Adjective

honest (comparative more honest, superlative most honest)

Positive honest

Comparative more honest

Superlative most honest

1. (of a person or institution) scrupulous with regard to telling the truth; not given to swindling, lying, or fraud

   Has the prime minister been honest with us?

2. (of a statement) true, esp. true as far as the knowledge of the person making the statement.
3. in good faith; without malice

   an honest mistake

4. fair; unbiased

   an honest account of events

5. (of measurement devices) accurate

   an honest scale

6. veritable; full

   an honest day's work

7. upright, truthful, fair

Synonyms

• See also Wikisaurus:honest

Antonyms

• dishonest

Derived terms

• honesty

Honesty is the best policy, we always hear from our elders. Honesty is the value of speaking truth and creating trust in minds of others. This includes all varieties of communication, both verbal and non-verbal. Honesty implies a lack of deceit. A statement can be strictly true and still be dishonest if the intention of the statement is to deceive its audience. Similarly, a falsehood can be spoken honestly if the speaker actually believes it to be true.

Honesty is typically considered virtuous behavior, and has strong positive connotations in most situations. A principal reason for this may be that honesty simplifies communication, in that honest statements can be trusted at face value, not necessarily as true, but as genuinely believed. Additionally, honesty helps to form bonds of trust in human relationships.

Conversely, dishonesty can be defined simply as behavior that is performed with intent to deceive. Lying, lying by omission, fraud, and plagiarism are all examples of this sort of behavior. Other examples can be doing one thing and telling the other, as if you are hiding something.

While there are a great many moral systems, generally speaking, honesty is considered moral and dishonesty is considered immoral. There are several exceptions, such as hedonism, which values honesty only insofar as it improves ones own sense of pleasure, and moral nihilism, which denies the existence of objective morality outright. Additionally, even in moral systems which approve in general of honesty over dishonesty, there are situations in which dishonesty may be preferable.