The Invention of Lying
Posted: December 14th, 2009, 4:01 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_invention_of_lying
(This thread contains spoilers, obviously.)
I thought this film had a great concept behind it, though I don't think it made the most of how great the concept was. Still, for a Hollywood rom-com it was certainly more thought-provoking than what is usually offered. The film is set in a hypothetical world much the same as ours, except that human beings do not possess the ability to lie. The truth is never concealed in this world; characters say whatever is on their mind no matter how offensive it might be, and they are unable to speculate on anything if they don't think it to be 100% true. The main character however, played by Ricky Gervais, spontaneously develops the ability to lie, with huge consequences for him and the world. It's a complete gimmick and doesn't make a lot of sense, but it works, and with it the film makes some witty and insightful comments on our world and the role that the truth really plays in it.
Physical attractiveness is a major theme throughout. In our world, of course, we can make things up and exaggerate in order to win people over and 'sell' ourselves to others in social situations. No such luck for Rick Gervais' character, who suffers regular humiliation by women he fancies and his coworkers due to being physically unattractive and lacking in wealth and other qualities perceived to compensate for attractiveness. The fact that physical attractiveness is so arbitrary is ignored (as in our world) yet emphasised throughout. The characters in Ricky Gervais' world are fully aware that attractiveness amounts only to genetic compatibility, yet still consider it to be more important than other forms of compatibility including mutual happiness, just as many people do in our world.
The film demonstrates to great comic effect the absurdity of advertising. Advertisers in Ricky Gervais' world casually admit that their product is not necessarily any better than their competitors; in one example a representative of Coca-Cola takes a sip of his own product and declares it to be 'a little too sweet' for his liking. He nevertheless implores people to continue buying it. The point here is that in our world advertising has almost nothing to do with the truth, a fact that we are all dimly aware of and yet continue to be suckered by. Advertisers in our world routinely portray products as if they exist solely for our benefit, when in fact they wouldn't exist at all if not for the profit they turn. Moreover, products are said to satisfy some need of ours that supposedly existed prior to encountering the product, but often the product itself creates a need that never previously existed. And of course there is the basic manipulation employed by advertisers in sneaking in some sort of association of a desirable thing with their product, often entirely unrelated to the product itself, such as beautitful people, a happy family life or, bizarrely, in the case of some ads, a sense of global community.
Another theme is the role of entertainment, which has such an impact on our real world that it is hard sometimes to acknowledge that it is entirely unreal by definition. In Ricky Gervais' world, the only entertainment that exists is to watch historical lectures being read. There can be nothing else because to enact anything, even real events, is a form of lying. Nobody can pretend, and their world is thus bland indeed. Our imagination consists of either conjuring things that don't exist, or speculating on things that might. The truth alone isn't very satisfying; we need imagination and make-believe.
More controversially perhaps, the film deals with religion, implying that faith is enitrely speculative. In the film, since nobody has the ability to consider that which is not known to be true, the concept of gods or a life after death never emerged. However, after Ricky Gervais' character gains the ability to lie, he comes up with the idea of what we know in our world as Heaven in order to comfort his dying mother. The doctor and several assistants overhear this and demand to know more about what, to them, is the truth about what happens when you die. When word catches on, Gervais' character is forced to expand on his lie, telling the world that when they die they will each get 'a mansion' in Heaven with whatever they want, and that there is 'an invisible man in the sky' who determines whether they go to Heaven or Hell. In order to satisfy the crowd that has gathered at his house, he announces that entry to Heaven is dependent on a 'three-strike' system. The consequences of these prounouncements on Ricky Gervais' hypothetical world represent Gervais' criticisms of religion.
Thinking they know for certain that an afterlife exists and that they will gain entry provided they don't do three 'bad things', some of the inhabitants of Ricky Gervais' world advocate using up two of the strikes. Why not, if entry to Heaven is dependent only on having less than three transgressions? Moreover, some of the characters become apathetic about the path their lives are taking. Why bother to achieve anything other than sitting around drinking beer, when entry to an afterlife much better than their current life is assured?
Obviously, you have to fill in the gaps a little to see how these criticisms of the religion that Gervais' character invents represent criticisms of religion in our world. Firstly, I don't think Gervais as filmmaker is trying to expressly accuse religion of being false. Gervais' point is not that religion is a lie but that, like the characters in his hypothetical world, if religion were based on lies or even just harmless speculation, we would have no way of knowing. We weren't around when the events of the Bible occured, so how can we take them to be anything other than speculation? I don't mean to suggest that people shouldn't speculate about things like God or afterlife, but that religion should not be taken to be anything more than speculation. It isn't, in other words, the same kind of truth as the truths we see around us everyday. Even if religion points to something as true as those common sense, observable truths that we encounter around us, unlike those common sense truths, we have no way of knowing whether religion is or isn't true. I think this criticism can be summed up thusly: it's okay to personally believe religion to be true, but don't assume it to be as true for everyone else as it is for you in your dealings with other people.
Of course, a valid criticism of the film's handling of the subject is that it assumes a moral order could have emerged without religion. I for one certainly don't think that that I could state with confidence that a moral order could have emerged in more primitive times without the authority that religion provided. However, realistically speaking, there is only so many lengths Gervais could go to in your standard length Hollywood rom-com in order to justify his position. I think due to the very nature of film making and its limitations, anyone who tries to make a point through film should focus on making that point, not on justifying the assumptions behind it. If it were possible to make films in the same way as a philosophical treatise is written, the filmmaker's message could perhaps be made more clear, but it certainly wouldn't make for good entertainment.
Despite assuming that a moral order could have emerged without religion, Gervais succeeds in making a good point about religion's role in moral behaviour. Religions that posit an afterlife, historically, have almost always defined moral criteria against which entry to the afterlife is judged in order to give an incentive for moral behaviour. But if moral behaviour is carried out purely with that incentive in mind, it is not really moral at all. It is merely opportunistic behaviour. An opportunist could thus get away with doing whatever he pleases so long as he satisfies the minimum requirements of entry into the afterlife, and this is indeed how many of the characters in the film see it.
The film uses a three-strike system as a stand-in for the afterlife beliefs of the various real-world religions, but it doesn't matter: as long as there are specified requirements of entry into the afterlife that someone believes to be true, that person is essentially given a free-pass to do whatever they please so long as they satisfy that minimum. Catholics for example are often parodied as anticipating their confessions before they even sin. The point that Gervais is making seems to be that, in our world, unlike in his hypothetical world, we don't know whether religious claims are true or not, so why should we base moral behaviour on them? If something is morally good or bad, it is morally good or bad in spite of what conditions religions specify for entry to the afterlife. Religions that do so are prone to reducing morality to a reward-punishment system, when in fact there are reasons to act morally that have nothing to do with Heaven or Hell.
Gervais makes another intruging point about religion's role in our lives: since religion is speculative, are its claims, especially in regards to a supposed aferlife, really something we should base our lives on? In the film, the other characters believe that everything Ricky Gervais' character says is unquestionably true; thus, they base their lives on his claims. When Gervais' character tells them that there is an afterlife that he describes as being better than their lives on earth, they become apathetic about their lives in ancipation of heavenly reward. This is a valid criticism of belief in afterlife: why should we care about living our lives to the fullest if something better awaits us when we die?
(Despite the attention I have payed to Gervais' treatment of religion, I am also interested in discussing the other points mentioned. However, much of the film was devoted to the issue and I felt that it needed to be addressed in detail.)
(This thread contains spoilers, obviously.)
I thought this film had a great concept behind it, though I don't think it made the most of how great the concept was. Still, for a Hollywood rom-com it was certainly more thought-provoking than what is usually offered. The film is set in a hypothetical world much the same as ours, except that human beings do not possess the ability to lie. The truth is never concealed in this world; characters say whatever is on their mind no matter how offensive it might be, and they are unable to speculate on anything if they don't think it to be 100% true. The main character however, played by Ricky Gervais, spontaneously develops the ability to lie, with huge consequences for him and the world. It's a complete gimmick and doesn't make a lot of sense, but it works, and with it the film makes some witty and insightful comments on our world and the role that the truth really plays in it.
Physical attractiveness is a major theme throughout. In our world, of course, we can make things up and exaggerate in order to win people over and 'sell' ourselves to others in social situations. No such luck for Rick Gervais' character, who suffers regular humiliation by women he fancies and his coworkers due to being physically unattractive and lacking in wealth and other qualities perceived to compensate for attractiveness. The fact that physical attractiveness is so arbitrary is ignored (as in our world) yet emphasised throughout. The characters in Ricky Gervais' world are fully aware that attractiveness amounts only to genetic compatibility, yet still consider it to be more important than other forms of compatibility including mutual happiness, just as many people do in our world.
The film demonstrates to great comic effect the absurdity of advertising. Advertisers in Ricky Gervais' world casually admit that their product is not necessarily any better than their competitors; in one example a representative of Coca-Cola takes a sip of his own product and declares it to be 'a little too sweet' for his liking. He nevertheless implores people to continue buying it. The point here is that in our world advertising has almost nothing to do with the truth, a fact that we are all dimly aware of and yet continue to be suckered by. Advertisers in our world routinely portray products as if they exist solely for our benefit, when in fact they wouldn't exist at all if not for the profit they turn. Moreover, products are said to satisfy some need of ours that supposedly existed prior to encountering the product, but often the product itself creates a need that never previously existed. And of course there is the basic manipulation employed by advertisers in sneaking in some sort of association of a desirable thing with their product, often entirely unrelated to the product itself, such as beautitful people, a happy family life or, bizarrely, in the case of some ads, a sense of global community.
Another theme is the role of entertainment, which has such an impact on our real world that it is hard sometimes to acknowledge that it is entirely unreal by definition. In Ricky Gervais' world, the only entertainment that exists is to watch historical lectures being read. There can be nothing else because to enact anything, even real events, is a form of lying. Nobody can pretend, and their world is thus bland indeed. Our imagination consists of either conjuring things that don't exist, or speculating on things that might. The truth alone isn't very satisfying; we need imagination and make-believe.
More controversially perhaps, the film deals with religion, implying that faith is enitrely speculative. In the film, since nobody has the ability to consider that which is not known to be true, the concept of gods or a life after death never emerged. However, after Ricky Gervais' character gains the ability to lie, he comes up with the idea of what we know in our world as Heaven in order to comfort his dying mother. The doctor and several assistants overhear this and demand to know more about what, to them, is the truth about what happens when you die. When word catches on, Gervais' character is forced to expand on his lie, telling the world that when they die they will each get 'a mansion' in Heaven with whatever they want, and that there is 'an invisible man in the sky' who determines whether they go to Heaven or Hell. In order to satisfy the crowd that has gathered at his house, he announces that entry to Heaven is dependent on a 'three-strike' system. The consequences of these prounouncements on Ricky Gervais' hypothetical world represent Gervais' criticisms of religion.
Thinking they know for certain that an afterlife exists and that they will gain entry provided they don't do three 'bad things', some of the inhabitants of Ricky Gervais' world advocate using up two of the strikes. Why not, if entry to Heaven is dependent only on having less than three transgressions? Moreover, some of the characters become apathetic about the path their lives are taking. Why bother to achieve anything other than sitting around drinking beer, when entry to an afterlife much better than their current life is assured?
Obviously, you have to fill in the gaps a little to see how these criticisms of the religion that Gervais' character invents represent criticisms of religion in our world. Firstly, I don't think Gervais as filmmaker is trying to expressly accuse religion of being false. Gervais' point is not that religion is a lie but that, like the characters in his hypothetical world, if religion were based on lies or even just harmless speculation, we would have no way of knowing. We weren't around when the events of the Bible occured, so how can we take them to be anything other than speculation? I don't mean to suggest that people shouldn't speculate about things like God or afterlife, but that religion should not be taken to be anything more than speculation. It isn't, in other words, the same kind of truth as the truths we see around us everyday. Even if religion points to something as true as those common sense, observable truths that we encounter around us, unlike those common sense truths, we have no way of knowing whether religion is or isn't true. I think this criticism can be summed up thusly: it's okay to personally believe religion to be true, but don't assume it to be as true for everyone else as it is for you in your dealings with other people.
Of course, a valid criticism of the film's handling of the subject is that it assumes a moral order could have emerged without religion. I for one certainly don't think that that I could state with confidence that a moral order could have emerged in more primitive times without the authority that religion provided. However, realistically speaking, there is only so many lengths Gervais could go to in your standard length Hollywood rom-com in order to justify his position. I think due to the very nature of film making and its limitations, anyone who tries to make a point through film should focus on making that point, not on justifying the assumptions behind it. If it were possible to make films in the same way as a philosophical treatise is written, the filmmaker's message could perhaps be made more clear, but it certainly wouldn't make for good entertainment.
Despite assuming that a moral order could have emerged without religion, Gervais succeeds in making a good point about religion's role in moral behaviour. Religions that posit an afterlife, historically, have almost always defined moral criteria against which entry to the afterlife is judged in order to give an incentive for moral behaviour. But if moral behaviour is carried out purely with that incentive in mind, it is not really moral at all. It is merely opportunistic behaviour. An opportunist could thus get away with doing whatever he pleases so long as he satisfies the minimum requirements of entry into the afterlife, and this is indeed how many of the characters in the film see it.
The film uses a three-strike system as a stand-in for the afterlife beliefs of the various real-world religions, but it doesn't matter: as long as there are specified requirements of entry into the afterlife that someone believes to be true, that person is essentially given a free-pass to do whatever they please so long as they satisfy that minimum. Catholics for example are often parodied as anticipating their confessions before they even sin. The point that Gervais is making seems to be that, in our world, unlike in his hypothetical world, we don't know whether religious claims are true or not, so why should we base moral behaviour on them? If something is morally good or bad, it is morally good or bad in spite of what conditions religions specify for entry to the afterlife. Religions that do so are prone to reducing morality to a reward-punishment system, when in fact there are reasons to act morally that have nothing to do with Heaven or Hell.
Gervais makes another intruging point about religion's role in our lives: since religion is speculative, are its claims, especially in regards to a supposed aferlife, really something we should base our lives on? In the film, the other characters believe that everything Ricky Gervais' character says is unquestionably true; thus, they base their lives on his claims. When Gervais' character tells them that there is an afterlife that he describes as being better than their lives on earth, they become apathetic about their lives in ancipation of heavenly reward. This is a valid criticism of belief in afterlife: why should we care about living our lives to the fullest if something better awaits us when we die?
(Despite the attention I have payed to Gervais' treatment of religion, I am also interested in discussing the other points mentioned. However, much of the film was devoted to the issue and I felt that it needed to be addressed in detail.)
