Emma Levine

speaker

594 appearances 2 recordings 1 series first heard Mar 2026 last heard 6d ago

Emma Levine’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Sep 2026 with 1.

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Hidden Brain · Why Conversations Go Wrong · 14 Sep 2026 podcast

see what he's saying when talking to students is that the truth seems harmful if the takeaway is that there was no cost to doing drugs and actually it was quite a bit of fun back then.

This is a really longstanding and complex medical ethics question, and one that I'm really interested in and have been engaged with in my research.

And there aren't easy answers.

Having worked with and talked to a lot of clinicians, I think

this tension is on their minds constantly and many do decide that sometimes it is better to hide the truth because

telling the truth would cause unnecessary harm.

Going back to this idea of, right, would the truth lead someone to a good decision, better understanding, even if it hurt their feelings?

And, you know, the example you shared in something that a lot of clinicians talk about is, right, when there's cognitive impairment, like dementia, the ability for the truth to bring about full understanding, right,

or growth or change is more limited.

And that sometimes, for better or for worse, gives people the perceived leeway to lean more towards do no harm, to lean more sometimes towards deception as well.

Absolutely.

And I do think this particular instance is one of paternalism.

In my own research, I do find that paternalistic lies tend to backfire, even if they're told with prosocial intentions, right?

Because if you take away my ability to make a decision, if you assume, right, that the harm of smoking is worse for me than my own right to choose, I might resent that.

It's a little bit more complicated in the situation of dementia because autonomy is already inhibited.

So this isn't an endorsement of that lie, but I think it's common for people to think differently about it in this situation.

Well, this is an interesting question, too, that goes back to kind of what we were talking about with autonomy.

I think a priori, a lot of people would say that I wouldn't mind being given a placebo if psychologically it would help.

And so something that's interesting to think about in these situations is can we solicit these preferences and understand them in our close ones before the pivotal decision comes that

So that we are actually acting consistent with their wishes, their autonomy, even in that moment if it feels like we're not, right?

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