I have said that there is somewhat more doubt
in cyberspace, but that it is reasonable to assume that most people are honest
most of the time, as we do in real life.
Two points.
First, that depends in part on what you mean by honest. There are few -- very few -- human beings who can be totally honest about themselves in an objective sense. There is a quite natural tendency to put our best foot forward. Many things can be literally true but functionally false. For example, take the football coach who was hired by Notre Dame and then fired before he started work because he falsified his resume. On this board, he could truthfully say he is a former major college football coach, but that, though strictly truthful, would hardly be honest. Furthermore, people here are unlikely to say negative things about themselves, so whatever picture you get is very onesided, and there is no 3D presence to help correct any misapprehensions that way (or to the contrary, either.)
Second, I do not make your basic assumption that people on line are honest most of the time. I see an awful lot of role playing going on. I have engaged in it myself, and others have also admitted doing it. Sometimes people reading role playing messages have trouble identifying them as such, and take the role play for the real person, which is a mistake that has led to more than a few dust ups here. (Indeed, jla's whole problem with me stems from his either believing or pretending to believe -- I happen to think the latter, but I could be wrong -- that a role play represented in any way the real person.) |
