Trustworthiness is by far the most important and the most complicated of the six pillars of character. A trusted person is above suspicion; She need not be monitored. Honesty is its principle attribute, and has two facets: 1) Communicating with truthfulness, sincerity, and candor (No lying; Warning! Lying includes more than mere speaking of untruths.), and 2) Good conduct by playing by the rules (No stealing and no cheating). Intent is the crucial element of honesty. Integrity, reliability, and loyalty are the remaining elements of Trustworthiness.1
Respect
Responsibility
Fairness
Caring and Good Citizenship
The Laws of Nature describe the interactions between objects and processes. These Scientific Laws
are carefully recorded observations of natural and contrived events and phenomena, observations repeatedly
performed by many people over many decades or centuries. Scientists place high confidence in them as
a result. So high is our confidence that Engineers use these Scientific Laws to reliably construct
machines and processes that make up the foundations of our modern societies and democracies.
Unintended Consequences of our gadgets can happen at any time, of course, if we are not
foresightful enough to anticipate them in time to prevent them. But from the perspective of
Mother Nature, all consequences are merely natural consequences: She merely goes
about her merry way, following the laws of Physics and Chemistry, and does not care
who or what might be adversely affected. That is, there is no such thing as Unintended Consequences
to her. It may not be fair, but Nature is not about fairness.
Ethics is a philosophy of social behavior, an invention of sentient beings. It's about
deliberate fairness with the promise of mutual benefit. Ethical Behavior is fundamentally
necessary every time groups of two or more individuals get together. Even among the worst segments of
society there has to be some minimal level of Trust and Respect, for if it did not exist,
unrestrained selfishness and shortsightedness would lead them to kill off each other eventually.
There is another perspective as to why Ethics had to be invented. Ethics is not a part
of Nature. In the four hundred years since Kepler, Galileo, and Newton founded
Modern Science, no one has observed anything that could be construed as a set of natural laws
of ethics. Nature is about Existence, the basic rules of forces, motions, energy, reactions,
evolution, .... Fail to follow the rules, and an object will be destroyed. (More accurately, no object or
process is allowed to come into existence in the first place if it can not follow the rules of
Nature. Existence comprises the scientific concepts of self-consistency and constructive
interference, a topic far afield the purpose of this article.) Nature has nothing to say
about Ethics. So we humans invented it. Perhaps we are not the only species to have done so, though.
The wolf pack is an ordered and caring society, too.
The first two Pillars, Trustworthiness and Respect, cover the largest territory within
Ethics.1
This article focuses on the Honesty attribute of Trustworthiness, and on the Golden Rule
approach to Respect.
Lying, Stealing, Cheating, and The Golden Rule
Apparently, the concepts of lying, stealing, and cheating are not well understood anymore,
and the Golden Rule (either version) seems to be ignored too often. We start with brief summarizing
definitions. The following sections deal with details and examples for each in turn.
Lying is the intention to deceive or confuse. Lying is not in the words, or the lack of words;
It's in the intention of the deceiver.
Stealing is the intention to misappropriate. Stealing is not in the actions, or lack of
actions; It's in the intention of the misappropriator.
Cheating is the intention to defraud. Cheating is not in the actions, or lack of
actions; It's in the intention of the deceiver/defrauder.
The Golden Rule is the intentional and habitual display of respect to others as an
example for others as to how you would like to be respected.
Definition
Intention
Reasons for Not Lying
There are different kinds of lies that have different effects and severity,
however.3
The most important categories of lies are as follows:
Fabrication
Bold-Faced Lie
Lies by Omission
Misleading Statement
Contextual Lies
Fraud
"Good" Lies
St. Augustine's Taxonomy of Lies
Augustine's Taxonomy of Lies in Stereographic 3D. (To see it in three dimensions, cross your eyes so
that the two images overlap in your vision. Be sure you are facing the image squarely and level.) The axis
from the back bottom corner to the left represents increasing harm, the axis from the back corner
to the right represents increasing help, and the vertical axis represents increasing severity.
The top-most data point corresponds to Lies in religious teaching, the bottom-most point
represents Lies that harm no one and that save someone's "purity." This graphical
representation clearly distinguishes the five most harmful lies from the three least harmful.
[Click on the image for a larger version.]
(Jocose lies are not listed because Augustine did not believe them to be lies.) There are three
attributes for each type of lie in this taxonomy: Harm, help, and severity. To
the right is a three dimensional stereographic plot of Augustine's Taxonomy of Lies.
The most toxic lies (most harmful, least helpful, most severe) appear near the upper left-most corner,
the least toxic (least harmful, most helpful, least severe) appear near the lower right-most corner.
The purpose of the 3D plot is to illustrate the great difference between lies that harm and those that do
not (which are still bad because they are still lies.) It's quite interesting that he thought religious
lies to be the worst kind of lie. Perhaps he had in mind the false authority of
ipsit-dixitism (a self-referential appeal to authority or a stubbornly
unsupported repetition of a disputed claim with the claimant asserting power or disinterest
in
objections3), which seems
to be rampant in modern politics, too, particularly in politically conservative thought. More on these
points later.
Other Lies
Other Species
Children
When children first learn how lying works, they lack the moral understanding of when to refrain
from doing it. It takes years of watching people tell lies, and the results of these lies,
to develop a proper understanding. Propensity to lie varies greatly between children, some doing
so habitually and others being habitually honest. Habits in this regard are likely to change in early
adulthood.3
Some, however, never learn this lesson, or at least not the universality of the lesson. In one respect,
they are lying to themselves for thinking that it is acceptable to lie when it is convenient or to
their perceived benefit.
"Accidental" Miscommunication
E-Prime
Truthiness
The concept of truthiness caught on so fast it has an international following. "Truthiness:
Something that is spoken as if true that one wants others to believe is true, that said often enough with
enough voices orchestrated in behind it, might even sound true, but is not true." Spoken in the Canadian
Parliament, May,
2006.3
Truthiness is a lie, and can variously fall into the fabrication, bold-faced lie,
and lying by omission categories. It is also a form of ipsit-dixitism. Truthiness
frequently has political overtones and purposes. Modern examples include creationism,
denial of global climate change, supply-side economics, eliminating poverty by mere
spending, and alien abduction. Some groups can wildly endorse these ideas without regard
to the facts, without regard to those who disagree or whose expertise contradicts their theories,
and with no concern for the eventual (unintended) consequences of acting on their theories. To be
sure, many adherents to these kinds of ideas strongly believe them to be true, but because the facts and
reasoning that should buttress them do not exist while contradicting facts and logic are steadfastly
ignored or denied, they become lies when attempts are made to teach or impose them onto the
general population.
The Big Lie
The expression Big Lie (German: Große Lüge) was coined by Adoph Hitler in 1925 for a
lie so "colossal" that no one would believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the
truth so
infamously".3
His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that
there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on
one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie
sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe
it.3
Many well-known figures have spoken about the Big Lie: George Orwell (1984, about
newspeak), Frank Zappa (The Real Frank Zappa Book, about organized religion,
government, and the music industry), Richard Belzer (UFOs, JFK, and Elvis:
Conspiracies You Don't Have To Be Crazy To Believe, "If you tell a lie that's big enough, and you
tell it often enough, people will believe you are telling the truth, even when what you are saying is
total crap."), Heinrich Himmler ("Tell a lie enough times and it will become the truth"), and
Ernest Hemingway ("A big lie is more plausible than
truth.").3,10
Of course, eventually every Big Lie is exposed, begrudgingly and late perhaps, and sometimes after damage has
already been done. For example: Hitler's lies about Jews, and biblical inerrents' insistence
of a 144 hour process of planet formation (including flora and fauna) less than 10,000 years ago and a
rational ratio of circumference to diameter for the circle. Big Lies even happen in stories
(The Emperor's Clothes).
In spite of its inevitable exposure, the Big Lie is so effective that it's still in wide use, so much
so that a variant has popped up: A Big Lie that claims the opposing side is using the
Big Lie. Let's hope we are not on the brink of a sinking spiral of civility and grid lock.
Discussion and Summary
Look at it from the victim's perspective. If it cost time, money, effort,
friends, reputation, or trust as a result of acting upon the substance of the
lie, then the victim has lost things that were possessed before the lie. Think of the
Golden Rule before carrying through with a lie: Would you want to be it's victim
if the roles were reversed?
One standard form of legal oath before making a deposition or taking the witness stand in a court
trial is Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? for which the
proper response is I do. There is a reason for making the oath so complicated. It's a reminder
to the deposed and the witness how not to lie. The first clause (tell the truth)
is the affirmation part of the oath, the second clause (the whole truth) reminds the oath taker
to leave nothing out, that is, no lying by omission, no out-of-context lies, and no
misleading statements, and the last clause (nothing but the truth) is a reminder to
relate no falsehoods, including fabrications.
With respect to the description of the legal oath above, I have a personal and professional (as well as
philosophical) problem with the standard advice given by attorneys of the witness: Give only minimal
answers and do not volunteer any information. However, following that advice puts a witness in danger of
violating the second clause of the oath, leading to possible if inadvertent lying by omission,
out-of-context lies, or misleading statements. If upon cross-examination, the questioner
asks the right questions to fill in the missing parts of the earlier answers, there is no problem. But
that may not happen. It can be worse. Sometimes, a witness is exhorted to answer only with a simple
"yes" or "no," and the judge may go along with it. If the question is improperly stated (by accident
or deliberately), both allowed answers may lead to a lie. This happens when a question is
posed that has an untrue assumption built in, and the witness is not allowed to correctly restate
the substance of the intended question. Such a situation is especially problematic when an expert
witness is on the stand (even more so when the witness is a scientist or engineer). The reason
there is an expert witness is usually because there is a highly detailed or technical aspect to
the trial that is needed to be addressed but is not generally understood by the judge or jury.
But if the nonexpert questioner asks an overly simplistic question and demands an improperly
simple answer, the witness is in a tough spot, damned if he does, damned if he doesn't.
The only resolution is hope for a reasonable judge that can recognize the conundrum and
allow the witness to sidestep the issue.
There is a related pet peeve of mine concerning questions asked in a court trial. An "accidental"
miscommunication can happen when a "yes or no" question is stated as both a positive declarative question
and a negative declarative question, all in one sentence. Suppose the question is "You were at home the night
of November 17, were you not?" Suppose the witness was indeed at home the night in question. If the witness
truthfully answers the first clause ("You were at home the night of November 17."), the answer would be
"yes;" If the witness answers the second clause ("You were not at home the night of November 17."), the
truthful answer would be "no." But a simple "yes" or "no" cannot be the correct answer for both clauses
simultaneously. Such a sloppily posed question should be answered "I was at home the night of November
17" if the judge allows an answer that departs from a simple "yes" or no."
Engineers and scientists (particularly physical scientists, i.e. physicists and chemists)
operate in a professional mode that requires accuracy, precision, details, and
context that most laymen think is too complicated and unnecessary. Further, the experiments,
calculations, and designs inherent to science and engineering do not allow for waffling,
obfuscation, or lying. If an design engineer were to lie in his design of an
airplane or bridge, the transgression would become very apparent when the airplane fails to get off
the ground and the bridge falls down. The effects of an engineering lie are immediate,
visibly obvious, and can negatively affect a large number of individuals. If a scientist were to lie
about the results of her experiment, the falsehood is exposed when other scientists attempt to
reproduce the experiment to verify its reported results. A scientific lie is similarly
obvious and immediate to a large number of scientists. That is not nearly as true for other
professions or for social lies. If a husband says he went to the office when he really
went to a local bar, the wife may find out quickly and easily, it may severely affect their
relationship, but the general public is not negatively affected nor is it aware of his lie.
As a result of the necessity of their profession, engineers and scientists generally have habits of honesty
that also carries over to their private and social lives. They are typically perplexed about the relatively
high frequency of lies in the general public and its generally nonchalant attitude towards lies.
It can be argued that speech is more than mere communication; It can also be a tool for manipulation,
a means to an end. That is a valid point. Speech can be used to convince another to do something for
you, and if successful, there is a meeting of the minds that seals a contract. But if false statements
are used to convince the other to do a beneficial action, the victim loses assets as a result. For
example: "I'll pay you next week if you give me the new car to use this weekend." But there is no
intention to pay. A lie has just been committed. If the dealer volunteers to give up the keys
to the car for the weekend under the promise of eventual payment, both a lie and a theft
has occurred. Stealing is the next subject.
Definition
Mens Rea (Intent)
For example, if X goes to a restaurant and, by mistake, takes Y's scarf instead of her own, she has
physically deprived Y of the use of the property (which is the actus reus) but the mistake prevents
X from forming the mens rea (i.e. because she believes that she is the owner, she is not dishonest
and does not intend to deprive the "owner" of it) so no crime has been committed at this point. But
if she realizes the mistake when she gets home and could return the scarf to Y, she will steal
the scarf if she dishonestly keeps it. Note that there may be civil liability for the
torts of trespass to chattels or conversion in either
eventuality.3
Specific Forms of Theft
Property
Ownership
Tangible Property and Intangible Property
Most people have a good grasp of what tangible property is, and what it means to have it
stolen. Similarly for money, labor, and identity. However, understanding
intellectual property is a challenge for many, perhaps originating from its apparent ephemeral quality,
its intangibility. For the purposes of this article, the most relevant types of intellectual
property are copyrights and patents.
Copyrights
• Bundle of Rights
• Works of Authorship
• Copyright Protection
A work of authorship automatically becomes copyrighted when it is completed (fixed).
Copyright protection is automatic:
• Duration of Copyright Protection
• Fair Use Exceptions
• Medium vs. Work of Authorship
• No Copying
It is acceptable to loan or sell a book or cd to another for their personal use. It is
also acceptable to make a temporary copy to loan IF (this is a big
IF, and a somewhat dangerous one at that) the purchased original copy and the
loaned duplicated copy are not used, viewed, read, or performed simultaneously.
A purchased copy is for single use only.
Example: A purchased single copy of a computer program can be installed on both the office computer
and the home computer under the restriction of using only one of the copies at a time.
(Most people cannot be in two places at once anyway, so it is easy to comply.) The extra hassle of installing a
program on the office computer, then uninstalling it at the end of the day so that it can be installed
on the home computer for the night is eliminated. Books, music, and photographs have no similar
associated hassle in bringing them home at night. The copying of books and music for personal use and
for loan is not necessary and it is legally dangerous. All it takes is two individuals
to accidentally view or read the copies at the same time to be in violation of the law, to
infringe upon the copyright holder's property. The simple way to avoid this danger
is DON'T MAKE COPIES FOR ANYONE ELSE.
• Copying Is Stealing
• Remedies to Copyright Infringement
Patents
• Definition of a Patent
• Utility, Design, and Plant Patents
• A Teaching to the Public
• Patent Protection
• Patent Infringement
• Remedies to Patent Infringement
Discussion and Summary
A tomato plant, and its fruit, is ephemeral. A tomato seed is not a tomato plant, but it can become a plant
in time. Its potential to become a plant is the intangible property the owner of the seed
possesses. The tomato fruit is an intangible property until it forms and becomes tangible.
After the fruit is removed and carried away to be consumed, its existence as property vanishes,
as does the plant itself come winter. Tangibility, portability, and durability have
no bearing on property-ness.
Ownership is ownership. Ownership of any type of property has at least one universal
attribute: Control over the owned property. This control is the defining characteristic of
ownership. The authority to decide who may drive an automobile, and where and when it may
be driven, is the mark of ownership. The mere driving of that vehicle is not the mark of
ownership.
Theft is theft. Theft of any type of property has at least one universal
attribute: The unauthorized removal of control over the stolen property from the proper owner. Loss
of control deliberately caused by another is the defining characteristic of theft. Use
of an automobile without permission is the mark of theft. The ease of taking and using the
vehicle for an illegitimate purpose is not a mark of theft.
A common, ordinary, unlocked automobile (say, a Ford), keys in the ignition, is secretly stolen from
the next door driveway of its owner, used by the thief to visit a dying friend, then returned
to the neighbor's driveway without the neighbor knowing it was ever gone. A stolen Ford is as much stolen
property as a stolen DeLorean, a rare, very valuable, and difficult-to-replace automobile. The easy
availability of taking the car for a self-determined emergency without depriving its owner of its
use does not excuse the theft. Scarcity, copyability, and deprivability
have no bearing on ownership-ness. Easiness, accessibility, and necessity
have no bearing on whether the act is theft or not theft.
Theft is a concept with almost universal understanding when it comes to tangible property.
The concept of intangible property that can be owned, and subsequently stolen (notably
copyrighted music performances), however, seems to be grossly misunderstood by many people worldwide.
They are perplexed and angry at the prosecutions of those caught collecting, copying,
sharing, and distributing music, especially if the internet is involved. Many do not yet
understand that it is illegal to do so. Many others who do understand the illegality do not
understand why it is illegal. And yet others vehemently disagree that it should be
illegal to copy and share copyrighted music, and are working to legalize unauthorized copying.
Many argue that if it's on the internet, it must be free for the taking. Many argue that the owners
should have known better to put their works in digital format and/or on the internet, so that it
serves them right to have it all stolen by copying. Many argue that it is so easy to copy that
it is (or should be) legal to do so. Many argue that the owners are not being deprived when music
is copied and shared, so it must be permissible. All of these arguments are wrong, untrue,
illogical, and one-sided. These arguments have always been wrong, untrue,
illogical, and one-sided. Legal scholars and legislatures worldwide have recognized the legitimacy
of ownership of intangible property for centuries.
Intangible property has the same attributes as tangible property. Stealing both
types of property has essentially the same consequences. Copying another's intangible property without
permission is illegal.
Ignorance of the law (as well as disagreement with the law) is no excuse, anywhere
or any time. Ignorance or disagreement with the owner of property you misappropriate is no excuse either.
It's difficult to imagine an owner accepting an explanation "I didn't know the car (house, office) was
owned by someone who did not want anyone else to use (enter, occupy) it" from the thief. The owner spent
a lot of time, money and/or effort to attain and maintain the car (house, office) and is likely to be
unsympathetic to the thief who has no patience to expend an equivalent time, money, or effort to
obtain the equivalent property legitimately.
Similarly for the performer of a recorded song. The performer spent a lot of time, money, and effort in
education, training, acquiring permission, rehearsing with other musicians, renting a recording studio,
recording and mixing the studio sessions, and duplicating the final version for retail sale. The
performer deserves both the credit and compensation for the effort, expense, and delayed gratification
to get it just right so that consumers can enjoy it. It is hypocritical to object to the performer's
(or the record label's) efforts to protect the property rights imbued in the recording while
similarly protecting one's own property.
It is expected that one would object to a stranger yanking the sound system from one's automobile so that
the stranger could enjoy it. Similarly for the artist whose music is ripped from the artist's album and
given or sold away. Laws, regulations, and rules are meant to be fair for everyone,
to be applied to everyone the same way. Refusing to live by the rules that others are expected to follow
is cheating, the next subject.
Definition
Cheating fundamentally includes several elements of both lying and stealing, with
specific motivations to gain something of value by illegitimate means. That is why lying
and stealing are discussed before cheating. Cheating is lying and/or stealing
with the intention for acquiring something for more than merely the "pleasure" of fooling or depriving others.
Children
Children may cheat for a number of reasons. Some never develop a sense of guilt, so they have
no internal inhibitors to breaking rules. If they will gain something by breaking a rule, they
break it without a qualm. Others experience a thrill in breaking rules, finding it exhilarating to
oppose authority. "Getting away with it" gives them a sense of superiority and power over the rule makers
and enforcers. Children who lack sufficient challenges in their lives may cheat out of boredom, in
effect creating a challenge for
themselves.16
Many children cheat because they feel compelled to measure up to a standard that they do not believe
they can reach honestly. Further, the tendency to cheat is inversely related to the expectation of
success.16
Studies have also discovered a (socioeconomic) class difference in attitudes toward cheating.
Middle- and upper-class children who have been raised with academically oriented values view cheating
as a much more serious issue than stealing. The theft of knowledge is considered a
greater crime than the theft of money or material goods, for example. In contrast,
lower- and working-class children who have grown up in a world that emphasizes material survival, and
in which higher education is an unlikely privilege, view stealing as much more heinous than
cheating.16
What Are Rules?
Why Do We Need Rules?
Young children are taught certain rules that have a lot to do with their safety. Do not touch a hot
stove or go near a tub of hot water. Stay clear of any stairs. Don't touch sharp objects. Don't fight with
other children. Don't run out into the street. It sounds like a lot of "don'ts" that might constrict a
child's natural curiosity about the world around them, but these are all general, common sense rules
that help to keep them safe throughout their childhood. Without being taught such rules, the
consequences could be dire. Rules are a necessary part of all our lives, and it starts from early
childhood.20
Because children are not innately aware of dangers in life, they must be taught how to avoid certain
things, as it is throughout the entirety of our lives. If rules are not taught and enforced,
some wouldn't know the differences between right and wrong, safety and danger, the consequences of
cause and effect. Left to our own devices, we just wouldn't have a clue and therein lies the
chaos.20
Rules and limits are the beginning points of a rational and orderly relationship with your
children. They tell us that there is a system, how it operates, and what is
expected.21
People who habitually jaywalk (illegally walk across a street in the middle of the block) frequently step
out in front of moving cars without thinking. They stop traffic, sometimes intentionally. Violating the
rule against jay walking amounts to massive inconsideration to other people (complete
strangers)22
as well as creating a safety risk for themselves and others. Without rules such as this, people
would work against each other, being inefficient if not destructive, wasteful, and painful.
• Analogy
The waves represent two people, each with similar goals, say, to reach the other side of the street/block,
one on foot, the other driving an automobile. If they both follow the rules (pedestrian walking only in
crosswalks, vehicle stopping at all crosswalks), then each accomplish their goal with a small amount of
invested effort. This is represented by constructive interference, where each reinforces
the other's cooperation by simultaneously achieving the goals. On the other hand, if one jay walks or
refuses to stop at the crosswalk, the other is unjustifiably and negatively impacted. This is
represented by partial destructive interference, where one refuses to cooperate, and
only one achieves his/her goal. The worst case scenario occurs when neither follows the
rules, both refuse to yield, and a collision occurs with resulting injury or damage. This is
represented by complete destructive interference, where neither cooperate, and
neither achieves his/her goal.
Academic Cheating
For those classes in which considerable homework is required, such as Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics,
and Music, students working together presents a conundrum. Profs. Craig Wright and Frederick Ziegler of
Yale University, agree that problem sets are a peculiar problem, since there is a thin line between group
work and just copying another student's answers. Ziegler tries to delineate this boundary for his
students. "I actually encourage students to work on problem sets together," he explained. "My only request
is that they don't hand in exactly identical papers." Ever since an incident in his class involving a
student who stole someone else's problem set, Ziegler has made his students place their
completed problem sets in locked metal
boxes.25
Cheating has become commonplace in high schools, largely because students are using technology
to gather and share information in rather innovation ways. Students can develop habits in high school
that will get them expelled when they use them in college, and sometimes students won’t even realize
their “habits” are
illegal.26
• List Of "Unintentional" Cheating
• Pandemic Numbers
The 2002 Report Card on the Ethics of American Youth, a biennial national survey conducted by Josephson
Institute, revealed that students admitting they cheated on an exam at least once in the past year
soared from 61 percent in 1992 to 74 percent in 2002, the number who stole something from a store
within the past 12 months jumped from 31 percent to 38 percent, and the percentage who say they
lied to their teachers and parents increased
substantially.27
Michael Josephson, founder and president of Josephson Institute, said of the report’s findings: “The evidence
is that a willingness to cheat has become the norm and that parents, teachers, coaches, and even
religious educators have not been able to stem the tide. The scary thing is that so many kids are
entering the workforce to become corporate executives, politicians, airplane mechanics, and nuclear
inspectors with the dispositions and skills of cheaters and
thieves."27
Cheating does not end at graduation. For example, resume fraud is a serious issue
for employers concerned about the level of integrity of new
employees.29
Comparing his 1990 study to one done by William Bowers in 1964, McCabe and his co-author, Linda Klebe
Trevino, caution, "Although the number of students who cheat has increased only modestly, the
students who do cheat are engaging in a wider variety of test cheating behaviors today
and are also cheating more
often."30
• Miscellaneous Facts On Student Cheating
Highlights from the Josephson Institute's 2002 Report
Card:27
• Most Likely Cheaters
• Plaigerism
• Off-Campus Cheating: Distance Learning
• Common Excuses For Cheating
• Student Rationalizations For Cheating
Why do students engage in conduct they themselves think is wrong? Many researchers site
neutralization of deviance, a concept first defined by Gresham Sykes and David Matza in 1957.
Basically, neutralization is the old, familiar thought process that says, "Yes, this behavior
is wrong, and society is justified in making rules to disallow it. BUT special circumstances make it OK
for me to ignore this rule." Sykes and Matza defined five ways individuals often neutralize deviant
behavior: denial of injury, denial of the victim, appeal to higher
loyalties, denial of responsibility, and condemnation of the
condemners.30
Many students believe no one is hurt by their dishonesty. Indeed, 29 percent in a Santa Clara
University survey claim cheating is justified if the student learns from it. About a fifth blame
the teacher for their behavior, one student wrote, "Cheating can be justified if the teacher is a
tyrant---I mean, really." Another 15 percent excused cheating because the work was "meaningless."
Peer pressure and the need to please their families (75 percent) proved to be the stronger loyalty than
integrity.30
On the other hand, that many students feel compelled to neutralize their behavior can be construed as a
hopeful sign. It suggests they have not abandoned the basic value of integrity—just decided that, in certain
circumstances, it does not apply to
them.30
To some students, cheating is not about values at all; it's about power. Some people, they argue,
have the advantage of well-connected families; some are naturally bright; others get ahead through
cheating. In these students' minds, all means are morally equivalent, according to Gary Pavela.
For these young people, he observes, "Concepts like 'morality,' 'virtue,' and 'truth' have no meaning
except to disguise and facilitate the use of power by those who have it, or seek
it."30
In other words, cheating is a legitimate way to "level the playing field" for some students.
Students also make distinctions in the seriousness of cheating behaviors and, for example, may allow
themselves to use sources without footnoting even though they would not purchase a term paper. To some
of these students, integrity is not a virtue in and of itself. The ultimate question is not "Am I an
honest person?" but "Will this behavior prevent my mastery of material I will need to become a competent
professional?"30
In the 1960s, the concept of education for its own sake held greater sway among students. In the '90s, many
young people look to the university more as a credentialing institution for business and the professions.
Within this framework, cheating in a "nonessential" class may be more easily
neutralized.30
That is, many students are effectively thinking "Cheating is wrong, but not in my case, because I
have more important reasons."
Many cheating students believe that cheating in school is a dress rehearsal for life. They
mentioned President Clinton's Monica Lewinsky scandal and financial scandals like the Enron case, as well
as the inconsistencies of the court
system.35
Michael Josephson says students take their lead from adults. "They're basically decent kids whose values
are being totally corrupted by a world which is sanctioning stuff that even they know is wrong. But they
can't understand why everybody allows
it."35
So they fall back to the philosophy "Cheat or be
cheated."28
Besides, as Josephson points out according to one study, less than 2 percent of all academic
cheaters
get caught, and only half of them get punished. So there's almost a 99 percent chance of getting away
with it.28
• Ideas And Behavior That Reinforce Cheating
Many suggest kids learn to cheat from the larger culture. Josephson says, "The rule of thumb we use is:
Whatever you allow you encourage. So whether they're seeing it with Enron or Barry Bonds or Paris Hilton,
somewhere here or there, they are seeing people get away with stuff. The truth is they don't have to look
further than their own high school. There is so much cheating going on in their own school by their
own colleagues, with their teachers looking the other way, in a way that almost looks like passive
approval. There's a culture that begins to develop, when you see people do this, and it provides the moral
cover they need to insulate themselves from a conscience. It's like saying, "Come on, I'm not the only
one, it's happening all the
time."28
Kids also use survival-mode thinking and exercise risk management when they decide to cheat, says Pope.
Suppose someone gets to the end of several hours of homework and it's 10 p.m. and she still has an English
paper to write. If she turns in nothing, she knows it's a guaranteed zero. If she downloads a paper from
the Internet, she might get caught and get a zero. But if she doesn't get caught, she might get an A. So
it seems worth it to many to turn in the plagiarized
paper.28
David Callahan, author of the 2004 book The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are Doing Wrong to Get
Ahead, says there are two economic explanations for the rise of cheating. One is that there's
more to gain. "We live in a time when the winners are getting ever more lavish rewards and the incentives
to get to the top are greater than they've ever been before. In the late 1960s, if you were a CEO and you
inflated the value of your company's stock by cooking the books, maybe you'd make a couple of extra
million dollars when your stock holdings went up. But if you do that now, there's the potential to make
hundreds of millions of dollars. If a top baseball player took performance-enhancing drugs 20 years ago
and hit more home runs, maybe he'd make $1 million a year, which is how much the top players got paid
in the mid- to late 1980s. Now, if you can join the ranks of the super top players, you can sign a
$150 million, five-year
contact."28
The other economic reason is there's more to lose. The penalties for failure, or for simply being ordinary,
have grown. The middle class has been squeezed, so it's harder and harder to maintain a decent standard of
living. Callahan says the two other things that account for the rise in cheating are lack of
oversight and enforcement (as in deregulation in business and lack of serious consequences for violations
in business, politics and the academic world) and a change in American culture, ushered in the 1980s
with "greed is good" individualism and a shredding of the social contract. "In that cultural
context, it's not surprising that people are willing to cut corners to advance their own
self-interest."28
But even if kids are not aware of cheating scandals like Enron, says Pope, "they are absolutely
influenced by the role models they see close to them." So when they see their parent go "diagnosis shopping"
to get a doctor to say they have ADD so they can have extra time to complete their SAT test, or they hear
a coach tell them to fake an injury in football when their team is out of time-outs to gain an unofficial
one, kids get the message that it's OK, even necessary, to do take whatever steps to gain an advantage.
And to an adolescent that may translate as lie, cheat and
steal.28
• Current State Of Cheating
• Honor Codes
However, there is one consistent situation where honor codes don't work. “The [honor] system isn’t working
for in-class exams,” says Stanford University senior Alexis Hallaby (who conducted an online survey of 1000
undergraduates), especially in rooms where tiered seats afford test-takers tempting views of the desks
in front of
them.24
The problem is that without proctors, the honor system depends on students both obeying the code and
taking action when they see violations. And most students "just do not want to be snitches,"
Stanford's George Wilson
observes.24
There is hope, too. More than a third of another Stanford survey's respondents think honest students are
penalized by the honor code because others don't abide by
it.24
That might explain why there is a small increase of students turning in cheaters, admits
Wilson.24
"[P]eople who are cheating ... devalues my work ..." said one
freshman.24
Still, a basic tenet is that faculty "avoid, as far as practicable, academic procedures that create
temptations to violate the Honor Code"—and some would argue that an unproctored exam is one of those
temptations.24
• Why Cheat?
The best antidotes for cheating are teachers who fill children with a love of learning, who impart
some idea of life's possibilities and who understand that assessment is merely a means to an end, not
the end itself. A meaningful curriculum will shift the focus from learning boring lists of irrelevant
facts to exploring subjects in depth. Ultimately the best solution is to make learning exciting and
absorbing. Teach the whole child. Make the learning process student-centric. Allow students to buy
into the process. Empower them to guide and direct their learning. Encourage creativity and critical
thinking as opposed to rote
learning.34
Unfortunately, today's emphasis on teacher and school accountability, which is currently founded
on test scores only, results in pressures that push teachers away from instilling the love of
learning in their students and toward "teaching to the test." Without any love of learning,
children have no reason to take school seriously.
Parents have a huge role to play in combating cheating, too. That's because children mimic almost
everything their parents do. Parents must set the right sort of example for children to copy, and they
must also take a genuine interest in their children's work. Ask to see everything and anything. Discuss
everything and anything. An involved parent is a powerful weapon against
cheating.34
Failing that, school becomes just another obstacle to endure and children will take the cue of
indifference from their parents. It's just a short step from indifference to hostility or cheating.
Apparently, the vast majority of young people (and adults for that matter) believe that cheating
is wrong. Yet, by nearly every poll, most young people cheat at least once in their high school
career. So, the most important question is why do young people behave in ways that are inconsistent with
their stated beliefs? Perhaps the answer to this lies in a survival instinct, says Robert Kennedy. "I
am not a psychologist, but I believe there is a mechanism within each of us which triggers a need to
'save face.' Saving face can mean a desire to save oneself from the angry assault of a parent or
teacher; it can mean avoiding embarrassment; it can mean economic survival or a perceived pressure
be it self-inflicted or inflicted by some other extraneous force. Nowadays, college acceptance is
the major instigator of this survival
instinct."34
The reason parents aren't outraged about cheating, suggests Madeline Levine, author of The Price Of
Privilege: How Parental Pressure And Material Advantage Are Creating A Generation Of Disconnected And
Unhappy Kids, is that we have come to value achievement over character. She is worried that the highest
performing students in high school, who will become our doctors, lawyers, and policymakers, have few
qualms about
cheating.28
Indeed, this may have already come full circle. Donald McCabe attributes the rise in cheating
to the state of ethics in mainstream society. When students compare cheating to what's going on
in the rest of society, "it doesn't seem like a big
deal."33
Further, "You don't find any parent movement saying, 'Oh my God, why is this happening?' " says Michael
Josephson. "It's a silent conspiracy creating the disease of low expectations: 'Well, we can't really expect
people to be honest anymore.' ... We have lost our moral compass. And no one is putting the flag in the
sand and saying, 'This is wrong! It's dishonest, it's unacceptable, I don't care what the stakes are and
why you're doing it, it's wrong, and we will not permit it.' The solution is in the voluntary commitment
of the school system and the people who run it, the boards of education and the parents to say this is
not acceptable. If they would do that, they could change
it."28
• What's Wrong With Cheating?
From the perspective of a scientist or engineer, the second point above is the most important argument against
cheating. A cheating science researcher (or a cheating design engineer) is trying to
lie to Mother Nature herself. But she is not forgiving or understanding. Nature just
ignores the cheaters and continues doing her thing as she has for the past 13.7 billion years.
The cheating researcher or engineer eventually gets spanked when the lies catch up
with him or her. For Nature, it has nothing to do with ethics; It has everything to do with the
facts of reality. A faulty design for a bridge (a result of the student engineer cheating in his
Strength of Materials course), for example, will result in an unfinishable structure (the
spanking, for daring to fake knowledge and skill) at great wasted expense to his or her employer.
Of course, the employer of this cheater will see it as fraud (breach of ethics).
• Curbing Cheating
Regan McMahon suggests five ways to curb
cheating:28
Robert Kennedy further
suggests:34
Other measures could include:
Cheating And Business
• The Cheating Culture
The results of his question are presented in his 2004 book The Cheating Culture: Why More Americans Are
Doing Wrong to Get
Ahead.37
The flaunting of ill-gotten gains during the first Gilded Age provoked the broad moral concern of
turn-of-the-century progressive reformers. They laid the foundations for the American version of the
welfare state, which came into being during the New Deal and framed public discourse throughout the
post-World War II decades. Corporations had struck an implicit social compact with labor unions,
trading job security for acceptance of work rules, and loyalty to their employees and their
community in exchange for a steady supply of skilled workers. By the ’80s that compact was broken,
and the only constituencies recognized by corporate executives were their shareholders and
themselves. The unleashing of turbo-capitalism under Ronald Reagan brought with it a
privatization of public morality. Government became less concerned with curtailing corporate
malfeasance than with policing personal behavior. For the new breed of moral reformer,
marijuana was more alarming than toxic
waste.38
If one defines cheating as breaking the rules to get ahead (as Callahan does), then it matters
who is making the rules as well as who is breaking them. Deregulation has made many unethical practices
technically legal, such as those that pervade the credit card industry: deceptive advertising,
usurious rates, hidden fees, excessive
penalties.38
Another example is the "acceptable" practice
in business for cheating and gaming one’s customers known as the Least Noticeable
Difference (LND). This is a product strategy that involves improving gross margin via minute
degradations to the size or ingredient quality of a product. The key is to ensure that the
quality or size is reduced just enough so that most consumers will never
notice.39
Callahan pins much of the blame for the steady erosion of values and honesty in America on the growing
social and economic inequality in the country, or what he calls "our war against poor
people."37
According to Callahan, since the advent of the Chicago School of economists in the 1970s, policymakers
have overvalued competition, consumption and deregulation. The result is a nearly unprecedented rise
in pressure to cheat just to make ends meet for many. "The GDP has grown in this country by 40
percent in the last two decades, and yet more people are feeling more financial anxiety it seems
than ever
before."40
• Cheating In The Graduate Business Schools
• Corporate Fraud
And then there is the mortgage loan crisis of the last few years whose crash led to a world wide recession
second only to the Great Depression of the 1930s. The greed and shortsightedness that pushed the subprime
loan business to collapse has not yet been fully exposed. It continues still. Apparently many of the
executives of the biggest companies involved have yet to learn their lesson: The huge bonuses given to
some of them in spite of government bailouts to keep their companies afloat have created outrage in the
general public.
• Why So Much Cheating?
In his book, Callahan shows how Americans have cut corners to get ahead. It is the "culture of pleasure that
creates the tax evader, the cautious embezzler, the resume fabricator, the digital
file swappers . . . and the romantic
cheaters."46
Ours is a culture where winning and success has become sacrosanct. We are livid at our executives when
they break their trust. But we (more than 50 percent of Americans own public stock) were more than fine
with CEOs living large during the boom as long as they kept propping up share price so we too might
cash in.46
"We say we want a renewal of character," James Davison Hunter wrote, "but we don't really know what
to ask for . . . We are, in effect, petrified of such moral leadership because of the very demands
it would place on
us."46
Character has always required a reality bigger than oneself -- a reality that impinges upon us from the
outside. Such a reality is immune from our manipulation and dictates the boundaries of our life. Absent
such restraint, pragmatism governs our leaders, for when reality becomes no bigger than the desires and
dreams of individuals, personal survival and pleasure becomes the only true god. Character is irrelevant
today not because people want it to be, or don't have enough role models to emulate. It is irrelevant
because the concept of character is just that -- a disembodied
concept.46
Callahan is not concerned with "cheating" in terms of lifestyle choices like sexual behavior or drug
use, but rather with ordinary people's willingness to deceive others and cut corners purely to make
more money or win some prize. Examples include financial advisers who accept payoffs to knowingly
steer customers toward risky investments, lawyers and doctors who bill for hours never worked or services
not delivered, students who copy test answers or buy term papers, and employees who use company
time for personal business or
play.47
• "Winner Take All" Mindset
From a recent interview with Callahan: It's long been observed that the United States is a society where
personal wealth is so intensely respected that little attention is paid to the "means" by which one attains
that wealth. As Charles Dickens noted 150 years ago, Americans are always ready to forgive rogues—as
long as they're rich. Thanks to the trends of the past quarter century, this national trait has become
ever more pronounced. If you mix the values of the "me" generation with the notion that "greed is good,"
you get lots of
cheating.48
More from that interview: When corporations and individuals lie about company performance and share
values, everyone loses except those individuals who cheated, cashed out, and got away (thus
maintaining our 1% population of "the rich"). And yet the penalties for this type of cheating are
nearly nonexistent. How is this possible in a democratic society—where the good of the many outweighs
the good of the few? American society has defined crime very narrowly over the past decades. We've
imposed draconian punishments for wrongdoers in the lower classes—like drug dealers—while largely
ignoring the white collar crime wave. My hope is that the corporate scandals of recent years, as well
as growing revelations on middle class crime will help right the balances of justice in this
country. Everyone should play by the same rules. And everyone who breaks the rules should be treated
the same way regardless of whether they are a billionaire or a homeless person. Unless we have
this basic fairness, the social contract will lose its
legitimacy.48
• Where Are The Watchdogs?
• Battling Business Cheating
The corporate clean-up of the past few years has focused on such things as making CEOs and board directors
more accountable for earnings statements, and on reducing conflicts of interest among auditors and stock
analysts. While these steps are important--and, in fact, much tougher reforms are imperative--new rules
only scratch at the surface. Also needed are new reflexes toward honesty among corporate employees that
are so strong and automatic they can overcome the impulse to follow orders and protect institutional
interests.43
How do we foster such reflexes? One way is by making ethics training a much bigger part of professional
education in the United States. This means, as many have suggested, curriculum changes at business
schools that now treat ethics as a side topic and--with their relentless bottom-line orthodoxy--even
undermine the ability of students to think ethically. It also means a new stress on ethics in a whole
host of programs that train accountants, managers, marketers, and anyone else destined for corporate
life. Right now, most young people barely hear the word "ethics" on their way to the business
world.43
Another way to foster such reflexes is for companies to get much more serious about ethics training.
If boards of directors really care about shareholder interests, they will push corporations to develop
a whistle-blowing culture in which employees are prepared for the tough ethical dilemmas that may come
their way and rewarded for doing the right
thing.43
Further, we are unlikely to achieve our potential as a society if we don't work to reverse "unethics" or
if we accept "keeping the scorecard from getting any worse" as
success.44
That would be like treading water blindfolded in a whirlpool where the water is being sucked down the
drain faster than it's being pumped in. It may seem sufficient effort for a while, but eventually
the reality of an empty pool becomes too obvious to ignore.
Business must take a very active role at imposing integrity on themselves. For example, boards of
directors also have to demand more than a vanilla statement in the CEO's introduction to the annual
report. They should direct the CEO to develop measures and report on ethical performance as they
require reporting on other performance
measures.44
Compensation committees should be cautious that rewards to CEOs and senior management teams aren't so
lucrative that they may encourage executive decision making that is more compensation driven than
strategically driven. Out-of-balance rewards don't help. They may be legal, but, given the interests
of employees, retirees and stockholders, they're hard to justify as
ethical.44
On that theme, Callahan suggests that the surest way to end cheating is to drastically reduce
inequalities of income, status, and perceived security throughout U.S. society. Among other things,
funding new programs to expand opportunities for the disadvantaged, and removing inequities in
law enforcement, will, he believes, help establish a new social contract in society and restore
trust in U.S. public
institutions.47
Two more suggestions from Callahan: Allocate more money and personnel to enforce existing laws. Have
professional associations rethink their reason for existence. Their true task, he believes, is to guard
and enhance the status of their profession, not to blindly defend the privileges and reputations of
anyone currently practicing in their field. Instead of uncritically championing doctors, lawyers, or
teachers as a group, their respective professional associations ought to serve the larger public interest
by insisting on the highest levels of preparation and practice from every professional in their
field.47
The most important place to begin, however, is with ourselves. Ordinary individuals must be prepared to
lead by example, regardless of how celebrities, opinion leaders, or even their own neighbors may behave.
Each of us must dare "to be a chump." This means paying your full share of taxes even when you are sure
that many other people cheat and get away with it. It means paying full price for a new compact disc
even when you know you could easily, if illegally, download the same songs free from the Internet. It
means doing the right thing, not the easy or most profitable thing, in every situation. And it means
refusing to quietly tolerate cheating by
others.47
Jack Nadel's How to Succeed in Business Without Lying, Cheating or Stealing is a real-life primer
on doing business the old-fashioned way — with honesty, integrity and an acute understanding of simple
principles of success. Among his
pointers:49
Once upon a time, business was generally perceived as ethical. Sure, there were exceptions then, but today
the old exceptions are closer to being the norm. It does not have to stay that way. Indeed, it cannot
stay that way. It is possible to go back. But we as a society and as individuals will have to stop
cutting corners, stop looking for the easy or fast way, stop making exceptions for ourselves that we
would deny others, and begin to be exemplars of integrity.
No discussion about cheating in general would be complete without addressing cheating within a
marriage. Although the subject is a bit afield of the original intent of this article, it is sufficiently
relevant to other types of cheating that its inclusion is warranted.
Cheating here means breaking the established rules, whether they are explicitly or implicitly agreed
upon by the partners (spouses, girlfriend/boyfriend), of maintaining sexual and emotional exclusivity with
each other. As with most cheating, it implies behavior that is kept secret from the nonparticipating
partner. Unlike most other cheating, it is possible for both partners to be cheating on the other,
perhaps simultaneously as well as secretly.
• Fantasy And Reality
Infidelity and adultery happen frequently in all places of the world. No group, regardless of sex, race,
religion, level of income, location, etc. is unaffected by cheating and unfaithfulness. That is a
fact.51
"Good husbands" can cheat. Infidelity can occur even in happy marriages. Rich or poor, young or old, newlywed or
approaching a fiftieth anniversary - infidelity can happen to anyone. It has been estimated that infidelity
touches 80% of all
marriages.52
More specific facts and statistics regarding cheating lovers is difficult to come by, however, due to the
inherent secrecy of this issue. Cheating is, by nature, a process of lies and deception, requires hiding
behavior and evidence, and is not something most people are willing to reveal to anyone, even a
researcher.51
The problem with research findings and the statistics presented is that not everyone is honest with their answers
and often times the population used in the statistic does not represent the population as a whole. Because of this
problem, there ends up being two types of infidelity statistics: the low percents and the high percents.
The low end statistics usually have a broader and more accurate polling of the population, but end up with less
honesty in the results. The high end statistics tend to have a less accurate representation of the population,
but more honesty in the results based on the type of people that come forward to answer the
questions.51
Below is a summary of the full range of possibilities on the true nature of how frequent cheating
occurs:51
The low percents numbers are typified by a survey conducted the National Opinion Research Center at the
University of Chicago: 25 percent of men and 17 percent of women have had extramarital
affairs.50
However, these numbers come from self-admissions, an important factor to consider when estimating the true
incidence of cheating. Independently, it has been found that when relating to matters of a personal sexual
nature, men under-admit by a factor of 1:2 and women under-admit by a factor of 1:3 to
1:4.53
Using these factors to extrapolate to a true estimate yields a cheating rate of 50 percent for husbands
and 50 to 70 percent for wives. That means among all marriages, only 15 to 25 percent occur where neither
spouse has cheated. Also, 25 to 35 percent of all marriages have both spouses cheating on each
other, 15 to 25 percent with a faithful wife and philandering husband, and 25 to 35 percent with a faithful
husband and a wandering
wife.54
All these estimates are consistent with the high percents quoted earlier. Incidentally, the 50
percent estimate for married women is in agreement with psychologist Bonnie Eaker Weil, who has written
several books on
adultery.50
• Tidbits
More tidbits. A study by Lucielle Ostertag from the Italian Institute of Social Sciences showed husbands and
wives who cheat on each other are more likely to stay together. According to the scientific survey, the more
extramarital flings a couple enjoys, the more likely they are to remain together and the happier they will be.
"Not every extramarital affair is good," admits Dr. Ostertag. "Long-term relationships outside of marriage were
found to be quite
damaging.50
An article in a 1997 issue of Newsweek magazine noted that various surveys suggest that as many as
30 percent of male Protestant ministers have had sexual relationships with women other than their wives.
The Journal of Pastoral Care in 1993 reported a survey of Southern Baptist pastors in which 14
percent acknowledged they had engaged in "sexual behavior inappropriate to a minister." It also reported
that 70 percent had counseled at least one woman who had had intercourse with another
minister.50
• Ten Percent!
Geneticists, disease researchers, and evolutionary psychologists have known it for a while. Consistently, they
find that one in ten of us wasn't fathered by the man we think is our biological dad, the one assumed to have
contributed his sperm to the process. Even Dad himself may be under this impression. And Mom, knowing it's not
a sure thing, just keeps
quiet.56
Geneticists have stumbled upon this phenomenon in the course of conducting large population studies and
hunting for genes that cause diseases such as cystic fibrosis. They find purported full siblings to be
half-siblings, fathers who are genetic strangers to more than one of their children and uncles who are
much closer to their nieces and nephews than anyone might guess. Lumped under the heading of "pedigree
errors," these so-called mis-paternities, false paternities and non-paternities are all science jargon
for the unwitting number of us who are chips off someone else's
block.55
Non-paternity is believed to cut across all socioeconomic classes and many
cultures.55
Actual figures for these pedigree errors range from 1 percent in high-status areas to 30 percent (sometimes
50 percent) in lower-status areas. The overall figure of 10 percent is an average estimate based on many
studies taking place in sundry regions over the course of
decades.56
A British survey conducted between 1988 and 1996 by Robin Baker, a former professor at the University of
Manchester, confirmed the 10 percent figure. That seems high to skeptics such as Dalhousie University
geneticist Paul Neumann, although even he admitted that "my colleague, who's a woman, tells me women have no
trouble believing it. . . . It's the men who
can't."55
Others, such as Jeanette Papp, director of genotyping and sequencing in the University of California at
Los Angeles' department of human genetics, feel that 15 percent is reasonable for the Western
world.55
If men are surprised at these percentages but women not so, that might explain why women are more
forgiving of their wayward men than men are of their women: The ladies know something that their
significant others do not.
Considered in light of long-held views about sexual behavior, it exposes the myth of female monogamy and
utterly shakes the assumption that women are biologically driven to single-mate
bliss.55
Factor it into genealogical attempts to trace ancestry and it can snap entire branches from a family
tree.55
Presuming a pedigree error of 10 percent, an individual has less than 50 percent chance of being
genetically related to any male in the family tree further back than six generations (roughly 150
years); With the 15 percent figure, don't bother going back more than four generations (a century).
• A Simple Model
A simple model with reasonable assumptions can deliver probabilistic predictions of cheating over a large
population. The model here assumes no birth control when the husband and wife are coupling, but birth control
is used when she is coupling with her lover. Typical failure rates are 15 percent for condom use and 5
percent for oral contraception (the pill) over the course of one
year.58
The model uses a composite average of 10 percent failure rate, corresponding to 90 percent effectiveness for
pregnancy prevention. Another assumption takes advantage of the likelihood for a woman, according to sexual
behaviour expert Judith Lipton, "to conceive with a fresh partner because a woman can essentially develop
antibodies against her regular partner's sperm, so that she may be more likely to be impregnated by fresh
sperm"55
presuming she does not couple with her lover as much as with her regular partner, a good strategy if she
is not to arouse suspicion. The 10 percent pedigree error is also
assumed.59
The model predicts a minimum rate of cheating in the general population of wives of 30 percent if
the rate of coupling with lovers is on par with that with husbands: A typical cheating rate is 50
percent under that condition. If coupling with a lover is only half the rate as that with the husband, the
minimum cheating rate is 60 percent with the typical rate approaching 100
percent.59
These predictions are rough confirmations of high percents values arrived at by other means, as
quoted earlier.
• Not Just Humans
In part, researchers figured females would be deterred from cheating since they had more to lose than
a male by fooling around -- their mate might stop foraging to feed the hungry offspring, cutting off the
animal equivalent of child support, or worse, turn violent. Yet this, he said, seems only to have inspired
females to perfect the art of secrecy and deception: They persistently sneak off in search of stronger
genes, better feeding grounds, or good providers and protectors. These trysts may have been overlooked, said
Frances Burton, an anthropologist at the University of Toronto, because the researchers were often male.
"There is a weird double feedback thing that goes on when it comes to observing animals, particularly
non-human primates. We impose upon the observations human prejudices . . . it can obfuscate whatever truth
there is."55
DNA testing has eliminated all but 3 percent of 4,000 mammalian species that might be monogamous. But none of this
should imply that humans are incapable of monogamy, Barash adds. "Saying something is natural is often used to
justify unacceptable behavior. It's natural to poop on the floor, but we spend a lot of time becoming house
broken."55
Borash's wife, Dr. Judith Lipton, however, says the moral transgression of infidelity cannot compare with
the deception of lying about paternity. She thinks paternity fraud should be considered a crime of the
highest order. "Reproductive deception is morally similar to rape. "If you trick someone into raising a baby
not his own, and he puts 20 years of his life into an endeavor based on a falsehood, that is appalling. If
I were the queen of the world, birth control, of any form, would be available to any woman who wants it
and DNA testing would be available for all the men so that they would know who their babies
are."55
• Medical Ethics And Pedigree Errors
Dickens firmly believes that people who undergo genetic tests to find out about paternity are entitled
to such information. But he says those being tested for a genetic ailment or some other inherited
trait cannot expect the same: "It's not for geneticists to spring this information upon them. The
point is, when you are testing for a particular trait, it's either there or it's not there, and there
is no need to say why it is or why it isn't." Some fathers, of course, feel differently. Stacy Robb,
founder and president of the support group DADS Canada, said that "it's unfair because the doctors
come across this information and they don't tell the man listed as the father on the birth
certificate. It's a disregarding of men's rights. The point is mothers and fathers are not treated
equally."55
They have a point. The paradigmatic situation is that three people come to the hospital together, a
husband, a wife, and their child who they fear has cystic fibrosis. If the child has the incurable
disease she must have received two copies of the CF gene, one from each parent. Tests confirm the
families worst fears -- she has the disease -- but also reveal something unexpected. The child's
mother carries one of the culprit genes, but the father's DNA shows no such sign, which means he
is not the carrier and therefore cannot possibly be her biological
father.56
Typically, the hospital staff keeps the secret from him, but when they tell the mother, it rarely
comes as a surprise. If the case involves an expectant mother the hospital's legal obligation is
clear, says Cheryl Shuman, director of genetic counseling at the Hospital for Sick Children in
Toronto: The developing baby is considered part of the mother and the results of the tests therefore
belong to her. After birth, the course of action is less clear, she says, but lawyers advise that
the child is to be considered the patient, whose needs trump those of the parents. Since telling
the father could trigger a breakup and leave the child without proper support, the hospital keeps
the secret. Sometimes the secret can be a whopper. In one family with four daughters, the DNA
analysis was so surprising that counselors asked the mother to explain. "It turned out that the
daughters had three different fathers," said Peter Ray, a scientist at the
hospital.55
Bernard Dickens is wrong. He is in favor of lying to the duped dads, lying by
omission. Fatherhood is both a social reality and a genetic reality. Favoring one to the
exclusion of the other is unethical and unprofessional, and should be illegal. Allowing the mother's deceit
to continue is no different than allowing a lingering infection to fester, hoping it will cure itself without
treatment by not informing the patient of his true condition. That's a head-in-the-sand approach at best,
medical malpractice at worst. There is an infection in the marriage that produced the pedigree error, and
allowing it to percolate further in secret may well make things worst in the relationship. Better to give
the husband the option to deal with it (or not) in his own way while it may still be curable.
The lawyers advising the hospital are presuming to know better than those involved, rewarding the mother for
her successful lie. They are effectively operating as a secret tribunal, where the victim is convicted
of a crime committed against him. If they were to operate in court with the same attitude as they have
towards duped dads, withholding evidence (another example of lying by omission), they
would be at severe risk of contempt of court and of losing their license to practice law.
The courts are wrong to insist upon a common law that made sense 500 years ago but has been superseded by modern
knowledge and technology. Back then, there was no other way to determine paternity, so the presumption was
quite practical. Today, it is unethical to insist upon an outdated "practicality" based on ignorance when we
know better and can easily do better. It may well be in the best interests of the pedigree error child to
consider its true paternity while evaluating the fitness of the mother to be the custodial parent and whether
she may be responsible enough to properly administer the child support money from the duped dad.
Dr. Lipton is right: Reproductive deception is the moral equivalent of
rape, as well as fraud. Consider the following analogy:
Suppose two cars have an accident, the second car irresponsibly overtaking the first, sideswipping it, and running
it into a tree. The driver of the first car has a concussion and develops permanent amnesia about the events
leading to the accident and immediately after. The driver of the second car takes advantage of the first's
amnesia and successfully sues him for his own injuries and damage. The first driver's insurance rates increases
precipitously for years thereafter. His medical and legal bills pile up for decades. The police discover a video
recording of the accident after the court case has concluded, vindicating the first driver, but decide it's a
moot point to disclose its existence: Too much hassle and paperwork to reopen a case that has already been
satisfactorily closed. This example could be labeled "accidentive" deception, the legal
equivalent of protected fraud. The duped driver is paying for an accident not of his
doing, and paying for it for a long time, like the duped dad. The reckless driver has gotten
something for nothing, and no one else officially knows, like the lucky lover. The duped
driver may or may not wonder why he was driving so badly to cause the accident, out of character
for him, and what to do differently in the future, never knowing he did nothing wrong. Worse, though,
is the reckless driver who may likely think he can continue to escape the consequences of his
recklessness. The duped driver deserves better from the reckless driver and from the
police, just like the duped dad deserves better from the lucky lover, from his
cheating wife, and the DNA testers. This is a no brainer. Reproductive
deception is the moral equivalent of rape.
• Nature Is No Excuse
Cheating is breaking the rules. If promises are made to observe monogamy, then keep to
those promises. If those promises cannot be kept, then do the adult thing and admit to the failure.
Let the chips fall where they may, pay the price for what has been purchased by breaking the rules.
Do the ethical thing.
Perhaps the rules may be renegotiated (but don't bet on it). On the other hand, if no rules have been
broken, there is no cheating: If the husband and wife of a given marriage have different rules
than most, such as having no restriction on extramarital flings that are not a secret from each other,
then sex outside the marriage is not cheating. Similarly, if a marriage is dissolved by divorce or death,
sexual liaisons with others is not cheating on the ex/dead-spouse.
Know the rules. Abide by them. Renegotiate them if necessary and possible. Within a marriage,
the rules, the agreements, and the process of arriving at rules and agreements need not be public.
Neither do following or breaking the rules. But little should be kept secret from a Significant
Other. Big secrets like cheating do not promote stable relationships, the very definition
of marriage.
One last collective point. Ladies, bide your tongues about complaining of your men's wandering eyes
and hands. You are at least as guilty of failing to keep your panties on around men as your men are
at keeping their zippers up around women. And when it comes to lying, you've been caught out.
Gentlemen, keep your zippers up. So what that your women have a high likelihood of playing
around behind your back, that's no excuse for you to reciprocate. Marriage is not a game of
one-ups-manship cheating. Couples, start communicating with high integrity,
honesty, and fairness. Follow the rules, all of them, all the time. If one or both
of you cannot play by the rules, either change the rules by mutual agreement or get out of the
corrupt relationship.
Discussion and Summary
Every segment of society is involved with cheating and it's consequences. Cheaters are at least
a near-majority of every age bracket, every income bracket, every profession, every business category,
every social institution (i.e., marriage), and every organization (including religion). Protests of denial
are naive, devious, and/or hypocritical. The hypocrisy of exceptionalism is rampant, the idea that
"cheating is bad ... but not for me."
Then there are those who don't even know what is and what is not cheating. Somehow,
children can get all the way through college without knowing the definition of cheating, or why
it's bad. Many of those who do know think there is nothing wrong with it, or don't care. The people
or groups that are the most prevalent cheaters are those who least need to cheat to succeed
or have the greatest to lose if they're caught: Businessmen, religious leaders, students, and spouses.
Cheating is so widespread now that even the cheaters are being cheated, and many
of them don't know it! Unfortunately, cheating the cheaters does not cancel out the
damage: Entropy never decreases and cheating definitely increases entropy.
Sure, there are some differences between various groups of students when it comes to cheating. Students
at religious schools cheat slightly more than at others, 10 percent or so. Student leaders steal
slightly less than nonleaders, 10 percent or so. Big deal! The point is the percentages are way too high.
It's not worth splitting hairs. Anything higher than single digit percents is too high. From that
perspective, cheating in all student groups is four to seven times too high. And they carry that bad
habit with them after graduation. Look at business: Calling what they do there normal business practice
is a cop out, a lazy cop out at that.
It's seems amazing that civilization in general, let alone business in particular, works as well as it does,
for all the burden cheating creates for it. Apparently, society is so accustomed to cheating
it no longer sees it as anything other than normal. It's really immature, uncivilized, and selfish. It
contributes to the dumbing down of society, perhaps going as far as evolving into an idiocracy. (Let's
hope not. Rent the movie Idiocracy. You'll go to sleep depressed.) It may be only by good luck
that society has not yet hit the threshhold below which the system collapses.
Cheating is childish behavior. By the time children are in middle school, there really is no excuse
for it. But it is excused nevertheless. Too much pressure to "succeed." Everyone else is doing it. Huge
rewards for those who get away with it. The punishment is so little that it's worth it. Too much effort
to do things yourself. I want it now. I don't like him/her/them. Rules are for other people. It won't
hurt anybody. They can afford it. I've got mine, who cares about them.
After age seven, cheating could be considered sociopathological behavior. Of course, most
cheaters are not really sociopaths, but they surely act like it by their actions and
rationalizations. The fact they rationalize their cheating actually demonstrates hope, though.
It shows higher intellectual capability and conscience, even if they aren't using either. True
sociopaths don't bother to rationalize.
Cheaters don't clean up the mess they leave behind. That job goes to the noncheaters. A depressing job.
In fact, most of the real work in the world, the real accomplishments, are done by the noncheaters, the
naive, flexible, patient, reliable "chumps." Perhaps they were what Le Baron Russell Briggs had in mind when
he said "[M]ost of the work of the world is done by people who aren't feeling well."
What will it take for us collectively to realize what we are doing to ourselves, and to do something about
it? Great shocks like war or big frauds like Enron and the subprime mortgage debacle don't seem to work.
It's always "somebody else's fault." Our own impatience and unwillingness to look at ourselves gets in
the way.
We have to start doing things differently, each of us on our own. Stop cutting corners, don't take credit
for other's work, do more than the minimum required of you, pay it forward, actively teach your children
to do the same, passively set an example of high integrity. Stop cheating. Don't tolerate
cheating in others. Point it out to them. Be a whistle blower if necessary.
For example, perhaps we could use billboards or 15-second television commercials to teach the public, to
illustrate with the simplest phrases and the most eye-catching cartoons and animations, what constitutes
lying, stealing, and cheating. Perhaps role playing in the grade schools could teach
the bad consequences of cheating to young children. For big time adult cheaters or small time
repeat cheaters, send them back to a special "grade school" to learn what they didn't learn the
first time around, a Kindergarten for convicted CEOs and thieves. Perhaps it could be a deep immersion
Kindergarten, where they experience the receiving end of lying, stealing, and
cheating, that is, anger, frustration, ruin, and embarrassment. After learning the consequences
of others' bad behavior, experiencing the consequences of other's good behavior could more readily
induce them to learn the Ethics of Reciprocity, otherwise known as the Golden Rule, the
subject of the next, and last, major section of this article.
The approach of this section, about the Golden Rule, is a major departure from that of the previous
three sections. The lying, stealing, and cheating sections dealt with concrete
definitions and specific behaviors to avoid. The Golden Rule deals with behavior
that should be embraced, without going into specific concrete definitions of that behavior.
As such, it prescribes voluntary action of support that is intended to promote similar action of others
in response.
Ethic Of Reciprocity
The Historical Golden Rule In Religion And Philosophy
The sentiment behind the Golden Rule can also be seen as expressed by Homer in either the 8th or
9th century BCE. In the Odyssey, a character states "I will be as careful for you as I should be for
myself in the same need" (Book 5 Verses
184-191).60
Other examples of the Golden Rule in ancient Greek
philosophy:3
The Golden Rule in Native American
Spirituality:60
In the movie Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, the "not too smart" heroes coined a few sayings that
supposedly altered the future, one of which is "Be excellent to each other". It is a wonderful modern version
of the Golden
Rule.61
One might say that it's a most excellent version.
Benjamin Franklin And The 12 Foot Spoons
There was a man who died and was being taken to heaven by angels, stopping at hell on the way. The angels took
him to a place where there was a great bowl, so great that it was as big as a lake. The bowl was filled with
a nutritious stew. All the way around the sides of this bowl were people. Emaciated, starving, miserable
people. These people had spoons to eat the stew with, that were long enough to reach it from the shore
(about 12 feet). The trouble was, while they could scoop up the stew into the spoon, they could not get it
into their mouths because the spoons were so long the stew would fall off before they could get it to
their mouths. So here were all these pathetic people, suffering and moaning in agony, constantly trying
to eat the food that was abundantly in front of them - all in vain. Next, the angels took the man to
heaven. To his surprise, he saw the same scene! There it was, a giant lake-like bowl of the same stew,
surrounded by people with 12 foot long spoons. Yet something was different here - all these people
were smiling, happy, and healthy looking!
"What is the difference here that these people are happy and well fed?" the man asked the angels.
They replied, "Have you not eyes to see?" The man looked more carefully, and observed that one person would
scoop up the stew, and bring it to the mouth of another. Then someone else would scoop up stew and feed it to
the other.
The angels smiled and said, "Here the people feed each other. Here are the people that learned the way of Love."
The story is a bit of an exaggeration of the Golden Rule, of course, but it demonstrates it's prime
point: Helping others has a boomerang effect of helping self if there is a willingness to voluntarily initiate
the effort. The story is also an oversimplification of the rule, whose application in real life can become at
once subtly difficult and socially damaging if care is not taken. Before that can be explained, it's
necessary to look into the details of the Golden Rule from the point of view of logic.
The Silver Rule
To apply it, you'd imagine yourself in the exact place of the other person on the receiving end of the
action. If you act in a given way toward another, and yet are unwilling to be treated that way in the
same circumstances, then you violate the
rule.63
This particular version includes the positive Golden Rule and the negative Golden
Rule, which are, loosely
speaking:63,64
Sometimes, the positive version only is called the Golden Rule (which will now be labeled the
Reduced Golden Rule), while the negative version is called the Silver
Rule.64
The Reduced Rule is a rule of initiative, while the Silver Rule is one of constraint.
However, consistency requires that both must be followed simultaneously in order for either to be sensible.
To do this, knowledge and imagination is needed: Knowledge to know what effect our actions
have on the lives of others, and imagination to insert ourselves, vividly and accurately, in the
other person's place on the receiving end of the
action.63
• The Platinum Rule And The Indium Rule
The Platinum and Indium Rules have their detractors, with good reason. How does one know how others
want to be treated? Asking may not work if they are not in a position to answer or they have not reached a
particular and relevant understanding. Guessing won't always work either. Their tastes may not be the
same,3
their values may encompass quite different needs, priorities, and environments. Because of these potential
incompatibilities, these rules are not worth further consideration as a general rule of conduct. Of course,
if one can reliably determine their tastes and values, there sometimes may be an ethical duty to treat them
accordingly.
The Inclusive Rule
The Golden Rule As Theorem
Golden Rule:
Treat others only in ways that you are willing to be treated in exactly similar situations.
The positive and negative versions are implied, the term "others" means everyone (absolutely no
exceptions, that is, no exclusions whatsoever), and the phrase "exactly similar situations" means those
situations in which the roles are reversed but where the situations are otherwise VERY similar, and similar
only for those factors that are relevant to the situation and actions in
question.65
Gensler uses a form of symbolic logic to prove the validity of the Golden Rule, using axioms, theorems,
and corollaries of rationality, prescriptivity, and
universality.65,66
Basically, he requires all actions that affect others to be self-consistent, good for everyone,
every situation, and in every "direction." The Golden Rule does not say what should or should
not be done. It does say that the actions we perform that involves others must be internally consistent,
no contradictory elements of the actions. In other words, it requires conscientiousness and
impartiality.65
• Relevant Factors
For example, the time of day or season of the year likely would not be relevant as to whether to help an.
injured stranger stop a bleeding wound. On the other hand, it might well be relevant that a tornado is
bearing down. The color of the hat the stranger may or may not be wearing is also unimportant. (It'll
probably be lost to the wind anyway.) Generally, gender, religion, political view, education level, and
economic status should have no bearing on the Golden Rule. It should make no difference whether
one dislikes the person. The following illustrative story is true.
A very partisan man, in a crowd gathered to see the President of
the United States, was one of several that tackled a man who had heckled the President and had thrown an
egg at him. He was furious at the man's display of disrespect and the danger he represented to the highest
office-holder in the land. The gathering happened in 1948, the President was Harry S Truman, and the partisan
man was a life-long diehard republican. His friends and family were astonished. In a small but important
way, he had followed the Golden Rule by going to the assistance of a democrat, a political
arch-enemy. His explanation was simple, "He was the President." His political views were
irrelevant. (The partisan man was my grandfather. -sfj)
• Exactly Similar Situations
To answer this question, consider the following analogy. The fast flow of water in a river channel is
continuous from one moment to the next and from one spot to a neighboring spot, but there are lots of
microvariations of speed and direction from turbulence and eddys. Yet for all this random variation on a
small scale, the flow of the river in general is unchanged on the average. The effects of turbulence is
smoothed out by averaging over periods and volumes that are large as compared to the scale lengths of
the individual whirlpools and eddy currents that comprise the turbulence. The resulting viscosity and
mixing effects are what is experienced by a swimmer or a boat. That experience in the water is what
could be described as exactly similar from one time and place to the next. The individual
splashing and water drops may be different, but the net effect is the same. A huge number of extremely
tiny variations are not individually experienced because they contribute collectively only as a single
whole effect, a single factor. Swimming or boating on the same part of the river at the same time of
the year during the same kind of weather leads to exactly similar situations.
Exactly similar situations so far as the Golden Rule is concerned have the same description.
Many tiny variations of relevant factors are unimportant when their collective effect is macroscopically
identical. If the variations occur on a scale so small they are undetectable, close enough. If the
averages of variations from moment to moment are undetectable, close enough. That means
something like 99.999% similar is close enough. Even that is probably overkill. Likely 99.98%
similar is close enough to being close enough.
• Self-Consistent Actions
Self-consistent means internally consistent. A self-consistent process (whether
abstract, mechanical, political, theoretical, ...) has no internal contradictions, no internal elements or
rules at odds with other internal elements, no outcomes that negate the initiative. No paradoxes arise when
a self-consistent set of actions is engaged. Each element is always active: There is no disable
option to artificially turn off some or all elements at the whim of the operator, no artificial
exceptions. All the elements operate in harmony without spiraling upward into a destructive explosion
or downward to a null result. There is a technical description for such a self-sustaining process:
A self-consistent process is a stable process, neither accelerating into a runaway
outcome that is unsustainable nor extinguishing itself to nothing.
A classic illustrative example of a paradox occurs in a science fiction setting, involving time travel. A man goes
back in time to kill his grandfather before his grandfather has the chance to meet his grandmother. As a result,
the man's father is never born and neither is he. Which means he is not around to go back to kill his
grandfather to prevent his own father from being born. Which then means he is eventually available to go
back and kill his grandfather. And so on. An infinite loop of contradiction is created, from which there
is no escape or resolution. The cause-and-effect actions of the time traveling man is internally
inconsistent, self-contradictory, a paradox.
Because of this projected time travel paradox, it has been hypothesized by theoretical physicists that either
all time travel is impossible because they can create self-contradictory time loops, or (more likely) only
certain instances of (self-consistent) time loops are possible. A third possibility could exist, an
explosion of alternative time lines that the fabric of space-time might not be able to sustain. To pursue
all three of these possibilities further and their relation by analogy to the Golden Rule, consider
the concept of feedback.
An engineering design process called feedback control theory attempts to mimic the structure of nature
to create machines and processes that are inherently stable. A engineered stable process or machine runs
continuously without constant adjustment or tinkering from outside and does so without destroying itself
and without requiring to turning itself off to maintain stability or prevent its own destruction. In
principle, any unstable process can be made stable, and any stable process can be made more stable. This
is accomplished by providing one or more negative feedback loops. A feedback loop is
constructed by taking information from the output of a process and feeding it back to the input of that
process. A negative feedback refers to sending the negation of the output information to the
beginning to mitigate any overdriving (or underdriving) from the input. Negative feedback promotes
stability, positive feedback promotes instability.
A simple example is an electric motor with a feedback loop. The motor is set to a certain rotational speed.
However, perhaps due to variations of the input power voltage or the environmental temperature, it starts
rotating faster. A tachometer detects this increase, and sends a feedback signal back to the input to slow
down. It stops sending the signal when the desired speed is reached. If it slows down too much, the
feedback signal tells it to speed up. The negative feedback always pushes the motor toward the desired
(stable) speed. Without the feedback loop, the motor may run erratically, it may run so fast that if
burns out, or it may not run at all. With positive feedback, it will either come to a halt or pick up
speed until it flies apart.
In the Golden Rule, the phrase "... only in ways that you are willing to be treated ..." plays the role of the
negative feedback loop. It prevents faulty outcomes from occuring as a result of inconsiderate input
initiatives, and it corrects small errors of good intention that can produce unintended consequences.
It tends to prevent efforts that may be wasted (a null result), it tends to prevent efforts that may lead to
acrimonious feelings and reprisals (resentful or destructive responses), and it tends to fine-tune efforts to
produce effects that are acceptable to everyone involved (universally acceptable results). It creates the
self-consistency and robustness required to make the Golden Rule a universal rule of behavior.
Others And "Others"
In the preferred embodiment of the Golden Rule, "Treat others only in ways that you are willing
to be treated in exactly similar situations," everyone in the world is to be treated the same way as everyone
else. The others referred to in the Rule are human beings in need. It does not say some
others, it does not say others sometimes, it does not say others some places. There are no
qualifications beyond being homo sapiens sapiens to be considered an other with respect to
the Golden Rule. That is what makes it a universal rule.
Unfortunately, sometimes for some people others means "others" like themselves only. For example, the Old
Testament version of the Golden Rule, "Love your neighbor as thyself," referred to Jews with Jewish
neighbors. However, Jesus certainly stretched this in his version of the Golden Rule in the New Testament by
including the parable of the Good Samaritan. Thus others then included not only Jews but also
Gentiles.60
Nowhere in the Koran is there an expression of the Golden Rule. Because of its absence there, Islam
is the only major religion where the Golden Rule is not held to be central to its theology. Muslims
are typically surprised to learn their faith does not teach it. There is, however, a very restricted version
of the principle of reciprocity found in the Hadiths. The Hadiths are a non-binding collection of sayings
and acts of Mohammed and his companions. They have much less authority than the Koran, but contain a
version of the Golden Rule which applies only among "brother" Muslims. This Islamic "brotherhood
rule" does not apply to non-Muslims. (A non-Muslim is not to be addressed as "brother" by a Muslim.)
The Koran itself makes that clear (Koran 48:29). Islam denies the universality of the
Golden Rule because it starts with the division of all humanity into two different groups:
Islamic and non-Islamic. Every aspect of Islamic ethics is based upon this
separation.60
A reasonable conjecture would be that the lack of a universal Golden Rule in Islam would be a surprise
to non-Muslims also. However, from a historical perspective, perhaps we should not be surprised. Christianity
was quite intolerant of other religions for the vast majority of its history in spite of its own teachings.
The Crusades were wars on Islam, explicitly sanctioned by the Christian church. The mistreatment of Jews
was frequently claimed to be justified by Christian theology. Indeed, Christianity has been at war with
itself, leading to schisms within, as has Islam. Perhaps the development of a truly universal Golden
Rule is the result of cultural and religious (and political) maturation that requires time to
evolve, an ongoing process within all faiths and societies.
Individuals can also fail to universally apply the Golden Rule, often without realizing it. There
are several ways that such a failure can become established (misunderstanding the concept, misdefinition, lack
of proper attention, failure to connect the concept to a real-life situation, for examples) but there are only
two ways it can continue: Habit and inexperience. Bad habits are notoriously difficult to break,
and one often needs help from family or friends to identify them. Sometimes, experiencing the effects of the
Golden Rule can highlight one's own failure to think of it as something that should be good for
everyone, making it a learning moment. More often, though, the general accumulation of life's
experiences eventually exposes one's own misapplication of the Rule. Either way, the key is to
recognize those learning moments, and to take appropriate advantage of them.
Discussion And Summary
Before taking any action with the Golden Rule in mind, take a few moments to
think of yourself in their place. Make it a habit. Even better, make it a habit even when not considering a
Golden Rule Act. It might lead you to decide that action is appropriate after all. Third parties
are also potentially affected, so considering yourself in the place of a third party is important, too. A
negative effect on a third party may require a Golden Rule Act that we might not have otherwise done.
Such an act could be as simple as merely suggesting an equivalent alternative to a second party to prevent
or mitigate an adverse outcome for an unrelated third party. On the other hand, such an act may be as
provocative as intervening on behalf of a third party. Golden Rule Acts need not involve personal
physical acts; Simply calling attention to some particular situation is enough, especially if you do
not have the resources to deal with it yourself.
The Golden Rule requires us to have the proper attitude for doing the right thing regardless of the
immediate popularity or unpopularity of the act. It's the long term effects of your acts of kindness that is
important, for there is where the ultimate effect occurs for paying it forward. The best example of
the Golden Rule as applied by society at large is teaching our children, at home, in the schools
and universities, and on the job as apprentices, how to be productive, patient, and to get along with
others. As parents, teachers, and employers, we have to be patient and understanding ourselves as our
children learn and mature, making us examples of the skills and virtues we want to pass on.
The Golden Rule also means allowing others to take appropriate advantage of your own skills, possessions,
and knowledge. Of course, if you are a professional with a service or product to sell, there is an obligation
to yourself and to your business to expect compensation. Even here, the Golden Rule expects you not to
gouge your customers by demanding too much in compensation, most especially of those in immediate need.
You don't have to wait for Golden Rule situations to happen before you think about what you could do.
Think ahead, do some preemptive planning. Think about what situations you could find yourself
in where you would appreciate a bit of assistance, a little encouragement, a word of advice, or a modicum
of temporary protection. Then, when you see others in those situations, you no longer need to wonder what
to do or even if you should do anything. You have already decided. At that point, you need only carry out
your plan of action.
Everyone is entitled to an initial presumption of respect, whether by the Golden Rule or some
other mechanism. If you discover later that some individual is not deserving of your respect, you can
leave him or her behind with good conscience. But be fair about such a decision. When a person is in
great pain or anguish, sometimes their behavior may be atypical, unintentionally harsh, without being aware
of it. Patience and understanding is then the right attitude to muster. Don't rush to a
judgment of abandonment without first considering this possibility.
There is no good reason to not use the Golden Rule with other species. An animal in pain is also in need
of help or compassion. Many mammals have the capacity of self-awareness and intelligence as well as compassion:
Whales, dolphins, wolves, and gorillas, for example. They also display reciprocity of compassion and
protection, to their own kind and sometimes even to humans. Dogs and dolphins are well known for assisting
humans in need. If and when extraterrestrial life and intelligence is discovered (or they discover us), it
is a safe bet they will also have developed their own version of the Golden Rule, and it will be
similar to ours.
Don't let others succeed in forcing you to use only their version of the Golden Rule (presuming
they have one). Not family, not friends, not organizations, not religion. Often enough, they have their own
purposes that may be at odds with the universal value of the Golden Rule. Think for yourself. Think
"outside the box." Be above the petty excuses and prejudices of others when following the Rule (or
any other aspect of ethics for that matter). Be an example of good character, set a high
standard, by applying the Golden Rule to everyone.
Being ethical is not always easy. In fact much of the time, it is difficult, time consuming, or
expensive. Consider the classic parable of the Good Samaritan. A traveler is mugged and left injured
and in pain. Several travelers pass by him but refuse to help, including some who should have known better.
A stranger with no particular obligation or expertise stops to assist the injured man, treating his wounds
and taking him to an Inn to recover, paying for his stay there until he can travel. The stranger's actions
satisfies both the affirmative and constraining parts of the Golden Rule. He decides
that he would want someone to help him and would not want others to ignore him in that situation.
His decision to act was relatively easy for him, but it did cost him time and money.
Consider now a different situation. A child is painfully dying but could be saved by blood transfusions. Her
parents refuse to authorize the transfusions for personal or religious reasons. There appears to be an
ethical dilemma. The intentions of the Good Samaritan who brings the child to the doctors, who
then have an obligation to treat her, are at odds with her parents' preferences. Whose wishes prevail? For
a young child, it's not that difficult to decide. She is not yet capable of determining what is in
her own best interests. She knows only she is in pain, and may know what her parents wishes are but
not why. The Golden Rule tells us to carry out the transfusions. There is considerable
legal precedent that supports this action. To withhold medical care from a young child is parental
abuse, and is illegal.
The situation gets dicey if the dying child is in mid-adolescence but still younger than the age of majority.
She may or may not yet be capable of knowing what is in her own best interests or understand why her
parents would have medical help withheld. It's important to make this distinction because a Golden Rule
Act is applied to the child, not the parents. If it is determined by someone properly
qualified that she is capable of making her own life and death decisions, then the ethical thing to
do is let her decide. Regardless of what the decision is or who makes it, someone will be disappointed.
That's what makes good intentioned ethical decisions difficult sometimes. There is no where near
as difficult a situation if she is a legal adult with a sound mind. Unless, of course, she is unconscious
and time is of the essence. Then, in the absence of a prior directive, placing yourself in her
place is the ethical approach.
The Golden Rule is only a policy, a guideline. It helps govern our own behavior towards others in terms
of how we want to be treated. We are not islands in a sea of people, but members of a village. Look after the
village in whatever capacity you have, and it will look after you.
TRUSTWORTHINESS AND RESPECT REVISITED
The remainder of this article discusses other aspects of ethics. It is not meant to be an in depth
account, but merely provide an outline for further study. It is presented only for the sake of completeness.
Trustworthiness
• Integrity
• Reliability
The second aspect of reliability to address potentially happens after a promise has been made.
Avoid bad-faith excuses. Interpret one's promises fairly and honestly. Don't try to
rationalize
noncompliance.1a
Failure to carry through on a promise, no matter what the cause, should be followed by an apology. If
an explanation is appropriate, it should always come after the apology. If the people to whom
the apology is addressed have any integrity themselves, they will accept the explanation much
more readily if they are done in that order.
• Loyalty
Respect
Civility, courtesy, and decency requires a respectful person to be an attentive listener
(which generates respect in return), but patience need not be endless. People need to make
informed decisions about their own lives. Dignity and autonomy requires us not to withhold
information they need to make those decisions. Everyone, including maturing children, should have a say
in the decisions that affect them. Judge others only on their character, abilities, and
conduct. Accept individual differences and beliefs without
prejudice.1a
The Other Four Pillars of Character
An accountable person is not a victim, does not shift blame, and does not claim credit for others' work, but
does lead by example. If others depend upon our knowledge, ability, or willingness to safely and effective
perform tasks, we must diligently pursue excellence by being reliable, careful, prepared, and
informed. Being responsible also means perseverance when necessary, finishing a task started
even as obstacles arise. Perhaps most important is exercising self-control, restraining passions
and appetites for the sake of longer-term vision and better judgment, and delaying immediate
gratification.1a
The highest form of caring for others is honest benevolence and altruism, not much different than
the Golden Rule, as is good
citizenship.1a
The most important of the last four pillars of character is fairness. Fairness is another
tricky concept, probably more subject to legitimate debate and interpretation than any other ethical value.
Disagreeing parties tend to maintain that there is only one fair position (their own, naturally). But
essentially fairness implies adherence to a balanced standard of justice without relevance to one's
own feelings or
inclinations.1a
How is that achieved?
Process is crucial in settling disputes, to reach the fairest results and to minimize complaints. A
fair person scrupulously employs open and impartial processes for gathering and evaluating information
necessary to make decisions. Fair people do not wait for the truth to come to them; They seek out
relevant information and conflicting perspectives before making important judgments. Fair decisions
are made with impartiality, without favoritism or
prejudice.1a
A sample Investigation Guidelines document illustrating a fair and transparent process of dispute
resolution is here.
Fairness also requires equity. For example, an individual, company, or society should correct
mistakes promptly and voluntarily. Also, it is improper to take advantage of the weakness or ignorance of
others.1a
Seven Step Path To Better Decisions
1. Stop And Think. The oldest advice in the world is think ahead, a powerful tonic
against poor choices and most especially for preventing foolish and impulsive behavior. Taking the time
to think about pending decisions also takes us out of the immediate situations where powerful desires or
pressures of hurriedness, or fatigue or ignorance, could push us into unwise
decisions.1a
Think ahead! What a concept. It's probably the best and simplest advice in the world, too.
A corollary idea is plan ahead. Anticipate some of the more obvious possibilities. It's not
hard, and it does take self-discipline, but the payoff makes the effort worth it. Theodore Roosevelt said
"Make preparations in advance. You never have trouble if you are prepared for it," and "Nine-tenths of
wisdom is being wise in time." Wisdom in hindsight is not worth much. Unless, of course, a lesson
is learned.
2. Clarify Goals. Before you choose, clarify your short- and long-term aims. Determine which are most
important.1a
3. Determine Facts. First resolve what you know, and then what you need to know. Be prepared
to get additional information, to verify assumptions, and to verify uncertain information
(that is, dubious "facts" offered). On that last point, we often discover that there are different versions
of the facts and disagreements about their meanings. Here are some
guidelines:1a
Getting the complete set of relevant facts is crucial. Robert A. Heinlein said it best:
What are the facts? Again and again and again -- what are the facts? Shun wishful
thinking, ignore devine revelation, forget what "the stars foretell," avoid opinion, care not what the
neighbors think, never mind the unguessable "verdict of history" -- what are the facts, and to how
many decimal places? You pilot always into an unknown future, facts are your single clue. Get the
facts!
4. Develop Options. Make a list of options and a set of actions. If you can think of only one or two
options, you're probably not thinking hard
enough.1a
5. Consider Consequences. Filter your choices through each of the Six Pillars of
Character. Eliminate unethical options. Identify the stakeholders and how the decision is
likely to affect them. Consider your choices from the perspective of the major
stakeholders.1a
6. Choose. If your choice is not immediately clear, talk to people whose judgment you respect, keeping
in mind the ultimate responsibility is still yours. If that avenue is not feasable, imagine what the most
ethical person you know do? "What would Gandhi
do?"1a
"What would Mr. Spock do?"
Consult your own conscience, too: What would you do if you were sure everyone would know? Choices that only
look good if no one knows are always bad choices. Character is revealed by how we behave when we think
no one is looking. And don't forget the Golden
Rule.1a
7. Monitor and Modify. Most hard decisions are based on imperfect information and predictions. So
many of them will be wrong. Keep track of their effects, and don't not be shy to modify them as new and
better information comes
along.1a
Obstacles to Ethical Decision Making: Rationalizations
If It's Necessary, It's Ethical. This is just a false assumption that says necessity breeds
propriety.1a
The False Necessity Trap. We tend to overestimate the cost of doing the right thing and underestimate
the cost of failing to do
so.1a
It's Just Part of the Job. Everyone's first job is to be a good
person.1a
I Was Just Doing It for You. This is a primary justification for committing "little white lies." This
rationalization overestimates other people's desire to be "protected" from the truth, when in fact most people
would rather know unpleasant information than believe soothing falsehoods. Consider the perspective of people
lied to: If they discovered the lie, would they thank you for being thoughtful or would they feel betrayed,
patronized, or
manipulated?1a
I'm Just Fighting Fire With Fire. When you fight fire with fire, you end up with the ashes of your own
integrity.1a
It Doesn't Hurt Anyone. This rationalization treats ethical obligations merely as factors to be
considered in decision-making, rather than as ground rules. Problem areas: Asking for or giving special favors
to family, friends, or public officials; Disclosing nonpublic information to benefit others; Using one's
position for personal
advantage.1a
Everyone's Doing It. This is a false "safety in numbers" rationale fed by the tendancy to uncritically
treat cultural, organizational, or occupational behaviors as if they were ethical norms, just because they are
norms.1a
I've Got It Coming. People who feel they are overworked or underpaid rationalize that minor "perks" --
such as acceptance of favors, discounts, or gratuities -- are nothing more than "fair" compensation for
services rendered. This is also used as an excuse to abuse sick time, insurance claims, overtime, personal
phone calls and personal use of office
supplies.1a
I Can Still Be Objective. By definition, if you've lost your objectivity, you can't see that you've lost
your objectivity!1a
Professional Codes Of Ethics
So why have a professional Code of
Ethics?67
The IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineeers), the AIChE (American
Institute of Chemical Engineers), and the AITP (Association of Information Technology
Professionals), for example, have codes that mostly restate the generic ethical principles that everyone
should have. Other professional societies go too far in their Codes of Ethics by detailing specific
procedures and behavior. Such detailed manuals are really Codes of Conduct, Statements of
Values, Mission Statements, and policies. There is nothing wrong with them and they are
appropriate, but they are not Codes of Ethics.
On the other hand, the SPJ (Society of Professional Journalists) seems to have a Code of
Ethics between these two extremes. General ethical guidelines are applied generally to journalism without
going into too much detail, hence allowing for flexibility and adaptability. All four Codes are
here.
This is an ever expanding list of books and articles that are relevant to this article.
1. Josephson Institute of Ethics,
www.josephsoninstitute.org
Last Updated February 25, 2010.
Respect is the right of everyone to be treated with Dignity, even unpleasant people. The
Golden Rule is the classic summary of treating others with respect. But be careful: The
Rule is more complicated in its application than generally believed. Respect prohibits violence,
humiliation, manipulation, and exploitation; It embraces civility, decency, courtesy,
dignity, autonomy, tolerance, and
acceptance.1
Being responsible means being in charge of one's choices in life, understanding that one's actions
matter, and we are on the hook for the consequences. We are accountable by not shifting blame or
claiming credit for the work of others, and by recognizing complicity with iniquity and wrongdoing
when nothing is done to stop it. Responsibility also means finishing that which we have started and
doing our best. Further, it means self-restraint, i.e., delay of gratification, never trying to "win
at any cost," and restraining lust, hatred, gluttony, greed, and fear for the sake of long term
vision and
judgment.1
Fairness is a difficult and tricky concept for most people, apparently, for it requires subscribing to
a balanced standard of justice without any reference to one's own feelings or inclinations. True
impartiality is sometimes hard for the best of us; That's why due process for dispute
resolution is critical. Another typical stumbling block is the failure to realize that there is almost always
more than one fair position or resolution. Fairness includes equity, the prompt and voluntary
correction of mistakes and the improper advantage taken of other's weakness or
ignorance.1
If we do not care for others, they become mere objects to be manipulated, and we feel no
obligation to be honest, fair, or respectful. Good citizenship is recognizing we are
part of a community within which we are obligated to know and obey its laws, and to stay
informed.1
Both Honesty and the Golden Rule deal with what we should do and what we should not do.
Honesty can be broken into three categories: No lying, no stealing, and no
cheating.1
The Golden Rule has two versions that must be satisfied simultaneously: Treat others as you
would have them treat
you,1
and Do not treat others as you would not have them treat you. In order to follow these
ethical guidelines, their terms must be understood.
To lie is to make statements that are untrue, when the falsity of such statements is
known or suspected by the speaker. A lie can be a genuine falsehood or a selective truth,
a lie by omission, or even the truth if the intention is to deceive or to cause an action
not in the listener's
interests.2
A lie (also called prevarication) is a type of deception in the form of an
untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others, often with
the further intention to maintain a secret or reputation, protect someone's feelings or to avoid a
punishment. To lie is to state something that one knows to be false or that one has not
reasonably ascertained to be true with the intention that it be taken for the truth by oneself or
someone
else.3
Startling to most people is that, in considering whether a statement is a lie, the least important
consideration is whether it is true! The more important considerations are, Did he believe it?
Did he intend to deceive? Was he trying to gain some advantage or to harm someone else? Is it
a serious matter, or a trivial one?2
Even a true statement can be considered a lie if the person making that statement is doing so to deceive.
It is the intent of being untruthful rather than the truthfulness of the statement itself that
is
considered.3
How can that be? If a completely truthful and accurate statement is deliberately delivered in a manner that
suggests that it should not be taken seriously, then it is a lie. Also, it is a lie when a
person accidentally makes a true statement when he thought it was false.
It's the intent to lie that makes it a lie.
Philosophers over the millennia have agreed that there is no good reason for lying. Their most
important arguments
are:3
1. Lying is a perversion of the natural faculty of speech, the natural
end of which is to communicate the thoughts of the speaker.
2. When one lies, one undermines trust in society.
A fabrication is a lie told when someone submits a statement as truth, without knowing for
certain whether or not it actually is true. Although a fabrication may be possible or plausible,
it is not based on fact. Rather, it is something made up, or it is a misrepresentation of the
truth. Examples of fabrication: A person giving directions to a tourist when the person doesn't
actually know the
directions.3
A bold-faced lie (often also referred to as bare-faced or bald-faced lie) is one
which is told when it is obvious to all concerned that it is a lie. For example, a child who has
chocolate all around his mouth and denies that he has eaten any chocolate has told a bold-faced
lie.3
There are political
statements that are way beyond exaggeration that would fall in this category.
One lies by omission by omitting an important fact, deliberately leaving another person
with a misconception. Lying by omission includes failures to correct pre-existing
misconceptions. An example is when the seller of a car declares it has been serviced regularly
but does not tell that an unrepaired fault was reported at the last
service.3
Another example of lying by omission happens when one person witnesses, or has knowledge of, a
lie by a second person to a third (who subsequently relies upon the veracity of the lie)
but does not inform the third person of the lie; Here, two people are lying to the third person.
A misleading statement is one where there is no outright lie, but still retains the purpose
of getting someone to believe in an untruth. Dissembling likewise describes the presentation
of facts in a way that is literally true, but intentionally
misleading.3
Sarcasm and obfuscation are frequently used to mislead or dissemble.
Contextual lies: One can state part of the truth out of context, knowing that without complete
information, it gives a false
impression.3
Quoting out of context is a classic example. Likewise, one can actually state accurate facts, yet
deceive with them. To say "yeah, that's right, I slept with your best friend" utilizing a sarcastic,
offended tone, may cause the listener to assume the speaker did not mean what he said, when in
fact he.
did.3
The seller of a product or service may advertise untrue facts about the product or service in order to
gain sales, especially by competitive advantage. This is consumer fraud. An example is the Illinois
Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act that holds a seller liable for omission of any
material fact that the buyer relies
upon.3
There are some lies that are considered acceptable for certain situations: The white lie,
the noble lie, the emergency lie, and the jocose
lie.3
But don't get in the habit of using them (except maybe the jocose lie), because it is a
slippery slope, and their proper use is quite rare. Even the jocose lie (lying in jest),
which includes teasing, sarcasm, and storytelling (especially tall tales), can
be misconstrued as true if the audience does not understand that it is not to be taken seriously. For example,
a deadpan delivery of a sarcastically humorous story told in a normally serious situation to a largely naive
audience runs the danger of being taken as a fact. (I personally experienced this phenomenon
frequently in a law school class taught by a very strict and purportedly humorless professor.
Most class members never knew these stories as jokes, and could not later be convinced that
they were jokes.)
Augustine of Hippo (St. Augustine) created a Taxonomy of Lies, listing in order of descending
severity:3
There are other categories of lies, too: Perjury, bluffing, exaggeration, puffery,
flattery, and lying by obsolete
language.3
They are important lies to avoid, but are not central to the purposes of this article.
Lies are not confined to humans. Koko the Gorilla had been known to lie to her handlers (using
American Sign
Language).2
Nor are lies confined to verbal language. Deceptive body language, such as feints that mislead
as to the intended direction of attack or flight, is observed in many species including wolves. A mother bird
deceives when it pretends to have a broken wing to divert the attention of a perceived predator
— including unwitting humans — from the eggs in its nest to itself, most notably the
killdeer.3
But these are defensive tactics, meant to protect others.
Lying is a learned habit: Evolutionary psychology is concerned with the theory of mind which people employ
to simulate another's reaction to their story and determine if a lie will be believable. The most
commonly cited milestone in the rising of this, what is known as Machiavellian intelligence,
is at the human age of about four and a half years, when children begin to be able to lie
convincingly. Before this, they seem simply unable to comprehend that anyone doesn't see the
same view of events that they do - and seem to assume that there is only one point of view
- their own - that must be integrated into any given
story.2
If we grew up and lived in total isolation, lies would not exist for lack of need; There would be
no one to lie to.
There are some regions in the United States (and likely in other countries, too) where "accidental"
miscommunication is a habit of a large fraction of society: Not saying what one means and not
meaning what one says. These are not lies, per se, more akin to sloppy speaking
by not choosing one's words carefully. Such miscommunication can have some similar effects as those
of a lie: Needless heated arguments with descending civility, where each side uses words and phrases
believing them to have meanings different than the other side assumes. I have witnessed verbal combatants
heatedly arguing in opposition to the other about some position in which they were in agreement (but did
not know it); Their disagreement arose from the words they were using, not the substance of the
argument. Another variation happens when two or more arguants are not arguing about the same thing.
The most common type of miscommunication, however, is when one or more members of a discussion attempts
to assert an opinion as a fact or conclusion. This is especially common among English language speakers; A
simple yet elegant solution to this problem is to speak and write only in a special subset of the English
language called E-Prime. To do so, however, requires abandoning lifelong bad habits of speech.
(The verb "to be" in all its forms is completely disallowed. This includes "be", "is", "isn't," "am", "are",
"aren't," "ain't," "was", "wasn't," "were", "weren't," "been" and "being," and their equivalent
contractions "'m", "'s", and "'re.") It's worth the effort since it promotes crystal clear
communication and carefully considered critical thinking, because in E-Prime it is
almost impossible to state an opinion as fact and it tends to prevent a speaker from making statements
that are false or are based on faulty logic and assumptions. (No, I am not speaking in E-Prime
here, not all of the time. I have not mastered it yet.) If you are interested in looking into
E-Prime, a few good places to start are
here,4
here,4
here,5
here,6
here,5
and here.3
Then, there are those who have excellent command of the language, but little understanding of the facts or
little inclination to defer to the facts. The best word to describe this phenomena is truthiness.
Truthiness is a term first used in its recent satirical sense by American television comedian
Stephen Colbert in 2005, to describe things that a person claims to know intuitively or "from
the gut" without regard to evidence, logic, intellectual examination, or facts. Colbert sought to
satirize the use of appeal to emotion and the "gut feeling" as a rhetorical device in contemporary
socio-political discourse. "We're not talking about truth, we're talking about something that seems
like truth – the truth we want to exist," he
explained.3
It used to be, everyone was entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. But that's not
the case anymore. Facts matter not at all. Perception is everything. It's
certainty.7
The grand daddy of all lies is the Big Lie. The Big Lie is a propaganda device
in which those in authority repeat an outrageous falsehood over and over; If there is no countervailing
voice exposing this Big Lie to the public, or if that voice is censored by the media, the Big
Lie is likely to be
believed.8
(The source of a Big Lie need not actually be in authority, but merely believe he
is in authority.) The Big Lie is a repeated distortion of the truth on a grand scale, especially
for propaganda
purposes.9
Paradoxically, a Big Lie is often easier to get people to believe than a smaller lie,
and more difficult for them to challenge even when facts support it. Propaganda is often
based on choosing some very large but comfortable lie which is hard to challenge - for social
status or other reasons - and spreading this throughout a whole
society.2
The idea is that you just keep repeating the same lie over and over, in spite of all arguments
or evidence to the contrary, until people believe it. Massive repetition is essential. (Think:
"Why do they keep running the same stupid commercials on TV, over and over and over again, ad
nauseum?")10
The difference between a Big Lie and a truthiness is the magnitude of the
lie's outrageousness and the effort invested to promote it. The Big Lie is a
truthiness of gigantic proportions.
There are many ways to lie, and many types of lies. Speech is not required to lie
(behavior is sufficient), nor is a falsehood needed (the truth will do!). What is required to
lie is the intent to deceive: What was the candidate liar thinking?
The liar may in fact believe the lie to be true. The manner of delivery
can be the source of the intent to lie. Failure to correct an untruth (even if the
falsehood comes from someone else) is a lie; Lying by omission is the least recognized
and least understood type of lie, and may be the most common.
In criminal law, theft (another word for stealing) is the illegal taking of another person's
property without that person's freely-given consent. The word is also used as an informal
shorthand term for some crimes against property, such as burglary, embezzlement,
larceny, looting, robbery, shoplifting, fraud and sometimes
criminal conversion. In some jurisdictions, theft is considered to be synonymous with
larceny; in others, theft has replaced
larceny.3
To steal
is to take the property of another wrongfully and especially as a habitual or regular practice,
to take or appropriate without right or leave and with intent to keep or make use of wrongfully, to
take away by force or unjust means, or to appropriate to oneself or beyond one's proper
share.11
Also, to steal
is to take (the property of another or others) without permission or right, esp. secretly or by
force, to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment, or to take, get,
or win insidiously, surreptitiously, subtly, or by
chance.12
The actus reus of theft is usually defined as an unauthorized taking, keeping or using of
another's property which must be accompanied by a mens rea of dishonesty and/or the intent to
deprive the owner or the person with rightful possession of that property or its use. In criminal law,
mens rea – the Latin term for "guilty mind" – is usually one of the necessary elements of a crime.
The standard common law test of criminal liability is usually expressed in the Latin phrase, actus
non facit reum nisi mens sit rea, which means that the act does not make a person guilty unless the
mind be also
guilty.3 (The
exception is strict liability crimes, not relevant to the topic at hand.) Mens rea is
the legal term for dishonest intent of theft, and is well defined in laws that deal with theft.
Specific forms of theft
include:3
To fully understand stealing requires also a full understanding of property, the object
upon which the act of theft is performed. In the context of stealing, the generic
term property is presumed to include 1.) money, 2.) labor, and 3.) specific
property (all three are included in the list above). Theft of money can involve
bank robbery, computer crime, economic espionage, embezzlement,
extortion, and tax evasion. Theft of labor is synonymous to theft
of services, the refusal to compensate for services contracted for and rendered.
Specific property (and the theft thereof) appears to be a straightforward
concept, but is not nearly so simple as most assume.
Ownership of property is concerned solely with control of the
property by its owner. Physical possession is unnecessary, and for some things, impossible. For
example, you can own but cannot physically possess such things as an automobile, a house, or land
(say, wrap your arms around it or physically put it into your pocket or purse). Further, you cannot
do just anything you wish with your property (drive the car you own on the left side of the road
in the U.S., shoot at anything or anyone you wish with the firearm you own, or pollute the ground water
below the land you own). But you can exclude others from using, occupying,
holding, or selling your property (e.g., disallow a neighbor from using your automobile or prevent
others from living in your house). Ownership of property is the right to exclude others
from enjoying the perks that come with owning that
property.13
From the perspective of ownership, possession could be physical possession (wearing shoes or
using an MP3 player placed in a pocket) or constructive possession (physically possessing
the deed to a house or a certificate of fractional interest in a business).
Property can be tangible property or intangible property. Tangible property
includes real property (land and the physical structures attached to it, such as a house or a tree)
and chattel (personal property, such as an automobile or a radio). Intangible property
includes intellectual property (patented inventions, copyrighted works,
trademarks, and trade secrets) and other (a catch-all category that includes
money, labor for hire, business interest, and personal
identity).13,14
The United States Constitution states, in Article I, Section 8, Clause 8,
The Congress shall have the Power ... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.
The Constitutional Clause is the bedrock of American copyright and patent
law.15
Intellectual property
law that the clause authorizes plays a vital role in furthering creativity by ensuring that inventors,
artists, and other creators will be able to profit from developing their work free from
infringement.14
From the very beginning, the founding fathers of the country recognized the need to create and protect
the rights of individuals to be creative and to reward them for their efforts. It was important to
them. Of the eight articles in the Constitution, they put copyright and patents
in the first, before addressing the executive and judicial branches and the States. Although
Congress sets up the enacting legislation, it is interesting that this is the first mention of
individual rights in the Constitution, even before the amendments that eventually came to be known
as the Bill of Rights. One of those rights is legal protection from
stealing, which is given the legal term infringement for copyright and
patents.
Copyright is a bundle of rights, each of which can be donated, sold, or assigned independently,
that attaches to any and every work of creative authorship. The copyright holder is entitled,
under 17 USC § 106, to exclusive use of the copyrighted material, including reproduction of the
works in any manner; preparation of derivative works; transfer of ownership; and public performance or
display. Further, the copyright holder has the right to sell, rent, or lease copies of the work
to the
public.14
A non-exclusive list of works of authorship that can be
copyrighted:14
Copyright protection does not cover ideas (including processes and procedures) but it does
cover the expression of ideas. There are many ways to express the same idea, and each
different expression of the same idea is separately copyrightable. In fact, it is possible to have two
different copyrighted works by two different authors of exactly the same expression of the same idea,
but only if they were created completely independent of each other. (This is not true for
patents,
though.)14
• There is no need to attach the author's name to the work (but it should be attached);
• There is no need to attach the copyright symbol © to the work (but it should be attached);
• There is no need to attach the year of the work's completion (but it should be attached);
• There is no need to publish the work (but it should be published);
• There is no need to register the work (but it should be registered).
Each of the five steps above makes the copyright protection better (by proving authorship) and easier
for remedies to infringement to be awarded to the copyright holder.
For an individual author, copyright protection is good for the life of the author plus
50 years. For the owner of works for hire, copyright protection is good for the
lesser of 75 years after publication and 100 years after
completion.14
During the term of protection,
the copyright holder has the exclusive use of the work (if the use is legal), and a perfect
right of exclusion of all others' use of the work. After the expiration of the copyright,
ownership of the work falls into the public domain.
There are exceptions to a copyright holder's right of exclusion, for very well defined and limited
uses. The fair use exception is set out in 17 USC § 107. For instance, a limited amount of material
can be quoted, e.g., in a scholarly article or book, in order to further the argument of the article or
give review readers a chance to form their own opinion of the work. Reproduction for criticism,
comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, or research is deemed
to be permissible fair use. So is
parody.14
Great care must be taken to not take too much of the copyrighted work, and the user must always
clearly identify the author. Failure to do either is an infringement (theft)
called plaigerism.
When a person buys a book, cd, dvd, computer file, or computer program,
for example, the purchaser owns only the medium upon which the copyrighted work resides,
not the words/phrases/chapters, notes/melody/arrangement, or images/composition/collection that represents
the content of the copyrighted work. The purchaser owns the paper, ink, glue, and cover of
the book but the expressions of the words printed on that paper are still owned by the author: The owner
of the physical book and the owner of the story are two different persons.
The book owner is further restricted to personal use only, reading it silently or aloud to a small
private group. Similarly for a motion picture dvd or music cd. However, what is not allowed, absent an
explicit agreement with the copyright holder, is public display, performance, or recitation.
No admission may be charged even for a small private gathering. Most important, there can be no
duplication for use by, viewing by, or performance for others. There can be no
copying for any purpose other than personal, private, archival, and nonprofit purposes.
Copying is stealing for any purpose than these personal uses.
Don't give away copies of music, photos, books, computer files, or computer programs to others, not even
to family members; It is illegal - it is theft of copyrighted property, infringement. It is
also a crime to remove or alter the digital watermark attached to digital files. File sharing
services are all subject to the same restrictions as individuals. All copyright holders have the
right to subpoena any internet service provider for the names and addresses
of alleged
infringers.14
The most common remedy to infringement is a court injunction to stop making copies and
distributing them. There can also be actual damages or statutory damages ($500 to $20,000, or
$750 to $150,000 for some infringements), and one year in prison plus $25,000 fine for
willful
infringement.14
Theft of copyrighted works is every bit as expensive for the thief as stealing an
automobile or robbing a bank.
Patent law is a very detailed and technical part of the law. Because of its cutting edge nature,
it is heavily science and engineering laden. In turn, its practitioners (patent
attorneys and patent agents) must be well schooled not only in the law but also in the
relevant branches of science and engineering. Since patent laws convey
property status to inventions and ownership to its inventors, it is
important for everyone to know something about patents, if only to avoid infringing
upon the property rights of inventors. Most people will have little opportunity to
infringe upon a patent, but just in case, the following paragraphs provide a minimal
description of invention ownership.
A patent, the second form of intellectual property protection provided for in the Constitution
Clause of the United States Constitution, is a grant, from the government to the
inventor(s), of a limited right to exclude others from making, using, or selling one's invention,
including the right to license others to make, use, or sell
it.13
The patent is the most absolute form of intellectual property, a statutory
monopoly. The most common patent is a utility patent, which permits the patentee
exclusive use (within the United States) of the invention for a 20 year term, running from the
date of filing (35 USC §
154).14
A patentable utility invention is any "new and useful process, machine, manufacture or
composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof." 35 USC § 101 (There are two other
less common patents, the design patent, which covers an object's non-functional visual and
tactile characteristics for 14 years, and the plant patent, issued for methods of asexually
reproducing certain plants and good for 20
years.14)
Unlike copyrights, only one inventor (or one team of collaborating co-inventors) is recognized for any given invention.
The patent document itself is a teaching to the public of the invention and how to use
it. The inventor (or assignee) is rewarded with an absolute monopoly for the term of the patent for
the efforts invested in creating or discovering the invention. The general public is officially
notified of the patented invention and all of its details when patent document is issued
and the patent granted. When the patent expires, ownership reverts to the public
domain. Until then, the inventor may do anything with the invention, or do
nothing, while preventing anybody else from using it. Alternatively, the
inventor may give up the patent to the public before its expiration.
Patent protection also extends to similar inventions (i.e., those with only trivial
differences, such as different colors if color is not important for the use of the invention) by virtue
of the Doctrine of
Equivalents.14
The most important protection is the patentee's option to prevent any or all others from using the
invention, the same important right for owners of all types of property.
Because the holder of the patent has sole control over the technology for a period
of time, anyone who reproduces the same technology without having an assignment or license may
be guilty of direct infringement. A patent owner also has a cause of action against a party who
induces someone else to infringe on the patent, or who contributes to patent
infringement.14
As with copyrights, the most common remedy to patent infringement is a court injunction
to stop making, using, or selling the invention. There may be damages awarded also, sufficient
to adequately compensate for the infringement but only so long as it is not less than a
reasonable royalty. For willful infringement, the court may award triple
damages.14
Property is property. All types of property have at least one universal attribute: Capacity
of being owned. This capacity is the defining characteristic of property. A plot of land
is property that can be owned, but the color of a tomato plant that grows on that plot is
not property because it cannot be owned.
Cheating is defined as the intentional act of breaking the rules, or attempting to achieve personal
gain through fraud or
deceit.16
To cheat is to deprive of something valuable by the use of deceit or fraud, to
influence or lead by deceit, trick, or artifice, to practice fraud or
trickery, to violate rules dishonestly, or to be sexually
unfaithful.11
A cheater
(sometimes called a cheat) gets something by dishonesty or deception; or
by depriving one of his or her rights and usually connotes deliberate perversion of the truth;
or by large-scale cheating by misrepresentation or abuse of
confidence.11
Cheating
is an act of lying, deception, fraud, trickery, imposture, or
imposition. Cheating characteristically is employed to create an unfair
advantage, usually in one's own interest, and often at the expense of others. Cheating
implies the breaking of rules. Cheating is a primordial economic act: getting more
for less, often used when referring to marital
infidelity.3
Cheating
is when a person misleads, deceives, or acts dishonestly on
purpose.17
Cheating as a concept is not understood by children until around age seven. Preschoolers often change
the rules to a game as they play, innocent of the fact that rules must remain consistent to
have any meaning. By seven, however, children have gained an understanding of rules,
fairness, and honesty, and cheating then becomes
intentional.16
As with lying and stealing, cheating is a social exercise, whose negative
consequences must be experienced in order to learn what all three are and why one should not partake of them.
For the purposes of this essay, a rule is a usual, customary, or generalized course of action or
behavior,18
a principle or condition that customarily governs behavior, a prescribed guide for conduct or action, or basic
generalization that is accepted as true and that can be used as a basis for reasoning or
conduct.19
Rules are guidelines for social interaction, a virtual road map for our travels through work
days and leisure times, especially for those situations that are unfamiliar. They provide a mental hand rail
to use while following the winding hallway to new experiences yet out of sight around the corner. And they
offer a reminder of what has worked well in the past for similar situations.
Some [children and adults] would prefer not to have any rules placed on them at all, as they feel
they become constricted by them, that their freedoms are infringed upon. But rules are part of life;
The world would fall into utter chaos without them. Within every facet of our daily lives, we are
confronted with rules. There are certain times that we must get up in the morning and certain times to
go to bed. There are rules to maintaining a proper diet. There are rules for marriage,
rules for the
road, rules in schools and places of business. There are rules to become a member of an organization
or church. There are even certain rules that we must abide by in order to be a citizen of any
country.20
Young children are the most puzzled by rules because they are still learning about them. They begin
their learning of rules with no idea of why they are important because they are born ignorant,
helpless, and selfish.
There is a phenomenon in Physics called wave interference that makes for a reasonable
analogy about rules. There are two types of interference, constructive interference
and destructive interference. Constructive interference happens when two identical
waves that are in phase results in a composite wave of twice the amplitude and four times the
energy where they overlap. Complete destructive interference occurs when two 180° out of
phase but otherwise identical waves results in a composite wave of zero amplitude, that is, no wave
at all. If the two waves are out of phase by less than 180°, the resultant wave will have an amplitude
between zero and twice that of each individual wave, partial destructive interference.
Student cheating in the high schools and colleges is pandemic, and well documented.
Part of the reason it is so huge a problem is many students do not know what cheating is. A
survey by Rutgers University Prof. Donald McCabe found that 50 percent of students don't think copying
questions and answers from a test is
cheating.23
McCabe predicts even more erosion of integrity in higher education when upcoming generations arrive:
Their attitude is, "If it's on the internet, it's public knowledge, and I don't have to cite
it."24
Since students use tools and techniques that have not been used before, they might not always know what
really constitutes cheating. The following activities constitute cheating, and can in a student
getting kicked out of
college:26
On the other hand, many students do know what cheating is. A national survey by Rutgers'
Management Education Center of 4,500 high school students found that 75 percent of them engage in
serious
cheating.23
According to a national survey of high school students by Josephson Institute, cheating,
stealing, and lying have continued their alarming, decade-long upward
spiral.27
A 2005 Duke University study found that 75 percent of high school students admit to cheating,
and if you include copying another person's homework, that number climbs to 90
percent.28
From the Academic Cheating Fact
Sheet:29
Denise Pope of the School of Education at Stanford University says that of all high school students
who cheat, "the ones who cheat more are the ones who have the most to lose, which is
the honors and AP (advanced placement) students. Eighty percent of honors and AP students cheat
on a regular
basis."28
Another group of students recently revealed to be most like likely to cheat is athletes. In
a landmark survey of nearly 5,300 high school athletes conducted in 2005 and 2006 by the
Josephson Institute of Ethics in Los Angeles, 65 percent admitted to cheating in the classroom
more than once in the previous year, as opposed to 60 percent of nonathletes, a percentage that
institute founder Michael Josephson says is statistically significant. And varsity athletes were
more likely to cheat than nonvarsity. Further, he thinks "The major male sports seem to
be spawning a win-at-any-cost mentality that carries over into the classroom. Thirty-seven
percent of boys and 20 percent of girls said it was proper for a coach to instruct a player
to fake an injury. Forty-three percent of boys and 22 percent of girls surveyed said it was
proper for a coach to teach basketball players how to illegally hold and push, for
example.28
Plagiarism may be another practice students don't consider to be serious. Some 58 percent of those
McCabe surveyed acknowledged "one or more instances" of plagiarism, ranging from downloading an
entire paper to "cutting and pasting" online publications and not crediting the source. "They seem to
know what [plagiarism] is," McCabe says of his young respondents, "but they raise some
questions about where that line is that actually crosses into
cheating."31
Online assessment for distance learning is even more conducive to cheating than on-campus learning.
Cheating generally increases with age up to 25 then levels off: This is the prime age group for
distance learning. Cheating also increases the more distant the student is from the instructor,
and is easier. Online exams are not well secured, and frequently easily hacked with determined effort.
Multiple or interrupted attempts at an exam are not easily preventable or detectable, as is
unauthorized help during an exam. To date, little has been done to address these
problems.32
Since the current trend in higher education is to more and more long distance learning, cheating
can only get worse without extraordinary efforts to control it.
The excuses offered by students for cheating are as varied as they are alarming:
Not knowing what constitutes cheating is one reason for its prevalence. However, many students do know
what cheating is, and even admit it is wrong to cheat, but cheat anyway.
One of the most disturbing trends is that behavior once considered cheating is no longer thought to be
so. Copying homework, for example. An eighth-grader in private school says, "That's not cheating,
it's
helping."28
"We call it the morning scramble," says Denise Pope of Stanford. "In the morning at a high school, you see
a ton of kids sitting around copying each other's homework. Because a percentage of their grade is
based on their turning in their homework. And a lot of these kids are doing so many classes and
after-school activities that there's no way they could possibly do all the work required of them. So
kids don't even count that as cheating. That's just sort of survival for them: divvying up the
work. That's why they're IM-ing (instant messaging) all the time while they're doing homework.
It's another way of divvying up the work. It's a way of ensuring that you get it done. It doesn't
matter how you do it, just get it done and get it
in."28
Margaret Fain and Peggy Bates of Coastal Carolina University summarize the current state
of cheating: For lots of students, lofty ideas about honesty and integrity have very little to do with the
"real" world or why they are going to
college:36
In most honor systems, students pledge to abide by a code that clarifies expectations regarding appropriate
and inappropriate behavior. Thus, wrongdoing is more clearly defined under honor code systems. When the
definition of wrongdoing is made clear, it becomes more difficult for potential cheaters to
rationalize and justify cheating behavior, and the incidence of cheating may be lower as a
result. According to Phyllis Brown of Santa Clara University, the important thing is not so much the
code as the clarity. The institution must explain what cheating is and what will happen to
students who get caught at
it.30
There are diverse theories of explaining away the prevalence of cheating in the schools. Below are a few.
To get students (or anyone) to stop cheating, they must first understand why cheating is wrong.
Thomas Lickona, in his book Educating For Character: How Our Schools Can Teach Respect and Responsibility,
defined a few
reasons:34
As mentioned above, parents and teachers are the two most influential figures in the lives of children that
should promote integrity in the schools. Donald McCabe agrees. He suggests we'd be much better off promoting
integrity among our students rather than trying to police their
dishonesty.23
However, to ignore the cheating that exists presently would defeat all attempts to prevent
future cheating. So something should be done about the dishonesty that is here and now.
A blend of policing and promotion seems appropriate.
David Callahan contends the cheating and lying from Wall Street to university exam rooms
are unraveling the fabric of the nation. The road he traveled to get to that conclusion started when he
wrote his 2002 book Kindred Spirits: Harvard Business School's Extraordinary Class of 1949 and How They
Transformed America. As he conducted his interviews, many with men who had run some of the country's
largest multinational corporations, he became convinced that they operated under very different moral
guidelines than many of their successors. "They were not saints," says Callahan, "but they had very
different values. They grew up during the Depression, fought in World War II, went to Harvard
Business School on the G.I. Bill, and many came from the working class. They went into business with
low expectations. They did not have a strong sense of entitlement. Wealth would be created
patiently over many years. They were thankful for what they had been given, and many had a belief
in social equity." The anger he encountered among these men over the huge compensation packages
awarded to heads of companies today, coupled with their disgust with the loss of values, led
him to wonder what had changed in American
society.37
Callahan's explanation may or may not be accurate, but cheating is very much seated in the
business community, starting with the schools. A 2006 survey, carried out by Pennsylvania State,
Rutgers and Washington State universities, covered 5,331 students at 32 graduate business schools
in the U.S. and Canada. Out of those, an astonishing 56 percent of business students were willing to
own up to
cheating.41
Note, that is just those who admitted to their own cheating! It doesn't end there. After doing
3.8 million background checks, Automatic Data Processing Inc. announced in April 2004 that
52 percent of job applicants had lied on their
résumés.42
There have been many very visible scandals in the corporate world during the past decade or so.
They were all widely covered in the news media, so the details of their transgressions will be skipped
over here. An incomplete list includes Enron, Tyco, Adelphia,
WorldCom, Bayer, Parmalat, Haliburton, and Martha
Stewart.42,43,44
The church hierarchies of various denominations and faiths are not
immune.42
Tax evasion, both corporate and individual, more than doubled during the 1990s (at least $200
billion a year) and continues to
rise.45
The recent investment scandal promulgated by former NASDAQ chairman Bernard Madoff (arrested
in 2008 for a Ponzi scheme that lasted decades) in which he stole at least $50 billion set a
new fraud record for an
individual.3
The barriers to cheating are falling. In the office, there are legal disincentives, but fewer
social sanctions about twisting the rules. Indeed, regulators are now forced to set standards that people
often followed automatically a generation
ago.41
Business has developed a "win at all costs" culture that, at least tacitly, encourages rule-breaking.
In a recent survey, many of the students said they cheated on their exams because they assumed
that was the normal thing to do. That's probably true once they go to work as well. The prizes on
offer have grown hugely -- while the punishments have hardly grown at
all.41
"Americans have long been tolerant of cheaters in business," Callahan says. "We admire
the rich, even if they broke a few rules to get rich. When it comes to money, we're more focused
on the ends than the
means."41
Since the 1970s, the United States has increasingly become a "winner-take-all" society, argues Callahan.
In field after field, a few top performers receive pay and public acclaim out of all proportion to what
most workers doing substantially the same job can
command.47
As economic inequalities have deepened during the last several decades, the renewed worship of money
has bred temptation at all levels. Executives at Enron, WorldCom and other corporations, intoxicated
by the heady atmosphere of deregulation, defraud shareholders of billions and get away with little or
no punishment. The little guy naturally says: If the big shots get away with it, why not me? So he
cheats on his taxes, steals from his company and downloads music without paying for
it.38
"I see cheating as the symptom, not the problem," says Callahan. Cheating is "a profound
moral crisis that reflects deep economic and social problems in American
society."40
To be sure, the winner-take-all aspects of our economy and culture inspire great striving and the pursuit
of excellence. But they also bring out the worst in people, producing envy, cheating and cutthroat
behavior. Another reason a culture of cheating thrives today is the failure of watchdogs to enforce
strict rules. More of us will cheat if we don't think anyone's looking. The problem of sleeping
watchdogs is common across U.S. society. Tax evasion more than doubled in the 1990s, passing $200
billion a year, as Congress reduced the Internal Revenue Service's enforcement capacity by cutting
its budget. The Securities and Exchange Commission, which oversees Wall Street, knew that there
was an epidemic of accounting fraud in corporate America during the recent boom, but it didn't
have the resources to stop these abuses. Academic dishonesty thrives in part because schools often do
little to police and punish
students.45
The best approach to fighting cheating and fraud in business involves the businesses
themselves, because they can take ownership of the problem and the solution. In other words, the system
will only work if people regulate themselves. And if they hadn't bluffed and cribbed their way through
their economics paper, even MBA students might realize that a market based on integrity will be a lot
more efficient than one dominated by deception. Instead of all those courses in accounts and marketing,
MBA subjects should probably focus more on ethics. Honest business behavior starts in the
classroom.41
Although approximately eight out of ten of Americans disapprove of
adultery,50
a study published in 2006 by the Journal of Sex Research showed that 80 percent of women (compared
to 98 percent of men) have frequent fantasies involving persons other than their partner, and the gender
gap narrows in longer-term
relationships.50
Clearly, extramarital sex is on our minds. But it is not easy to determine how many go beyond the fantasy stage.
Some interesting tidbits of relevance. Studies have found that men are less forgiving of affairs than women. When a
woman has a physical affair, she's risking her marriage more than a man who has a physical affair. Women are more
forgiving.50
More on this point later. A Taiwanese study on extramarital affairs identified men married from 8-16 years as
the group at greatest risk, as they are involved in about 24% of all affairs. Not far behind on the risk scale
are people 2-4 years into marriage. And 16% of all affairs happen during the first year of
marriage.50
People whose sexual histories included more risky situations or had cheated on a partner before were
more likely to lie to get what they
wanted.50
Both genders are heavy into cheating on their spouses. For men, it has been almost an a priori
assumption, a cultural truism. For women, however, it is only recently that the substantial suspicions
that have been there for decades among geneticists and others has begun to trickle into the social and legal
discourse.55
The well established 10 percent pedigree error in the general population is inconsistent with the 15 to 20
percent cheating rate from the self-admissions of wives. With readily available birth control and abortion,
the fraction of wives that cheat must be much
higher.57
In fact, any known pedigree error can be used to work backwards to determine a more realistic estimate.
All this messing around might have been predicted by animal behavior, but it has been only recently that
researchers learned just how hard faithful females are to find in any species. Dr. Barash, a zoologist and
professor of psychology at the University of Washington, explained that while it was generally known that
most mammals are rarely monogamous, certain species were held up as paragons of virtue. Scientists
believed, for example, fidelity was definitely for the birds. But despite thousands of hours of observation,
birds managed to fool not only their mates into thinking they were faithful, but their observers. Their DNA
tests show that 10 to 50 per cent of birds are fathered by a male other than the one sharing the
nest.55
Based on a 500-year-old common law, most US states operate on the presumption that a husband is the
father of any child born to his wife during a marriage. It is a presumption so strong that courts
typically discount DNA results to the contrary, in the "best interests of the child," in divorce
and child support decrees. Canada has a similar legal attitude. "Fatherhood is a social reality,
not a genetic reality," says Bernard Dickens of the University of
Toronto.55
Some research seems to imply that cheating, marital infidelity, is natural,
pushed by evolutionary biology. Perhaps that is so for the animal kingdom in general, but that does
not mean it is inevitable for humans. Humans have something the rest of the animal kingdom does not:
Civilization, with all of its attendant attributes such as laws, regulations, enterprises of
specialties, languages that can express, support, and expand abstract thought, literature, poetry,
song, and celebration, the precise universal language of Mathematics, the scientific process of
discovery and invention, war, peace, travel (including to places that are ultimately hostile to
human life), self-awareness, the capability of conscience, and a sense of past, present, and
future. We can learn, unlearn, and relearn. We can culture and promote other species. And we
can learn not to poop on the floor. So certainly we can learn not to break the rules that we
have ourselves constructed.
Cheating is the ultimate corrupt combination of lying and stealing, and a gross and
deliberate misrepresentation of self: Talent that does not exist, faked qualifications, history that
isn't, possibilities stolen, trust betrayed, and false knowledge, not to mention theft of property,
damage to others' reputation, creation of liability, delay or prevention of real achievement,
consequences deferred, and the projection of mistrust onto society. The character of a cheater
is constructed of smoke and mirrors, an illusion, a mirage so ephemeral that a large portion of a
cheater's effort is spent on hiding things.
The Golden Rule does not to have just one single definition. In essence, it is an ethical code that
states one has a right to just treatment, and a responsibility to ensure justice for others. It is also
called the Ethic of Reciprocity. It is arguably the most essential basis for the modern concept of
human rights. A key element of the Golden Rule is that a person attempting to live by this rule
treats all people, not just members of his or her in-group, with
consideration.3
What is good enough for me is good enough for you, and vice versa.
The Golden Rule is often thought of as originating in Christianity with the Biblical verse "Do unto
others as you would have them do unto you" (Matthew 7:12). But some versions of the Golden
Rule existed long before Christianity. It is in fact a common belief held in some form by most world
religions. The earliest form of the Golden Rule in religion dates prior to Confucianism and
Buddhism. Confucius is attributed with a statement in the 6th Century BCE that "one should not extend
harm to others which one would not wish for one’s self." Buddhism documents also dating from the 6th
century BCE include the quote "Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful." Hindu
religious aspects that include the teaching of Karma also date to the 6th century BCE or earlier
and include in the Mahabharata the prescriptive to "Do not unto others which would cause pain if
done to you" (5:15:17). "That which is hateful unto you, do not impose on others," Judaism.
The Torah also includes the prescriptive dated at about 1400 BCE as "Love thy neighbor as thyself"
(Leviticus 19:18). In Islam, Mohammed’s Farewell Sermon includes the statement "Hurt no one
so that no one may hurt
you." 60,62
Note that some versions are expressed in the
negative.62
More on this point later.
Benjamin Franklin was intensely interested in the Golden Rule, and dreamed of an organized effort to
promote it. There is an allegorical fantasy attributed to him that illustrates the fundamental difference
between a world of people who are looking out for themselves first, and a world of people who make caring
for others their first priority. Essentially, the story exemplifies living by the Golden Rule, or
not living by it, in a nutshell. It goes something like
this:61
One of the best versions of the Golden Rule is:
There is another pair of rules that are closely
related:3,64
The inclusive rule, where both positive and negative rules are implicitly assumed and hereafter simply called
the Golden Rule, is the best we can get. It tells us what we may or should do subject to our
willingness to accept it in return, and only requires knowledge that can be determined externally if we do
not already know the relevant facts from personal experience. If the requisite knowledge is not available
or if the necessary imagination is not possible, then the Golden Rule is not applicable. In such a
case, if a decision must be made whether to act or not, some other ethical rule of conduct will have to
provide guidance.
Still, it is expected that the Golden Rule should apply to the vast majority of situations. With that
expectation in mind, there have been objections to its
oversimplicity.3
In his book Formal Ethics, Harry J. Gensler proposes modifying it slightly to answer those critics:
With respect to acts of the Golden Rule, relevant factors of a situation are those factors that have
direct bearing on the action that is being contemplated, factors that might assist in determining what the
action should be or not be, or whether any action should be done. A relevant factor of a situation
is one that might necessitate a different action if that factor were itself different. A different irrelevant
factor would not require a different action.
The phrase "exactly similar" seems contradictory, but as used here, it is a term of art with a meaning that
is not the sum of its component words. It refers to just how similar the relevant factors must be when
imagining the reciprocal action. The ideal reciprocal situation would be exactly the same as the original
situation. But Nature does not allow such a thing. Exactly same situations are impossible because Nature
can not reproduce such exactitude. Ultimately, it is the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle of
Quantum Mechanics that puts an upper limit on the precision of "exactness." However, for the purposes
of the Golden Rule, there is no need to go any where near that level of concern. So, how much
similarity is needed? How close is close enough?
The phrase self-consistent seems not to be known or understood much outside the theoretical Physics
community. Even non-science college professors, including law professors, typically are baffled by the
expression. Perhaps the combination of "self" and "consistent" is jarring, at once non-sequitur and a
little bit redundant. At any rate, it is a crucial concept that must be understood so that the Golden
Rule can be properly followed.
To whom should the acts of the Golden Rule be directed? Of whom is the Rule speaking when referring
to others? For any given group or individual, the answer is likely to seem obvious. However, most of us
presume we are more enlightened and experienced than we really are. As a result, the others of the
Rule is very frequently more inclusive than we think.
The Golden Rule is a calling for us to be selfless, at least sometimes. It asks us to do things
that we are not obligated to do, at least sometimes. It asks us to ease the pain and suffering of others, at
least sometimes. It asks us to promote the growth and welfare of others, at least sometimes. And it asks us
to do these things without any expectation of immediate return favor, always. The Golden Rule is the
ultimate pay it forward rule of behavior, because it sets us up as examples of good
character.
The Josephson Institute breaks Trustworthiness into four categories, Honesty,
integrity, reliability, and loyalty. This article has concentrated on honesty
(no lying, no stealing, and no cheating), but it is only the beginning. (A necessary
beginning, because without honesty, the rest is moot.) Once the concept of honesty is mastered,
it's time to start applying it to the other three categories.
A person with integrity is an individual who acts according to her beliefs, not according to
expediency. She does so with consistency, because there is no difference in the way she makes decisions from
one situation to another: Her principles do not vary at work or at home, in public or alone. An individual
with integrity is the original what you see is what you get personality. People who act
inconsistently have no integrity; They are called hypocrites or
two-faced.1a
Too often, hypocrites don't even know of their lack of integrity. When pointed out to them (gently),
some are puzzled or surprised but willing to think about changing their ways, others may become quite
angry and defensive. So it may not be worth the effort of speaking to them of their inconsistency,
especially if it is unlikely they will have to be dealt with in the future. Better to be a good example
of integrity and hope they'll figure it out on their own eventually.
Reliability basically means keeping promises. There are two aspects to ponder here. Avoid
unwise commitments if it is likely that they cannot be kept, whether by one's later unwillingness to carry
through, by one's inability to carry through, or there is a realistic possibility that unknown or future
events may intervene that will make it difficult, undesirable, or impossible to carry through. Further,
make sure one's commitments are clear to others (not to mention to oneself), that there is no
misunderstanding as to what the promises
involve.1a
All these factors should be addressed before verbalizing any promises.
Loyalty is a responsibility to promote the interests of certain people, organizations, or affiliations,
a duty that goes beyond the normal obligation we all share to care for others. But there are
limitations to loyalty. No one has the right to ask another to sacrifice ethical
principles in the name of a special relationship. Having many loyalties inevitably requires
prioritizing them. It is reasonable to assume one's own children, spouses, and parents must come
first, which will mean having to subordinate loyalties to others. Of course, multiple
loyalties can lead to conflicting interests. Employees and public servants, for example,
have a duty to make all professional decisions on merit, unimpeded by conflicting personal interests.
They owe ultimate loyalty to the public. Sometimes, loyalty may require safeguarding
confidential information, but not where it breaks the law or threatens others. Then, there may be
the obligation to become a
whistle blower.1a
Everyone has a right to be treated with dignity, regardless of who they are or what they have done.
The Golden Rule is a good guideline for extending respect to others. We have a responsibility
to be the best we can be in all situations, even when dealing with unpleasant
people.1a
Life is full of choices, and we are responsible for them. That means several things: Being in charge
of our choices and, thus, our lives, that is, being accountable for what we do and who we are, hence
recognizing that our actions matter and that we are morally on the hook for the consequences. It also means
pursuing excellence and exercising
self-restraint.1a
Problem solving, also known as critical thinking, takes time and effort. It is not easy, and
almost always takes longer than originally anticipated, frequenty because the problem is bigger than thought
at first blush. Getting it right, arriving at a correct, fair, ethical, and effective
resolution, varies from one situation to another, and there is more than one way to accomplish it. One
approach, involving dispute resolution and mentioned above, is outlined
here. Another, geared to solving Physics and
Engineering problems, is displayed
here. A more generalized
method, from the Josephson Institute, is summarized below.
In making tough decisions, don't be distracted by rationizations for bad decisions. Below is the Josephson
Institute's list of the most common ones.
Individuals are often members of professional societies that provide services and opportunities that are unique
to a particular profession. Almost every professional society has developed a professional Code of Ethics
that is applied to the particular profession. Engineers, journalists, nurses, and teachers, for example, all
have codes of ethics. However, they really don't add much to the practice of ethics per se aside from
reminding it's members that they are obligated to be ethical.
1a. Josephson Institute of Ethics,
Making Ethical Decisions
2. Knowledgerush,
www.knowledgerush.com/kr/encyclopedia/Main_Page
3. Wikipedia,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
4. Dan Scorpio,
www.angelfire.com/nd/danscorpio
5. The Institute of General Semantics,
www.generalsemantics.org
6. Litemind,
litemind.com
7. A. V. Club,
www.avclub.com
8. SourceWatch,
www.sourcewatch.org
9. Answers.com,
www.answers.com
10. The Orange Papers,
www.orange-papers.org
11. Merriam-Webster Online,
www.merriam-webster.com
12. Dictionary.com,
dictionary.com
13. Black's Law Dictionary,
www.blackslawdictionary.com
14. Lawyer's Desk Book,
www.aspenpublishers.com
15. Copyright Cases and Materials,
West Publishing Co.
16. Healthline,
healthline.com
17. KidsHealth,
kidshealth.org
18. TheFreeDictionary,
www.thefreedictionary.com
19. WordNet,
wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
20. Do We Really Need Rules?
www.associatedcontent.com/article/923351/do_we_really_need_rules.html?
21. Fleet & Family Support Center,
www.cnrsw.navy.mil/fsc
22. Why Have Rules?
www.jimloy.com
23. CNN,
cnn.com
24. Stanford Magazine,
www.stanfordalumni.org
25. The Yale Herald,
yaleherald.com
26. About.Com: Education,
homeworktips.about.com/od/cheating
27. Josephson Institute: Character Counts,
charactercounts.org/programs/reportcard
28. San Francisco Chronicle,
sfgate.com
29. Education Testing Service,
www.glass-castle.com/clients/www-nocheating-org
30. Santa Clara University,
www.scu.edu/ethics/publications
31. School Library Journal,
www.schoollibraryjournal.com
32. Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration,
www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla
33. Palo Alto Online,
www.paloaltoonline.com
34. About.Com: Private Schools,
privateschool.about.com/cs/forteachers/a
35. ABC News,
abcnews.go.com/Primetime
36. Coastal Carolina University,
www.coastal.edu/library/presentations
37. New York Times,
www.nytimes.com
38. In These Times,
www.inthesetimes.com
39. Ask The Manager,
askthemanager.com
40. Seattle Post-Intelligencer,
www.seattlepi.com/books
41. Bloomberg.com,
www.bloomberg.com
42. The Christian Science Monitor,
www.csmonitor.com
43. The Cheating Culture,
www.cheatingculture.com
44. Pittsburg Post-Gazette,
http://www.post-gazette.com
45. The Cheating Culture,
www.cheatingculture.com
46. The Boston Globe,
www.boston.com/bostonglobe
47. World Future Society,
www.wfs.org
48. Houghton Miffland Harcourt,
www.harcourtbooks.com
49. Jack Nadel,
jacknadel.com
50. infidelity-etc.com,
www.infidelity-etc.com
51. Infidelity Support,
www.infidelitysupport.com
52. DISCOVERING INFIDELITY - One Woman's Story,
www.southgatearc.org/qsy/marriage/infidelity
53. Citation Needed,
Citation Needed
54. Stevens F. Johnson,
www.sfjohnson.com/acad
55. Canadian Children's Rights Council,
www.canadiancrc.com
56. 100 Things You're Not Supposed To Know by Russ Kick,
www.amazon.com
57. Daily Mail,
www.dailymail.co.uk/femail
58. Contracept.org,
www.contracept.org
59. Stevens F. Johnson,
www.sfjohnson.com/acad
60. wiseGEEK,
www.wisegeek.com
61. Golden Rule Organization,
http://www.thegoldenrule.net
62. Answers.com,
www.answers.com
63. Harry J. Gensler,
www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler
64. Q C Terry, Golden Rules And Silver Rules Of Humanity,
www.authorhouse.com/BookStore
65. Harry J. Gensler, Formal Ethics,
www.routledge.com
66. Stevens F. Johnson,
www.sfjohnson.com/acad
67. EthicsWeb,
www.ethicsweb.ca
© 2009, 2010 Stevens F. Johnson and the Dept. of Physics/Science,
Bemidji State University. All rights are reserved unless explicitly stated otherwise.