Self-deception: Hypocrisy or Akrasia?

My only recent mention of "hypocrisy" is: What is completely natural and human is to claim to want to believe truth. Most every group likes to feel superior by believing that its beliefs are less biased than other groups' beliefs. Consider today's "reality-based politics" or frequent Christian references to TRUTH. ... Probably our greatest lever is shame and hypocrisy, i.e., the fact that most people pretend to want what we (say we) want. If forced to choose between what they pretend to want and what they usually want, many may choose their pretensions.

Wikipedia says hypocrisy is criticizing others as worse than you for not living up to a standard you fare no better on. This is the sense in which I used the word, and my use seems appropriate there.

It is also worth emphasizing that weakness of will is not the only plausible explanation for a deviation between thoughts and actions. Another explanation is motivated bias; we feel good thinking well of ourselves and badly of others, and because of that don't look very critically at our positive claims about ourselves.

I was thinking of this post as a continuation of our discussion in your Resolving Your Hypocrisy post of Dec06. It's this business of saying "really want" to refer to people's impulses instead of their principles, as if their low self were the only true one, that I strongly object to; it does not help people. (Under the circumstances - though I hesitate to make this accusation - I point out that calling others hypocrites instead of just akrasics, and calling their lowest selves their truest selves, may allow us to look down on them.)

"It's this business of saying "really want" to refer to people's impulses instead of their principles, as if their low self were the only true one, that I strongly object to; it does not help people."

I agree this something to be careful of, but on the other hand what are we to make of consistent contradictions between what someone claims to want and how they act?

Take an example I find extremely shocking, arguments by parents against other parents spending money for their children’s education. This is often put forward on the ground that it causes social inequality. If a poor parent makes this argument, I can understand it. After all it is to their child’s comparative advantage to have the children of those wealthier than themselves receive no benefit from the parents wealth. (Though in reality the more truly educated people there are the better off for all) What I can’t understand is parents who smugly announce that they could spend the money on their child‘s education, but that they will not because that would cause inequality. (granted that this argument comes more often in the hypothetical from the childless, but I have seen parents make it.)

If questioned these parents would doubtless say they love their children and want the best for their them, but should we believe them? If one believes that a child’s education is extremely important, it would seem one would do everything one could to give one’s child the best possible education. Of course maybe the parents believe that a society where money was spent on children in accordance with their ability (i.e. the smarter the more money spent on the child’s education regardless of ability to pay) would be more in their child’s interests as it would make society wealthier and benefit their child along with every one else. However in that case it would seem that the money they will not spend on their child should go to a fund to help the bright but disadvantaged, not spent on their own consumption. If they instead spend the money on frivolity (not to put frivolity down in general), what are we to make of this?

To take this a step further what if their child is very bright and wins a scholarship to Eton. (assuming that Eton does offer a superior education. As an American, I can only go by reputation) If they refuse to let their child go on the grounds that the existence of schools like Eton cause in equality what are we to make of that? Suppose the scholarship is not to a posh school like Eton, but to a state program to educate the most gifted on the premise that this is to the general benefit of society. If the parents refuse to let their child attend because this would create social inequality, because their child is already “privileged” by superior intelligence and shouldn’t be given the means to make this inequality greater, what would this tell us about the parents?

At what point do we say that their behavior towards their child is inconsistent with their claim to love their child and want the best for them?

Contrariwise, what about parents who claim allegiance to the alleged moral ideal of egalitarianism, but spend vast sums of money on their child’s education giving them a massive advantage in life. At what point do you conclude that they are either neo-aristocratic paternalists or ethical egoists?

My point is that while I agree that people do fall short of their ethical ideals (I do it myself more often than I should like others to know), we can not judge people by their words alone.

In the eventuality of all things, we can only be judged by our actions. A weakness of will is better than one who would consciously do differently than they had proclaimed, but in the long run, we are what we do.

Think of any time that we have had to rely on someone unreliable. They may have meant well, they may have tried to an extent, but in the long run if the only thing reliable about them is that they will not execute their expected responsibilities, they have somewhere crossed that line to join with the hypocrite.

Hebrew proverbs speak of the “simple” and the “profane.” A simple man is as a piece of property without fences or borders. Any old thing can blow through. A profane man is property that remained simple for so long – that is, without borders or accountability – that the property is just so overgrown and polluted that no one would want it.

There is hope for the simple, while there is none for the profane.

Somewhere along the way, a weakness of will becomes a matter of habitual choice, and there is no more excusing for good intentions.

Caplan takes on self-control here.

I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person I'm preaching to.

(by Bob Dobbes, in Newsweek ... long ago)

Another mistake is to deduce hypocrisy solely from evidence of inconsistency. Hypocrisy isn't the only cause of inconsistency.

What of those who act hypocritically in that something they profess doesn't match certain actions - but simply haven't yet become aware of the hypocrisy? Theirs isn't a conscious decision to choose illusion over reality, and neither is their self-deception born of akrasia, this weakness of will you speak of. This belief and this action remain non-overlapping magisteria in their minds, to steal from Gould.

Take the example of a person who professes to seek and embrace truth whereever they find it. Jolly good for them! But they don't take the next step of acting on this belief to search out and test other 'truths' they espouse, and so they remain an active participant in a cult, even going so far as to say they believe in the cult because it is true. Clearly there is some kind of self-deception going on here, but how could one recognize it, and where is this bias or heuristic? It's not deliberate hypocrisy nor akrasia. Is it simply a lack of follow-through or is there more to it? Someone could go their whole life without realizing they hold two contradictory ideas or that their actions contradict something they profess.

At some future point this individual could have a crisis. They profess to believe in the cult because it is true. They learn that some claim made by the cult is untrue. Now they must pick between what were once two non-overlapping magisteria; pick the cult by BSing some other reason and continue professing it despite contrary evidence, or pick the other claim of seeking out truth.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I'd be interested to see your take on this though. How much can a lack of putting two and two together be a form of self-deception? I see how some organizations or ideas could stand to profit by isolating themselves from investigative thought. Say you're taught all your life that communism, or capitalism, or religion, or atheism, or pork is bad. This claim could be true, could be false, or somewhere in between. Plenty of people go their whole life never thinking of challenging the claim, of looking to verify it. The thought never crosses their mind. How can we combat this tendency to just accept something and never give it a second thought, to never realize how one idea or claim could be contradictory to a different one we hold? Great articles! I'm highly enjoying them.

Don't most people preach the expected but live their desires?

Related quote from The Diamond Age:

In the late-twentieth-century Weltanschauung, a hypocrite was someone who espoused high moral views as part of a planned campaign of deception --- he never held these beliefs sincerely and routinely violated them in privacy. Of course, most hypocrites are not like that. Most of the time it's a spirit-is-willing, flesh-is-weak sort of thing.