MBlume comments on Not Technically Lying - Less Wrong

32 Post author: Psychohistorian 04 July 2009 06:40PM

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Comment author: MBlume 05 July 2009 05:57:56AM 4 points [-]

Perhaps I'm just arguing for the conclusion I want, and thus digging myself deeper, but in your example, 3 seems entirely truthful to me. You're administering saline, sure, but you're administering it in order to treat pain. If you had a better means of treating pain, you would be using that. Given those circumstances "The strongest painkiller I have." actually seems accurate.

Comment author: AndrewH 12 July 2009 03:47:36AM 2 points [-]

It is truth, but you are explicitly saying those words so that the hearer (the patient) forms a false belief about the world. So it cannot be really truthful because most people in that situation would, after hearing example 3, believe that they are being given something that has more affect than a placebo.