A Lie for a Lie

Passage

Saint Augustine wrote that to proceed against lies by lying would be like countering robbery with robbery. To respond to wrongdoing by emulating it to accept lower standards.

And yet it has seemed to many that there is indeed some justification for repaying lies with lies. Such views go back as far as the kind of justice that demands an eye for an eye. They appeal to our sense of fairness: to lie to liars is to give them what with by others, so liars forfeit the right to be dealt with honestly.

Two separate moral questions are involved in this debate. The first asks whether a liar has the same claim to be told the truth as an honest person. The second asks whether to a liar than to others.

In order to see this distinction clearly, consider a person known by all to be a pathological liar but quite harmless. Surely, as the idea of forfeiture suggests, the liar would have no cause for complaint if lied to. But his tall tales would not constitute sufficient reason to lie to him. account in weighing how to deal with him, not merely his personal characteristics.

Passage

A view derived from Immanuel Kant holds that when rational beings act immorally toward others, then, by virtue of their status as rational beings, they implicitly authorize similar actions as punishment aimed toward themselves. That is, acting rationally, one always acts as one would have others act toward oneself. Consequently, to act is, as if that person’s act is the product of a rational decision.

From this it might be concluded that we have a duty to do to offenders what they have done, since this amounts to according them the respect due rational beings. But the assertion of a duty to punish seems excessive, since if this duty to others is necessary to accord them the there is no injustice, and where there is no injustice, others have acted within their rights.