A Question

[A_Wanderer]

Is something a lie if people assume it out of ignorance?

 

[MadelynIris]

"to the best of my knowledge" no

 

[Earnie Shavers]

Were you aware of the ignorance and therefore deliberately play up to it, with every intention of misleading, despite telling the truth?

 

[nbcrusader]

Known unknowns vs. unknown unknowns.

 

[Bonochick]

"Just remember...it's not a lie, if you believe it." -George Costanza

 

[Judah]

It's not a lie, though it could be termed "truth challenged."

 

[verte76]

People are capable of believing lies. So, I would say that just because people believe something doesn't make it true. During the Black Death some people blamed the plague on the Jews. They believed that in some ways the Jews were responsible for the Black Death. Today we know that it was a germ. They didn't know germs existed in those days. So no, just because people believe something doesn't make it true.

 

[the iron horse]

The bigger the lie, the more the people will believe.

~Adolf Hitler

 

[BonosSaint]

Is something a lie if people assume it out of ignorance?

If someone is charged with being truthful and intentionally allows an erroneous assumption about a subject to which he is charged with being truthful, then yes it is the moral equivalent of a lie.

If someone believes what he is saying is the truth, then there is no intent to deceive and no lie.

 

[Irvine511]

Is something a lie if people assume it out of ignorance?

... am sensing a WMD parallel here ...

 

[A_Wanderer]

Re: Re: A Question

... am sensing a WMD parallel here ...

Actually a public figure ~ in regards to an Iraq - 9/11 link and the 40 odd percent of US citizens that believed it. Now take your average person and you know that 50% of people are dumber; I don't think that using the fact people believed/assumed a link should make the administration at fault.

 

[BVS]

How did I know where this was going.

 

[Earnie Shavers]

In my first post I was going to ask if this had something to do with Iraq, and then thought in the one in a million chance it wasn't, I shouldn't turn it that way...

 

[A_Wanderer]

How did I know where this was going.

Because every damn post is the same ~ and now we all know the exact way that the thread will go.

People will accuse Bush of lying, fully ignoring the Clinton administration, Rolf Ekeus and the international community. There will be defending posts citing UN resolutions and post bellum definitions of soveriegnty and the whole damn thing will wind up in the gutter.

 

[BVS]

Because every damn post is the same ~ and now we all know the exact way that the thread will go.

I think the posters are more predictable than the threads.

People will accuse Bush of lying, fully ignoring the Clinton administration, Rolf Ekeus and the international community. There will be defending posts citing UN resolutions and post bellum definitions of soveriegnty and the whole damn thing will wind up in the gutter.

Well Bush is the CURRENT administration. We usually concentrate on those that affect us now.

 

[melon]

There's "ignorance," and then there's "willful ignorance." A lot of this comes across as that the Bush Administration had a predetermined outcome ("war") and they were just looking for excuses to justify it--which ended up being faulty. I'm sure they probably believed the excuses too, so I guess they didn't lie. But it's kind of the difference between evolution (the evidence created the theory) and creationism (the "theory" created the "evidence").

Melon

 

[BonosSaint]

Actually this can turn into a very interesting discusssion if we take it further than the present and recent past, beyond this particular President--use of propaganda, factual accuracy vs. intellectual honesty, how much truth a leader owes his or her people, the difference between honesty and truth.

 

[Irvine511]

um, i don't think it's by accident that 40% of the american public (and a much, much higher percentage of Fox News viewers) believed that SH was involved in 9-11. look at every speech, every talk show appearance, every interview throughout the course of 2002 and 2003, especially after Labor Day 2002 because, as Andy Card noted, you should wait until *after* Labor Day to roll out a new product. the words "iraq" and "saddam hussein" and "WMD" and 9-11 are frequently in the same sentence along with "nuclear weapons program" and "reconstituted" and "mushroom cloud."

 

[Angela Harlem]

I actually thought this was about Mark Latham

Enough rope, indeed.

 

[A_Wanderer]

I actually thought this was about Mark Latham

Enough rope, indeed.

Well thats a topic unto itself ~ his behaviour now vindicates my thoughts that he was an unstable thug, now we know that he is an unstable thug with an interest in sticking Australia firmly in the malaise of neutrality.

 

[U2DMfan]

Is something a lie if people assume it out of ignorance?

Is it lies or just good ol' fashioned deceit?

Is there a difference between being dishonest or less than truthful and lying? I'd say surely yes.

Is something dishonest or less than truthful if people assume it out of ignorance?

Well it surely depends on what the "something" is, doesn't it?

 

[U2DMfan]

um, i don't think it's by accident that 40% of the american public (and a much, much higher percentage of Fox News viewers) believed that SH was involved in 9-11.

I haven't seen the latest poll on this, but the last one I saw had it at 50%. The one I saw was several months ago, I guess since then people are wising up, I suppose.

You have to assume a whole lot of damn ignorance for numbers that high.

2 out of every 5 people believe this out of sheer ignorance? Do these same people vote out of sheer ignorance too? Hmmmm...

 

[BonosSaint]

Intentional misdirection is just a lie without the paper trail or accountability. Deceipt for moral cowards.

I've done it myself. Given absolutely correct facts arranged and highlighted in such a way that I knew the listener would be misdirected, but nothing could come back to me. I knew I was ethically culpable.

 

[A_Wanderer]

If I took a poll of people; which would fall faster a 20kg ball of iron or a 20kg ball of foam how many people would say the iron ball?

Does this mean that their teachers lied to them in school?

What I am trying to illustrate is that a lot of people are ignorant of the world, they may assume things even though they are not being decieved.

While some may point to quotes like this

"Oh, indeed there is a tie between Iraq and what happened on 9/11.

it illustrates the connection, but the quotes are out of context

Oh, indeed there is a tie between Iraq and what happened on 9/11. It’s not that Saddam Hussein was somehow himself and his regime involved in 9/11, but, if you think about what caused 9/11, it is the rise of ideologies of hatred that lead people to drive airplanes into buildings in New York. This is a great terrorist, international terrorist network that is determined to defeat freedom. It has perverted Islam from a peaceful religion into one in which they call on it for violence. And they're all linked. And Iraq is a central front because, if and when, and we will, we change the nature of Iraq to a place that is peaceful and democratic and prosperous in the heart of the Middle East, you will begin to change the Middle East....

 

[BVS]

^Are you trying to say the ignorant won the election for Bush?

 

[A_Wanderer]

No, the ignorant put a lot of votes in for the democrats to be sure ~ it balances out and I have no problem with that, it is that buffer that can protect democracies.

It's the same in any country, most people don't give a piss about politics and are ill informed ~ the point is that I feel these statistics don't reflect lies on behalf of the administration in regards to a Baathist involvement in 9/11 rather a natural inference from people about Arabs that hate them.

 

[BVS]

It's the same in any country, most people don't give a piss about politics and are ill informed ~ the point is that I feel these statistics don't reflect lies on behalf of the administration in regards to a Baathist involvement in 9/11 rather a natural inference from people about Arabs that hate them.

So basically are you saying that it's Ok? Would Bush have gotten the votes he did if it wasn't for ignorance? Polls show that this connection played a huge roll, that and all those pseudo morals.

 

[A_Wanderer]

What is OK? I think that the statements above by Condoleeza Rice are perfectly fine and accurate statements about motivation for policy.

Are you saying that Kerry got his votes because people who vote democratic are generally smarter and better informed?

There are people who don't have a clue about politics or foreign affairs ~ and I don't think that they are only voting for the republicans.

 

[BVS]

What is OK? I think that the statements above by Condoleeza Rice are perfectly fine and accurate statements about motivation for policy.

Well I'm not sure which comments you were talking about, but none of these comments I found do I find proper for policy.

Are you saying that Kerry got his votes because people who vote democratic are generally smarter and better informed?

Not smarter, but they did seem to see through the smoke. Now I admit many voted based on other information, but that number can be factored into every election. The truth will be found in seeing why the voters voted the way they did.

There are people who don't have a clue about politics or foreign affairs ~ and I don't think that they are only voting for the republicans.

No but only another poll will tell you that.





There were those that stated this information from the very beginning. They didn't fall for this shit. Yet many did, including many in here.

 

[financeguy]

Well thats a topic unto itself ~ his behaviour now vindicates my thoughts that he was an unstable thug, now we know that he is an unstable thug with an interest in sticking Australia firmly in the malaise of neutrality.

Latham was surely right about the Iraq war issue.

(I think the operative expression is, even a stopped clock tells the right time twice a day...)