1、Unit 5The Real Truth about LiesRandy FitzgeraldAt the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, psychology professor Bella DePaulo got 77 students and 70 townspeople to volunteer for an unusual project. All kept diaries for a week, recording the numbers and details of the lies they told.One student

2、 and six Charlottesville residents professed to have told no falsehoods. The other 140 participants told 1,535.The lies were most often not what most of us would call earth-shattering. Someone would pretend to be more positive or supportive of a spouse or friend than he or she really was, or feign a

3、greement with a relative's opinion. According to DePaulo, women in their interactions with other women lied mostly to spare the other's feelings. Men lied to other men generally for self-promoting reasons.Most strikingly, these tellers-of-a-thousand-lies reported that their deceptions caused

4、 them "little preoccupation or regret". Might that, too, be a lie? Perhaps. But there is evidence that this attitude toward casual use of prevarication is common.For example, 20,000 middle- and high-schoolers were surveyed by the Josephson Institute of Ethics-a nonprofit organization in Ma

5、rina del Rey, California, devoted to character education. Ninety-two percent of the teenagers admitted having lied to their parents in the previous year, and 73 percent characterized themselves as "serial liars", meaning they told lies weekly. Despite these admissions, 91 percent of all re

6、spondents said they were "satisfied with my own ethics and character".Think how often we hear the expressions "I'll call you" or "The check is in the mail ”or "I'm sorry, but he stepped out". And then there are professions- lawyers, pundits, PR consultants-

7、whose members seem to specialize in shaping or spinning the truth to suit clients' needs.Little white lies have become ubiquitous, and the reasons we give each other for telling fibs are familiar. Consider, for example, a Southern California corporate executive whom I'll call Tom. He goes wi

8、th his wife and son to his mother-in-law's home for Thanksgiving dinner every year. Tom dislikes her “special ” pumpkin pie intensely. Invariably he tells her how wonderful it is, to avoid hurting her feelings."What's wrong with that?" Tom asked Michael Josephson, president of the

9、Josephson Institute. It's a question we might all ask.Josephson replied by asking Tom to consider the lie from his mother-in-law's point of view. Suppose that one day Tom's child blurts out the truth, and she discovers the deceit. Will she tell her son-in-law, "Thank you for caring

10、so much?" Or is she more likely to feel hurt and say, "How could you have misled me all these years? And what else have you lied to me about?"And what might Tom's mother-in-law now suspect about her own daughter? And will Tom's boy lie to his parents and yet be satisfied with

11、his own character?How often do we compliment people on how well they look, or express our appreciation for gifts, when we don't really mean it? Surely, these "nice" lies are harmless and well intended, a necessary social lubricant. But, like Tom, we should remember the words of English

12、 novelist Sir Walter Scott, who wrote, "What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive."Even seemingly harmless falsehoods can have unforeseen consequences. Philosopher Sissela Bok warns us that they can put us on a slippery slope. "After the first lies, others can com

13、e more easily, ”she wrote in her book Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life. “Psychological barriers wear down; the ability to make more distinctions can coarsen; the liar's perception of his chances of being caught may warp."Take the pumpkin pie lies. In the first place, it wasn&#

14、39;t just that he wanted his mother-in-law to feel good. Whether he realized it or not, he really wanted her to think highly of him. And after the initial deceit he needed to tell more lies to cover up the first one.Who believes it anymore when they're told that the person they want to reach by

15、phone is "in a meeting"? By itself, that kind of lie is of no great consequence. Still, the endless proliferation of these little prevarications does matter.Once they've become common enough, even the small untruths that are not meant to hurt encourage a certain cynicism and loss of tr

16、ust. "When (trust) is damaged, ”warns Bok, “the community as a whole suffers; and when it is destroyed, societies falter and collapse."Are all white lies to be avoided at all costs? Not necessarily. The most understandable and forgivable lies are an exchange of what ethicists refer to as t

17、he principle of trust for the principle of caring, "like telling children about the tooth fairy, or deceiving someone to set them up for a surprise party," Josephson says. "Still, we must ask ourselves if we are willing to give our friends and associates the authority to lie to us whe

18、never they think it is for our own good."Josephson suggests a simple test. If someone you lie to finds out the truth, will he thank you for caring? Or will he feel his long-term trust in you has been under-mined?And if you're not sure, Mark Twain has given us a good rule of thumb. "Whe

19、n in doubt, tell the truth. It will confound your enemies and astound your friends."謊言的真相蘭迪菲茨杰拉德1. 在夏洛特斯維爾的弗吉尼亞大學里，心理學教授貝拉 德保羅組織 了 77 名學生和 70 名市民志愿參加一個特別的項目。 所有參加者寫了 一周的日記，記錄下自己撒謊的次數和細節。2. 1 名學生和 6 名夏洛特斯維爾的居民聲稱沒有撒過謊。其他 140 名參加者共計撒謊 1535 次。3. 他們說的謊言里絕大多數在大眾眼中都不屬驚天動地的那一類。 其中有人假裝對自己的另一半或朋友表示肯定或支持，

20、 或對某位親戚 的觀點佯裝贊同。 依德保羅之見， 女性在相互交往中說謊主要是為了 不傷對方感情，而男性間撒謊則多半屬于自吹自擂。4. 最驚人的是，這些撒了數以千計謊言的人聲稱，欺騙行為并沒有 讓他們十分 “糾結或愧疚 ”。這會不會也是謊言？有可能。不過，確有 證據表明，這種撒謊也不眨眼的態度是很常見的。5. 例如，加州馬里納 -戴爾雷有一個致力于性格教育的非營利性組織 約瑟夫森倫理道德研究所曾對兩萬名初、高中學生進行過調查。92的青少年承認在過去一年中對父母撒過謊，73%將自己描述為“連續撒謊的人”，意即每星期都撒謊。盡管如此，91的參加者稱“對 自己的道德和人品還是感到滿意 ”。6. 想想我

21、們是多么經常地聽到這些話： “我會打電話給你”、“支票已 寄出”、“對不起，他不在。 ”還有一些職業律師、專家和公關咨詢 師其成員似乎專門歪曲或編造事實以滿足客戶的需要。7. 無傷大雅的小謊言無處不在，而我們撒謊的理由也大同小異?？?看這個例子，是關于一個公司經理的，我就叫他湯姆吧。他每年都和 妻兒到岳母家參加圣誕晚宴。湯姆非常不喜歡岳母做的“特色”南瓜餡 餅。不過，他每次總是對岳母說南瓜餡餅多么好吃，免得傷了她的心。8. 這有什么不對？ ”湯姆問約瑟夫森研究所所長邁克爾 約瑟夫森。 這個問題我們都有可能會問。9. 約瑟夫森的回答是要湯姆站在岳母的立場上考慮一下他的謊言。 假設有一天，湯姆的孩子一不小心說漏了嘴，使她了解了實情。她是 會對女婿說“謝謝你考慮得這么周到”呢？還是更有可能地，覺得受了 傷害，說“你怎么能騙我這么多年 ? 你還對我撒過哪些謊 ?”10. 湯姆的岳母現在對她自己的女兒又會起些什么疑心呢 ? 湯姆的兒 子會不會也對父母撒謊的同時滿意于自己的品行呢 ?11. 我們違心地恭維他人如何漂亮，對收到的禮物表示感激，這種情 況是不是早已司空見慣？毫無疑問，這些“善意的謊言”于他人無害且 初衷良好，是不可缺少的社交潤滑劑。但是，像湯姆一樣，我們應該 記住英國小說家沃爾特 司各特爵士曾