Fundamentals of Nuclear Science and Engineering

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement?

There are times when it is acceptable not to tell the truth.

Use specific reasons and details to support your answer.

Since we were young, we have been taught that we should be honest to others. But the fact isn’t so, there are some exceptions that we are supposed to be a liar, when it’s acceptable not to tell the truth. For some reasons, I totally take the side of the statement.

I believe that everyone of us, young people, might had been badly ill, but we could recover from these illnesses due to our good immune system and excellent medical services. However, some of our older beloved ones, might suffer seriously deadly diseases, such as cancers. In such case, letting the patients know the truth would worsen the situation. In order to avoid this, we had better not tell him or her the truth of disease. On the contrary, we should lie to him that the situation is okay and he would recover very soon, which would probably enable him to pick up confidence to overcome the disease. As the Chinese saying goes that a mother always worries about her son while he is thousand miles away from home, parents always worry about their children while children are far away from home. Children are kids in the parents’ eyes. As an adult, we’re no longer kids who depend on parents and learn how to live independently. Even if we meet difficulty and suffer from injustice, we should not tell our beloved ones lest we should worry them. If they asked us how it was going, we should reply that everything goes well. This is a special occasion where it’s acceptable not to tell the truth. Although the cold war has ended for 24 years, there are still some espionages in the world of today, such as spy activities between Iran and western countries. If some people ask us about something that we accidently know yet is confidential and important to our national security, on such situation we should tell them lies and try to inform police. In some cases, being honest could bring terrible consequences to us, we should learn how to tell situations whether we should not tell truths.