Ethics - Lying. Justice: What's The Right Thing To Do? Episode 07: "A LESSON IN LYING" To lie or not to lie? The Definition of Lying and Deception. First published Thu Feb 21, 2008 Questions central to the philosophical discussion of lying to others and other-deception (or interpersonal deceiving) may be divided into two kinds.
Questions of the first kind are definitional. They include the questions of how lying is to be defined, and how deceiving is to be defined, and whether lying is a form of intended deception. Questions of the second kind are moral. They include the questions of whether lying and deceiving are (defeasibly) morally wrong, and whether, if either lying or deception, or both, are defeasibly morally wrong, they are ever morally obligatory, and not just merely morally permissible.