You may recall the poignant fable of the frog and the scorpion. The scorpion arrived at a stream he needed to cross and, since he couldn't swim, asked a frog nearby if she would take him across on her back. The frog, understandably sceptical, said, “No thanks, you'll just sting me.” But the scorpion replied in a sweetly reasonable tone, “Why on earth would I sting you? I can't swim. If you die, I die.” This made sense to the frog so she agreed to carry the scorpion to the other side. But as she was halfway across the stream she felt a violent stabbing pain in her side. She realized she had been fatally stung. As the frog began to sink under the water, dragging the scorpion to certain death, she asked, “Why did you sting me? Now you will die too.” The scorpion replied, “It's in my nature”.

This story contains many of the themes of this book. The conversation between scorpion and frog illustrates the way we struggle over deception and accountability. Was the scorpion's persuasiveness based on an outright lie or did he manage to deceive himself before deceiving the frog? Why did she believe him? Was it because of the logic of his argument or did his persuasive tone of voice make him sound sincere? If she had survived the sting would she have admitted her foolishness (caught out by a sham display of sincerity) or would she have found a way to rationalize her choice in retrospect (saying that anyone would have done the same)? And how do we explain the sting in the tail? Did the scorpion even try to resist the temptation? What did he really want?