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by gary_0 625 days ago
Not living up to your word because you lack the moral fortitude, rather than having ill intent from the beginning, is still lying. You said you would do something, then ended up doing effectively the opposite. "I didn't lie, circumstances changed" is a bullshit cop-out, especially when it's a billionaire saying it.
2 comments

Lying requires the speaker to know that what he is saying is false. That’s what the word means.

By all means castigate Brin all you like but if you want to show he lied in this instance you have to show it was always a lie.

When I was five, I said I was going to be an astronaut.

As an adult, I took no action to make that happen; was I a big fat liar?

Yes, but at least the only person affected by that was yourself, and not millions of people.
Is a doctor allowed to abandon their Hippocratic oath because they aged 15 years?
If he does, did he lie when he swore the oath?
If he lied when he swore the oath, is he still a doctor?

BTW, I like this game: 'endlessly avoid making a point'. The winner is the person who gets the other one to end up questioning something that is required for a shared reality -- thus effectively admitting they might as well be arguing with themselves.

In my opinion your question is unanswerable because if he lied when he swore the oath he was never a doctor.

Can you explain how your question connects to the rest of thread? I can explain the thread if you don’t understand it, as you admit.

Please do explain because if you are trying to make a point it is escaping me.