Self-deception and its paradoxes
Creators: name: Szabados, Bela
Publisher: name: University of Calgary
Year: 1972
Subjects: subject: BF 697 S92 1972
subject: Self-deception
subject: Self-perception

description: Bibliography: p. 218-219.
description: It is possible to find in the writings of present day philosophers two 'schools of thought' about self-deception. On the one hand, there are those philosophers who contend that 'self-deception' must be analysed on the model of 'other-deception'. This approach seems to have generated paradoxes. On the other hand, there are those philosophers who contend that the model of 'other-deception' must be rejected if we are to provide a satisfactory account of self-deception. Such philosophers give us the impression that 'self-deception' is a mere figure of speech. They have failed to make us see how 'self-deception' differs from other notions that are obviously distinct from 'self-deception'. This essay shows that both of these positions rest on a mistaken assumption and, by rejecting this assumption, we shall see that a third approach to self-deception is possible which enables us to rectify the philosophical inadequacies entrenched in the either/or approaches. In the course of the argument, an account of the 'dynamics' of self-deception is provided. Philosophers in general have been so preoccupied with self-deception as a 'problematic' mental state that they have neglected the 'dynamics ' of self-deception. It is important to realise that to deceive someone is not merely to know something or to believe something but also to do something. It is also important to realise that to say that a person has been deceived by someone else involves not merely that the person in quest on believes something false or that he is not aware of some truth but also a tacit comment that the deceiver got the deceived to believe what he believes. Similarly, to say that someone is self-deceived involves not merely being in a state of mind, but also involves a comment as to how one got oneself into that state of mind. For this reason account s of self-deception which regard it as a unique state of mind, as a mental state involving conflict, are bound to be inadequate. Furthermore, since we speak of self-deception in many diverse connections , it isn't even obvious that it has to involve a conflict-state in every case. I shall argue that the 'dynamics ' of self-deception can be understood only within a certain background involving the ascription of motives and an account of the role which the evidence and the handling of the evidence play in self-deception. The motives render intelligible the 'doings' whereby the self-deceiver gets himself to believe things: the manipulation of the evidence, the rationalizations and so on. Here again the analogies and the disanalogies between the self-deceiver and the (mere) other-deceiver on the one hand, and the self-deceived and the person deceived by someone else on the other hand, must be brought out. In explaining the 'dynamics' of self-deception we shall also come to see how notions, often indistinguishable from self-deception in some philosophical accounts, do actually differ from self-deception. A good and enlightening example is the notion of 'wishful thinking' . The essay ends with an application of these findings to problems that self-deception raises for the moral philosopher.