“Professional Communication” and the “Odor of Mendacity”: The Persistent Suspicion that Skillful Writing is Successful Lying

Apparently, lying well about science is a specialized skill; writers have it, but scientists do not. From the time we first begin to write our little school reports, what we are mainly trying to do is make ourselves look good, that is, to look better than we are. The author calls this the "odor of mendacity". At first, mendacity is deliberate, a learned technique for presenting one's self and one's company favorably. We master it on the job by imitating the speech of our bosses. The chapter highlights the three professional communication precepts that the corporate mendacity is sustained: the precept of spin, precept of exposure, and precept of campaign. Skillful writing and speaking are social behaviors, performed by human beings, in stressful environments, and that, quite often, our models of correct rhetoric are just biologically inadequate.