Talk:falsehood

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Rfv-sense: The trait of a person who is mendacious and deceitful. (previously called "obscure") Not sense 1: the state of being false. DCDuring TALK 15:01, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Would you accept any of these? :

• http://books.google.com/books?id=IqoYAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA170&dq=his-falsehood
• http://books.google.com/books?id=PLYVM_9okGwC&pg=PA511&dq=his-falsehood
• http://kingjbible.com/micah/2.htm

—Ruakh_TALK 15:36, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

The definition means dishonety/deceitfulness, right? Overlap with the first definition "the state of being false" I'd have thought. Mglovesfun (talk) 16:16, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

I think it could be defined as "the state of being false", but it's nonetheless very different from the question of whether a statement is false. —Ruakh_TALK 17:02, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

(And actually, for people and statements both, it's less a "state" than a "property" or "quality".) —Ruakh_TALK 17:04, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

The first one might be arguable, but the others are clear. Do you think it is still in use currently in this sense?

Other dictionaries report as many as five senses, including (deprecated template usage) mendacity, only sometimes shown as obsolete.

Some make the distinction between "a false statement" and "something false; an untrue idea, belief, etc." Other senses are "lack of conformity to truth or fact" and "deception".

If we are to be merely a translating dictionary or aimed solely at earlier stage language learners, these kinds of distinctions may be more than can be supported. DCDuring TALK 18:54, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Possibly cited? It's rare. - -sche (discuss) 00:19, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

It is much less common than the other senses, but I'm not sure about rare. It seems to come up in discussions of character and of morality, in which the "fundamental attribution error" is widespread. Though I can't understand the KJV quote, the other cites seem OK. I think I found another one at COCA for good measure. DCDuring TALK 02:14, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I can't understand the KJV quote, either, but the word that it's translating, shéker, means "lie, untruth", not really "deceitfulness". (The Bible sometimes uses it attributively, like "words of shéker" and "lips of shéker", so it doesn't always quite translate to English "lie"; and this particular verse is difficult, with several major translations punting and totally paraphrasing that part; but it's closer to "lie" than to "deceitfulness", and several other major translations translate it as "lies" in this verse.) Of course, there's no guarantee that the translators of the KJV understood the word, and this verse, in exactly the way that people do today, but I really wouldn't take it to mean "deceitfulness" without further evidence. —Ruakh_TALK 02:49, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I have removed the Bible quotation and passed the word. - -sche (discuss) 02:28, 26 April 2011 (UTC)