefs are in conflict, and believe they are not in conflict. Because both of those beliefs, too, are in conflict, yet we can hold conflicting beliefs, so.... what's the problem?
It goes against common sense. But here it seems you're admitting that common sense is wrong? — Moliere
I feel that's irritating.
"I feel that's irritating" is true. But is the feeling of irritation true? No. But it is a part of the mind. So if the entire mind is belief, then surely there are non-cognitive beliefs. — Moliere
But if we can be in self-contradiction, then we can also be in self-contradiction about our beliefs. So we might just ignore it, which is something like what I believe jkg20 is saying. But we can also form a further belief, a belief that the two are not in self-contradiction. So we can believe that "A and B do not contradict" as well as believe that "A and B do contradict" -- since we can believe contradictory things. — Moliere
Which is an example of conforming to an image. Is it impossible to convince oneself that one likes football, or gurls, or shaving, or fighting, because one more desperately wants to conform than to be 'true to oneself'? Surely, it happens all the time? — unenlightened
Because you can intentionally tell yourself a lie, and then become unaware of said action. I'd say I agree with unenlightened's examples above -- we can have an image we want to conform to, realize we are not like the image, and then tell ourselves "But really, deep down inside, I am like that image" and then have our awareness flip such that we are no longer aware that we intentionally deceived ourselves. — Moliere
Being wrong is not equivalent to lying. Being wrong about oneself is not equivalent to lying to oneself.
The notion of 'self'-deception is nonsense. I've already adequately argued for that without subsequent valid criticism. — creativesoul
we can have an image we want to conform to, realize we are not like the image, and then tell ourselves "But really, deep down inside, I am like that image" and then have our awareness flip such that we are no longer aware that we intentionally deceived ourselves. — Moliere
I'm confident that neither 'self-deception' nor 'lying to oneself' is the best way to describe these situations though. I mentioned one earlier... the homosexual. We all adopt our initial worldview, and that includes much, if not most, of our own original 'self' image.
Here we see the inherent problem with the notion of self. I'm certain we all agree here. The self is largely delineated by others. — creativesoul
I don't think it works quite like that, in most cases. One needs a bit of psychology here.There is 'what I am', and there is 'what I think I am' (my self image), and the latter is an aspect of the former. But inevitably, I think that what I am is what I think I am. So self- preservation becomes a matter of preserving the image. — unenlightened
Suppose I look at myself from a position of ignorance. It comes naturally, from this realisation that I am not who I think I am. Then I see there is the self-image I have, but I give it less importance, because it is incomplete at best. So I am ready to discover myself anew. Perhaps, after all I am not the wise philosopher I think I am; perhaps I am not the nice balanced social being I think I am. I will find out as I go - I will learn about myself in my relationship to the world, but it will always be learning, never knowing. This is too frightening for me as long as I still think I am what I think I am, and it seems that to change my image is to die.
it is exciting to change the image in the face of new information, rather than a death-threat. — Moliere
https://www.jkrishnamurti.org/content/‘learning’/learning%20without%20accumulationLearning through experience is one thing – it is the accumulation of conditioning – and learning all the time, not only about objective things but also about oneself, is something quite different. There is the accumulation which brings about conditioning – this we know – and there is the learning which we speak about. This learning is observation – to observe without accumulation, to observe in freedom. This observation is not directed from the past. Let us keep those two things clear. — J.Krishnamurti
On the one hand one discovers oneself in relationship, one is learning, and on the other, one is told what one is and what one must be. One must be good because one is naughty. And Santa will know which you are. Most people are naughty and being good, taught to live a lie in negation of the lie they have been taught. — unenlightened
Would you say that "what I am" is itself a deception, that there is only what I think I am, and what others think I am? There really is no self, only an image. If not, then what supports the assumption that there is such a thing as what I am? Is it necessary to assume a "what I am", in order to produce a divided self, to expose the possibility of self-deception, which is really an attribute of the one undivided "what I think I am? — Metaphysician Undercover
'What I am' is writing a response - this one - (dasein?). This is real enough, I don't have to assume anything. And then you want a response that explains and justifies the writer in some way, and that is the image I am conveying in the writing that is not the writer, but an image of him. I don't see why you want to problematise this? — unenlightened
How do I get to the point where I can produce consistency between what I want to do, and what I ought to do, such that what I am is the same as what I ought to be, because I would be doing what I ought to be doing? — Metaphysician Undercover
You'll have to ask Jesus about that one, dude. — unenlightened
Your argument appears to be:
1: Self-deception only makes sense if it makes sense for one person A to act deceitfully towards a person B, where A and B are the same person.
2: It does not make sense for one person A to act deceitfully towards person B, where A and B are the same person.
3: Therefore, modus tollens, self-deception does not make sense.
To support (2), the model of A being deceitful towards B regarding some proposition P, goes along the following lines
a) A knowingly believes that not-P.
b) B's own interests are best served by knowingly believing that not-P.
c) A knowingly believes that his (A's) intentions/wishes are best served by having B knowingly believe that P.
c) A acts intentionally in order that B should knowingly believe that P.
So we end up, if the deceitful behaviour is successful, with A knowingly believing that not-P and B knowingly believing that P at one and the same time. This is not possible where A and B are one and the same person.
(Note that we are talking about A being deceitful to B, not A merely deceiving B.)
That seems right, and so (2) is a true premise.
But this leaves conditional (1) undefended and Srap Tasmaner and I have been suggesting that self-deception should not be modelled on one person being deceitful to another. That part of the argument you have not yet established. As far as I recall, it came down to intuitions about what you/I/Srap would or would not call cases of self-deception. — jkg20
Attempting to find out what would be a bit more congenial to your taste's creativesoul --
I think awareness through time is doing most of the work in making the concept of lying to oneself coherent, for me. Just as I can flip my awareness in a moment from the thoughts I am having to my fingers, to my memories, to my feelings it seems to me that a flip in awareness could happen from two halves of myself. So where I do agree with you is that the part of myself that is lying could not misrepresent their own thoughts and trick themselves -- there is a need for some kind of a division for trickery to be successful on this model, because you have to be aware of the trick if you're setting out to trick someone. Like a three card monte player knows how to replace a card without someone observing, they couldn't do so to themselves.
So I'm tracking with you on that. For me the flip in awareness is what's important -- so at one point we are aware of the trick, and at the other point we are not. For something like three card monte, where we have concrete points of reference in our literal hands this would be pretty extreme, though maybe possible. But for something a bit more abstract, like knowledge of myself, it doesn't seem so extreme to me because we aren't perfectly transparent to ourselves.
Since we aren't perfectly transparent to ourselves it actually becomes rather easy to lie to ourselves because the trick lies in what is actually a very plausible belief: "I am not transparent to myself" -- so if I come across something that I'd term inconvenient for myself, all I need do is remind myself that I am not transparent to myself and suddenly what was inconvenient becomes questionable.
That's why it makes sense for me, at least. Where in this line of reasoning does something just balk as unnacceptable to you? My guess is you'd just say this is not lying. But if I both believe P and ~P -- because I did, after all, come across something inconvenient -- then that seems to fit perfectly with the notion of lying, or tricking myself. In fact it seems like in order for me to intentional trick myself I would have to believe both, since to be intentional about the lie I'd have to believe P and want myself to believe ~P, then convince myself of ~P -- without changing the original belief.
Whereas to be mistaken would just be to believe something that is false, or to believe something that is true but for bad reasons. — Moliere
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