Telling the Truth: An Exploration of Ethics and Philosophical Theories

This essay delves into the multifaceted concept of truth-telling, examining the ethical and philosophical frameworks that govern it. It begins by highlighting the societal erosion of truth and the importance of moral values, emphasizing the necessity of learning and practicing truth-telling. The essay then explores various ethical perspectives, focusing on the philosophies of Kant, Nietzsche, and Foucault. Kant's theory, centered on the agreement of cognizance with objects, is discussed in relation to personal ethics and determination. Nietzsche's perspective on the flexibility of the mind and the importance of considering multiple perspectives in understanding truth is also analyzed. Furthermore, the essay examines Foucault's view of truth in relation to power, emphasizing the systematic production, distribution, and regulation of statements. The essay concludes by reiterating the importance of truthfulness and honesty, and explores the ethical implications of lying, drawing on Kant's perspectives.

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Running Head: TELLING THE TRUTH
Telling the Truth
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Telling the Truth
It has become rare to find someone who is consistent with saying the truth. Because of
the eroded ethic in saying the truth, organizations and people always call for justification to
ascertain what is said. It is beyond human imagination to fix the personality of someone to say
the truth but through learning of mora values, it is easier to say the truth. The most powerful
ethic is found to be that that supports telling truth. Truth telling is not a simple task; we must
learn and practice for ourselves before putting in action (Walker, 2010). Telling the truth is an
ethic that has been voted to have higher profits and can lead to a remorseless life. There are no
field that require truth saying, it is a general ethic that should be applied to every aspect of life.
This paper asses the various ethics available regarding telling the truth and uses the theories to
assess whether it is possible to say the truth or not. The question we need to ask ourselves is how
do people tell lies? More often, failure to telling the reality arise from the assumptions that we
make. We tend to assume that lying on small issue is not a problem, trying to tell the truth on
‘big deals’ and assuming other issues is not ethical. Telling the truth starts from within ourselves,
we don’t need to convince our minds to do something that is not correct.
Kant claims that truth is an agreement of cognizance with objects. The definition is an
illustration of the essence of saying the truth. Saying the truth is a personal ethic and
determination in combination. Telling the truth involves mind engagement, we have to focus on
what will benefit us and avoid drama. Dramas are experienced in simple conversations that are
never serious at all, it may be between friends or parents and children story telling (Denis, 2013).
Nietzsche comes up with the theory that explains the flexibility of our mind. Giving an example
of a pictorial presentation of an elephant, we cannot say the truth if we are unable to make our
minds as flexible as we can. Truth is a big picture, we cannot tell it with our small perception of

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self-satisfaction. To draw the real picture of truth, we need to focus on correcting mal mistakes
that we make. Nietzsche refers to small mistakes as lying and convincing our mind that it is a
small issue we lie on. Kant gives his theory of ethics in relation to the desire that human being
has. If one wants to be a lawyer, then he/she should attend a law school. More often e encounter
friends involving more drama in what they say to make their stories nice, at this point things that
are not real are included in story. The process of telling the truth starts from ethic consideration
rather than personal satisfaction. Truth can come along our way if we don’t develop the necessity
of influence winning. The desire we have towards our goals and objectives forces the mind to
create statements that can praise our dignity.
Above all, moral lessons begins at the stage when one is born. The character traits of
those around us can change our genetic behavior however immoral they are. 99% of people who
say truth, of which are rare to be found learn from their parents. It very simple to put things just
the way they are supposed to be. People just manipulate and complicate the truth with
consequences and personal desires hence telling lies. We don’t need to exceed our capabilities to
acquire what we desire instead we should use our weakness to explain how we should come up
with solutions (Hanna, 2000,). Truth is simple but telling the truth can be quit hard because we
are not ready to face consequences of our realities. The human brain is programmed to look for
simplicity, it tries to use any means to simplify things.
The most influential moral theories are “Categorical imperative” by Kant and “Principles
of Utility” by Bentham. The two theories are well taught in conjunction to personal position in
the society, and they talk more about staying away from negative moral behaviors in the society.
They both supported the ideology of existence of only one good think. Contrary, they do not
refer to the good thing that exist, the moral uprightness of an individual was the agreement.

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Telling the truth is one of the moral uprightness supported by the theories. Immanuel Kant’s
ethical theory contributes to moral laws and applies to everyone in the society regardless of
personal desires. The theory of human nature by Kant explains the ease of saying the truth.
As mentioned above, Kant aimed at reconciling morality in the society, this fits in our
project of saying the truth for Kant’s theory relies on human state of sensory nerves. The human
sensory nature is linked to external factors which Kant refers to as “Objects”. It comes out clear
that people have to interact with nature in almost every daily activity hence determining their
way of understanding things (Pavlich, 2017). Reasoning and the mode of communication plays
an important role in human beings whereby they use language to integrate their understanding of
nature. Reasoning plays an important role in determining whether one will lie or say the truth. In
simple terms, Kant suggested that we are responsible of doing thigs, things have mere chances of
determining our course. Linking this theory to Kant’s definition of truth as an object, we have the
ability to tell truth in all our statements. Sometimes, our desires drives us to doing things which
we’re not supposed to. The desire to get a job might make us to lie on the managers regarding
our experience to secure the job. Another example might be the desire to get things that are made
to people who are of a given age. One might decide to quote their wrong age in order to in the
price. Kant labels the desire to do things as “hypothetical imperatives” (Vanzo, 2010) and he
gives an example of someone who want to be a lawyer, probably they are required to attend
school and learn law before becoming a lawyer. Kant argues that the desire are great
determinants of human action, we have the choice to make between telling truth and lying
(Mahon, 2003). It is to our moral interest to lie and help others or ourselves. These are examples
that Kant gives regarding the categorical imperative theory, we choose not to lie even if we want
to satisfy.

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Nietzsche’s theory is crucial in saying the truth as it has a bigger perceptive idea of
objective truth. According to Nietzsche, we should make our mind to think that there is only one
way of facing matters in our lives. Nevertheless, we should consider a matter that we are the
evidence to our statements and we should be flexible in adjusting our thinking. The flexibility in
thinking can be applied in saying no to statements that we feel are not true ((Clark, n.d). In
making a false statement, we should follow by correcting and assuming it is a flip of tongue. A
healthy mind is that one that is flexible enough to tackle problems in different dimensions. There
exists many truth surrounding us but most of our statements are made up of less than 1% truth.
There are different interpretations of Nietzsche theory on truth, some argue that Nietzsche
believes there is existence of truth but there is no single perception of truth. The elephant
example is used to justify the reality of life and telling truth, we cannot get a full image of an
elephant by looking at its trunk and tail (Simpson, 2017). We cannot be sincere with what we say
or we get from people unless we look at it from different perspectives. Other people believe that
Nietzsche’s idea of truth can still be a lie.
Truth is not the perception we develop while reading the essay on elephant. Truth is our
presentation of exact information to people without manipulation. His unorthodox explanation of
truth can be useful in explaining the perfect style of the possibility in telling the truth. We cannot
represent truth with a single sketch but rather a three dimensional picture. Words are different
from taught, thoughts ca flow whereas words cannot flow on their own. Once said it is not
possible to get rid of what has been uttered. Language itself is flexible and expresses words in a
way that is viewed as facts. Many philosophers including Nietzsche present the mind as flexible
rather than fluid. Words are source of our conception on truth. Therefore, what human beings

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need to apply is the flexible part to come up with truth, they need to interpret words from the
inner side before saying them. The brain need not to be static on any idea that is perceived.
Foucault explains the regime of saying the truth in a different perceptive from other
philosophers. Foucault philosophies encompasses truth and power, which are the major world
problems. Through his knowledge and human experience, he spends time studying the behavior
of human beings. Saying the truth is a system of order from production to distribution of
statements. The philosopher uses techniques knowledge and scientific skills and the power to
punish. Foucault links the reality of truth with political reign by saying that truth has power.
Truth is a systematic way of producing, distribution and circulating word of mouth (Rayner, n.d).
The power which produces statements should be regulate them before production. Once
statements are made, they easily circulate and cannot be regulated. By including power in his
Philosophy, Foucault borrows the idea of other philosophers but in a different perception. The
brain has the power to produce and regulate whatever it is said. The primary terms here is power
and regulation, our brains should integrate the truthfulness of any word that is uttered. The main
problem facing people is an attempt to change our situations either economically, politically or
socially. For truth to be truth, we don’t need to supplement our words with force for acceptance.
Truth should be sufficient enough to make its own laws which will enforce clear statement given.
To start with, are statements written by Kant on truth. Many people misunderstand the
statements put forward by Kant and believe they are simple to follow. Most people who have
tried to grasp the content from Kant’s view on telling the truth end up distancing themselves
from them. Is it really ethical for one to lie? The question is open ended, there are those who
might view it as ethical whereas others as unethical. The reality is that, it is unethical to lie since
no one has ever reported dead on telling the truth. Kant joins other philosophers and hold that is

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not ethical to tell a lie. The ethical work of Kant argues on how and why telling a lie is unethical
(Grisez, 1958).
The scope of Kant’s philosophies against lying are not in effect yet. According to Kant
there are three senses of lies, the sense of right the ethical and the juristic. Kant does not accept
lying in any means at all, even if it means lying to save an innocent person. Truth in statement
made ether in written form or through word of mouth is something that cannot be avoided. It
doesn’t matter I the statement we make will disadvantage us. To that extent, there is a big
difference between truthfulness and being candid (Davidson, n.d). Truthfulness, honest, and
candid are three different words that confuse people diminishing the essence of saying the truth.
One does not need to be candid to say the truth. According to Kant’s philosophy of saying the
truth, it is possible for everyone to be truthful. One require to be refrain from making statements
that are not truthful and believe in the statement that one makes. Before uttering or writing
something, here should precede a stage at which we contemplate on what we are about to say.
The inner side should justify that what we are going to say is true ("Humean Virtue Ethics,"
2015). We need to differentiate between being candid and saying the truth.
Conclusion
From all the theories of ethics given, saying truth is possible if at all the mind can be
flexible enough to integrate what comes out of it. Kant proposes that, it is rare to change words
once they are out, for that reason, we should think on what we say. Since we are our own judge
of the statements that we make, we can tell if the words we say are true or false. If a statement is
false, we should adjust to truth before giving it out. Since desire is what leads to lying, we should
remain satisfied with what we have and develop desire of saying the truth. Truthfulness can be
learned and developed with time. It is not an easy task to tell the truth, we need to develop

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personal interest in saying the truth then associate with those who like telling the truth.
Thereafter we practice the ethic by reviewing on everything we get out of the mouth.
Foucault presents his theory by including power in our mind. He suggests the same
philosophy of mind possessing power to change anything that has to be said. Nietzsche comes up
with the theory that explains the flexibility of our mind. Giving an example of a pictorial
presentation of an elephant, we cannot say the truth if we are unable to make our minds as
flexible as we can. Truth is a big picture, we cannot tell it with our small perception of self-
satisfaction. To draw the real picture of truth, we need to focus on correcting mal mistakes that
we make. Nietzsche refers to small mistakes as lying and convincing our mind that it is a small
issue we lie on. Kant gives his theory of ethics in relation to the desire that human being has. If
one want to be a lawyer, then he/she should attend a law school. For people to get what they
want in life, they are forced to lie. Therefore, saying the truth is possible if at all one can rethink
on what he/she is about to say is true or false. There is no big deal and small deal in telling the
truth, we need to observe ethics as presented by Kant, Nietzsche, and Foucault.

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