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  3. We hear a lot about lying these days. Politicians saying whatever they need to get elected. Business people saying whatever to m

We hear a lot about lying these days. Politicians saying whatever they need to get elected. Business people saying whatever to m

admin2021-09-25  21
问题     We hear a lot about lying these days. Politicians saying whatever they need to get elected. Business people saying whatever to make a profit. Criminals insisting they did not commit the crimes they were caught doing. Even actors and community leaders lie to keep their positive public image. It seems that lying is more pervasive these days than it ever has. But whether that is the case or not is up for debate. There just may be more reasons to hear about lying or to find out if someone is lying.
    One way to consider the prevalence of lying is to consider if it exists for all animal species. Other animals have been in social groups for much longer than humans. Has lying been an issue with those animals as well? If so, then how long has lying been around? When you review studies on animals, you find that lying or being "deceitful" has been around for as long as any animal species have been in social groups. This has been known for quite some time. What has been found recently is that animals will be deceitful to members of their own species. Previous research emphasized that animals would use deceit (what we refer to as "lying") to protect themselves from predators.
    Considering lying, along with other behaviors we might consider to be immoral, is an interesting topic in recent academic works. This includes the book chapter "Immoral-like Behavior in Animals’ written by David Steinberg. Reading this chapter is a reminder that nonhuman animals face lying issues with many of the same behaviors as in human social groups. It is useful to keep this in mind when recognizing that human and nonhuman animals are equally complex and multi-layered in how they treat members of their own species.
    But when we consider the term "lying”, and how it exists in the animal and the non-animal world, it is also useful to note that it actually does not occur that often. Being deceitful about intentions or behaviors might be something animals do on occasion to put them in a better spot for survival. But doing this takes a lot of energy and effort that it is often not worth the cost. It is similar to how we humans will say that lying is "not worth it" because "then you have to remember what lie you told and tell another lie to explain the first lie". Similarly, an animal who might deceive other members of its group about where it found food so that it can have food for its own survival, then has to remember where it actually found the food while deceiving others.
    When considering why there seems to be pervasive "lying" these days, it might be useful to consider how much of it is actually " lying". " Lying" is a term for telling something that is completely false to obtain a desired outcome. Humans use the term "lying" for a lot of situations that might not actually be total deception. Animals do not lie that often. Likewise, humans, also, probably lie a lot less often than they are accused of. Using the term "lying" might be more often used for convenience rather than accuracy. Lies are totally, or almost totally, false and typically have a specific purpose of deceiving another individual.
What can we learn from Paragraph 2?
选项 A、Recent studies show that animals lie to protect themselves from other species.
B、Most animals lie in order to get out of trouble or keep a positive image.
C、Animals tend to be loyal to members of their own species to build a solid community.
D、Lying has been around in animal social groups for quite a long period of time.
答案D
解析 细节题。第二段主要介绍了除了人类以外的动物界的“撒谎”情况，作者认为撒谎或欺骗的现象在任何群体性动物中都存在，而且存在时间很长，人们早先就知道的是动物会使用欺骗来保护自己免受天敌的伤害，更近的研究则发现动物不仅会欺骗天敌，还会欺骗自己的同类，因此答案选[D]。[A]不是最近的研究内容；[B][C]文中没有提到。
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