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The Value of Truth

 

At the beginning of his article, McManus’ stance in truth is not rigidly constructed. Simply, he does not provide an ambitious argument in the question of whether untruthfulness is an utter vice, and hence harmful to society. At some point of his contemplation on truth, he states that in the post-modern structure of the society, the truth became very rare reducing the trust to the politicians, the government and most importantly diminishing the trust among people which he implies that such decline could be fatal harm to society. He also alludes that an excessive amount of deception dwelling and slithering among us is an indication of our utter corruption. He gives many thinkers account on the subject of truth and why we value truth and deception. He does not portray a one-dimensional argument, rather he proposes a three-dimensional argument dwelling on both sides of deception and truthfulness. He touches upon Plato and Kant who argue that truth allows us to see reality through a clear lens. He lastly, contemplates on Nietzsche's ideology in which Nietzsche’s acknowledges the fact that people are inclined to lie.  Nietzsche proposes that people find comfort in those lies that mask the ruthless truths people are escaping from. McManus’s argument centralizes among Nietzsche's and Plato’s meditations on the truth that have opposite ideas regarding why truth should be valued. McManus states that it is society’s arbitrary rules or oppression that obstruct people from telling the truth, and in the face of such obstacles he argues that society would be better provided that people were more inclined to tell the truth. He gives reason to his argument by depicting lies as an offspring of politics’ corrupted practice to guide people through manipulation. With this example, it allegedly becomes evident that truth is an utter virtue whereas lying is an absolute sinister act. Nevertheless, as McManus unfolds his argument into a more sophisticated and expanded framework, the rigid definition of lying and telling the truth becomes tentative according to the context. McManus to illustrate the flexible nature of truth and lie draws Machiavelli’s reflection on lying putting forward the idea that lying could be beneficial provided that deception is obligatory for the nation’s welfare. While Machiavelli stands as an excellent example to illuminate the necessity of lie, McManus fails to construct a strong basis for such an example. Through McManus’ example, the reader is compelled to think that lying could be a necessity in some scenarios.             However, McManus does not provide an explanation regarding what constitutes such scenarios which depict his example to be weak and deprives it of being persuasive. Later, McManus alters his focus to Nietzsche who claims that lying is a necessity for people to find peace, structure, and comfort in society. To be more precise, Nietzsche considers people to be either incompetent to understand or face the truth. In the illumination of Nietzsche’s deliberation on truth and lie, McManus shapes his argument into a larger sphere making it hard to conceive. He acknowledges to the reader that Nietzsche’s consideration of the lying concept proves to be correct in many scenarios, however, he does not integrate Niche into his argument. In his conclusion, similar to the whole article, McManus does not draw his argument as rigid and transparent as much as he should which leads his argument to be not persuasive.

 

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