Toward a formal analysis of deceptive signaling

Fallis, Don; Lewis, Peter J.

doi:10.1007/s11229-017-1536-3

Cited by 14 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Therefore, we agree with Reddy () that a new definition of “deception” and a new theoretical framework that separates deception from false‐belief understanding are needed in developmental psychology. Biological studies on animal deception rely on the assumption that deception may occur without insight into the mind of the deceived (see Fallis & Lewis, ), so we believe that the new approach should integrate two lines of deception research: human and animal deception.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In other words, contrary to involuntary deceptive behaviours (e.g., mimicry in insects), flexible deceptive acts of primates, and young humans might rely on similar mechanisms. For this reason we put aside the current debate on deception in the animal kingdom as a whole and focus our consideration only on the deceptions of humans and their closest relatives (see Artiga & Paternotte, ; Birch, ; Fallis & Lewis, for recent broad definitions of “deception” in the animal kingdom). We believe that the definition of “tactical deception” describes humans’ deceptions appropriately, with one exception—older children and adults deceive not only for self‐benefit but also for other‐oriented purposes (Warneken & Orlins, ), even when the deception involves personal cost (Popliger, Talwar, & Crossman, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A new model of the development of deception: Disentangling the role of false‐belief understanding in deceptive ability

Jakubowska

Białecka‐Pikul

2019

Social Development

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“Deception” is defined predominantly as the intentional attempt to create false‐beliefs in others. However, the intentionality behind early acts of deception and its relation to false‐belief understanding remain unresolved. In this article, we offer a three‐stage theoretical model of the development of deception in human ontogeny. We posit that at any age, human deception is an intentional action, but its form changes according to the level of the deceiver's intentionality. As the primary function of deception is to influence the behaviour of others, we argue that first‐stage deceptions‐in‐action involves only in the analysis of behaviours and perceptual access, not beliefs. In our view, the ability to deceive and false‐belief understanding are eventually inter‐connected, but false‐belief understanding is not essential for the earliest form of deception. Based on empirical findings, which suggest that by observing the results of early deceptions children build their knowledge of mental states as causes of human actions, we claim that the second stage of deception is representational deception. Further, as the understanding of beliefs becomes more advanced, the effectiveness of children's deception increases, and new forms of reflective deception (the third stage) emerge. Future directions for research are outlined, and limitations of the current model are discussed.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A new model of the development of deception: Disentangling the role of false‐belief understanding in deceptive ability

Jakubowska

Białecka‐Pikul

2019

Social Development

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“…Brian Skyrms, for instance, has used signaling games to develop a notion of 'informational content,' a generalization of the more familiar propositional content (Skyrms, 2010a;Birch, 2014). Signaling games have also been used by philosophers to work out accounts of deception appropriate for non-intentional organisms (Fallis and Lewis, 2017;Martinez, 2015). Moreover, signaling games have been used to frame a variety of issues in the philosophy of biology relating to the evolution of language and proto-language (Sterelny, 2012a,b).…”

Section: Previous Results and Theoretical Grounding: The Evolution Ofmentioning

confidence: 99%

Experimental Economics for Philosophers

Rubin¹,

O’Connor²,

Bruner³

2019

Methodological Advances in Experimental Philosophy

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Recently, game theory and evolutionary game theory-mathematical frameworks from economics and biology designed to model and explain interactive behavior-have proved fruitful tools for philosophers in areas such as ethics, philosophy of language, social epistemology, and political philosophy. This methodological osmosis is part of a trend where philosophers have blurred disciplinary lines to import the best epistemic tools available. In this vein, experimental philosophers have drawn on practices from the social sciences, and especially from psychology, to expand philosophy's grasp on issues from morality to consciousness. We argue that the recent prevalence of formal work on human interaction in philosophy opens the door for new methods in experimental philosophy. In particular, we discuss methods from experimental economics, focusing on a small literature we have been developing investigating signaling and communication in humans. We describe results from a novel experiment showing how environmental structure can shape signaling behavior.

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“…Several authors have recently raised the possibility of altruistic deception in something like this sense (Fallis, 2015;Fallis & Lewis, 2017;Artiga & Paternotte, 2018). None, however, has been able to offer a plausible empirical example of altruistic deception in a non-human species.…”

Section: White Liesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Altruistic deception

Birch

2019

Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in

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Altruistic deception (or the telling of "white lies") is common in humans. Does it also exist in non-human animals? On some definitions of deception, altruistic deception is impossible by definition, whereas others make it too easy by counting useful-but-ambiguous information as deceptive. I argue for a definition that makes altruistic deception possible in principle without trivializing it. On my proposal, deception requires the strategic exploitation of a receiver by a sender, where "exploitation" implies that the sender elicits a behaviour in the receiver that is beneficial in a different type of situation and is expressed only because the signal raises the probability, from the receiver's standpoint, of that type of situation. I then offer an example of a real signal that is deceptive in this sense, and yet potentially altruistic (and certainly cooperative): the purr call of the pied babbler. Fledglings associate purr calls with food, and adults exploit this learned association, in the absence of food, to lead fledglings away from predators following an alarm call. I conclude by considering why altruistic deception is apparently so rare in non-human animals.

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Toward a formal analysis of deceptive signaling

Cited by 14 publications

References 28 publications

A new model of the development of deception: Disentangling the role of false‐belief understanding in deceptive ability

A new model of the development of deception: Disentangling the role of false‐belief understanding in deceptive ability

Experimental Economics for Philosophers

Altruistic deception

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