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From Dr. Peter Kreeft:
Readers of the Gospels do the very same thing when they meet the
Pharisees, who could put up strong arguments for a literalism and
legalism about the Sabbath and against Jesus' apparent disregard for it.
I think we should have the same reaction to the critics of Live Action.
These people are of course far, far better people than either Euthyphro
or most of the Pharisees. (But remember Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea,
and Gamaliel!). But they are wrong, and wrong not just logically but
"you gotta be kidding"ly.
Most of my students, however confused their abstract philosophical
and ideological principles may be, are ordinary people of normally sane
and fairly healthy consciences (except, of course if it has anything
even remotely to do with sex). When they are confronted by a moral
legalist like Kant who holds that all lying is morally wrong, they
instinctively sense that he is wrong, though they cannot explain why –
just as most students, when confronted by St. Anselm's 'ontological
argument,' instinctively know it is wrong somehow, though they cannot
refute it logically. Similarly, most (though not all) pro-lifers
instinctively side with Live Action even if they cannot answer the
arguments of its critics. (Is it an accident that its critics are more
Kantian than Aristotelian?)
Similarly, when we discuss Kant and the issue of lying, most of my
students, even the moral absolutists, are quite certain that the
Dutchmen were not wrong to deliberately deceive the Nazis about the
locations of the Jews they had promised to hide. They do not know
whether this is an example of lying or not. But they know that if it is,
than lying is not always wrong, and if lying is always wrong, then this
is not lying. Because they know, without any ifs or ands or buts, that
such Dutch deception is good, not evil. If anyone is more certain of his
philosophical principles than he is that this deception is good, I say
he is not functioning as a human being but as a computer, an angel, a
Gnostic, or a Kantian. He is a Laputan, like Swift's absent-minded
professors who live on an island in the sky in Gulliver's Travels, and
who make eye contact with abstractions but not with human beings.
But can't we solve the problem of the Dutchmen and the Nazis by
saying that all lying is wrong but the Dutchmen don't have to lie to
save the Jews because they could deceive the Nazis without lying by a
clever verbal ploy? No, because effective deception by clever verbal
ploys cannot usually be done by ordinary people, especially by clumsy
Dutchmen. I know; I'm one of them. Our moral obligations depend on
abilities that are common, not abilities that are rare.
Besides, the Nazis are not fools. They would suspect clever
prevarications and sniff out duplicitous ploys. They could be reliably
deceived and deterred from searching every inch of the house only by an
answer like "Jews? Those rats? None of them in my house, I hope. Please
come in, and if you find any, please give them rat poison. I hate those
vermin as much as you do."
You promised the Jews to hide them from their murderers. To keep that
promise, you have to deceive the Nazis. Physical hiding and verbal
hiding are two sides of the same coin, whether you call it lying, or
deception, or whatever you call it. What it is, is much more obvious
than what it is to be called. It's a good thing to do. If you don't know
that, you're morally stupid, and moral stupidity comes in two opposite
forms: relativism and legalism. Relativism sees no principles, only
people; legalism sees no people, only principles.
The closest analogy I can think of to Live Action's expose of
Planned Parenthood is spying. If Live Action is wrong, then so is all
spying, including spying out the Nazis' atomic bomb projects and saving
the world from a nuclear holocaust.
If you say that morality changes in wartime, I reply that police
'sting' operations are an example of legitimate peacetime spying. An
undercover policeman saves children from becoming drug addicts by
pretending to be a drug customer to expose the drug dealer. Is this
pretending 'lying' or not? I don't much care, except as a professional
philosopher and logician. I do much care that the 'sting' works and my
kids are protected. Do you care more about protecting your own moral
correctness than protecting your kids' lives?
If lying is always wrong, then it is wrong to lie to a nuclear
terrorist (the "ticking time bomb" scenario) to elicit from him where he
hid the nuclear bomb that in one hour will kill millions if it is not
found and defused. The most reasonable response to the "no lying"
legalist here is "You gotta be kidding" – or something less kind than
that. Thomas Aquinas said that even torture is sometimes justified; in
emergency situations like that; if torture, then a fortiori lying. (Read more.)
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