i had never considered honesty a worthy fundamental value alongside compassion, integrity, and others. it's the capital G, capital R, "Golden Rule," that's so culturally fundamental that nobody even attempts to participate in it.

i read Lying with the feeble hope that Harris would string the magic words together to flip my worldview on its head and make me see the world in a different light, as so many other books would claim to do and fail just as well. but, disappointingly, our difference is only in signifiers.

a hypothetical transwoman lives her life without telling a single person she was born male. female coworkers divulge information about their missed periods, menstrual cramps, and abortions, free and comfortable under the false belief that they are sharing this information with a kindred spirit who has shared all of the same difficulties and can reciprocate empathically in turn. had they known our hypothetical transwoman was born male, they may have felt differently about sharing.

before reading lying, i would have called this a justifiable lie. the same kind of lie that Harris would argue requires a high level of manipulating facts and spinning false narratives. it's the kind of lie our transwoman would have to fabricate supporting lies and weave in supporting truths. she will lie by carrying tampons to provide for her coworkers, colleagues, and strangers in their time of dire need. she will lie by donning conventionally feminine apparel. she will lie by masking her face in a cloud of makeup. i would argue these lies are morally acceptable, but Harris would argue these are not lies at all; they're "deceptions" that don't necessarily carry the weight of immorality that a "lie" does.

here comes our difference in signifiers. Harris distinguishes "lies" from "deceptions". he defines a lie as an intention to mislead others when honesty is expected, to develop false beliefs in others, and to intend one thing while communicating another. relating to our hypothetical transwoman, Harris counters the "wearing makeup is a lie by omission" argument with this distinction, writing:

"deception can take many forms, but not all acts of deception are lies. even the most ethical among us regularly struggle to keep appearances and reality apart. by wearing cosmetics, a woman seeks to seem younger or more beautiful than she otherwise would. but honesty does not require that she issue continual disclaimers— 'i see that you are looking at my face: please be aware that i do not look this good first thing in the morning…'"

so according to Harris, our hypothetical transwoman wearing makeup wouldn't be a lie, it would be a deception. which, under Harris' understanding of the topic, would make sense. as he states in the book:

"the more consequential the beliefs—the more a person's well-being demands a correct understanding of the world or other people's opinions—the more consequential the lie."

are our transwoman's deceptions consequential to the people she's deceiving? her act of 'passing socially as a woman' is more consequential to some people than others. the delivery man, who gave her a pizza in exchange for a $10 tip, probably didn't suffer too much when he parted with, "have a great evening, ma'am." her female coworkers may possibly suffer slightly, but only if they were to discover the truth of her circumstance (although, as Harris would argue, the idea that a lie is only harmful when it's discovered is the same justification people use to weave lies into the stories of their lives, believing that they can construct an alternative history from handpicked lies and mistruths. at this point, Harris must also admit the transwoman is lying because her selective tellings of the truth intend to develop a consequential false belief among her coworkers). the man she takes on a date with the intention of a one-night stand, never disclosing beforehand that she has male genitalia until he had already been laid bare upon the bed, is suffering tantamount to rape.

after reading and interpreting lying, i think i'll adopt Harris' model of lies. but it's not very satisfactory. now, instead of believing that "lies that negatively affect other people are immoral and lies that do not negatively affect other people are moral," i'll believe that "lies are immoral and deceptions may be either moral or immoral; what matters is whether a person's well-being has been negatively affected because of the deception," which is pretty much the same thing i believed before reading the book, except now i can say that my selfies on social media are mere deceptions.