Comment by noblethrasher

Don Norman (The Design of Everyday Things) discussed this at the Business of Software Confence almost a decade ago: https://vimeo.com/96714148

He specifically talks about the case of benevolently deceptive progress bars vis-à-vis tax software @ 52:30.

Basically, UI/UX is theater, and just as Puck observed in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, humans come to theater because they want to be fooled.

So, good UX is the magician that is upfront about the fact that everything is a trick, but evil UX is the charlatan that hides the fact that a trick is being done in the first place (credit to Jaron Lanier).