• maytham naei
    18
    ## True Lie

    True Lie is the process of adding more truth to make your lie more potent.

    Let's start with a logical paradox:

    > "I always lie"

    Here is the problem with this statement:

    - If that statement is a lie: then I lied about "always lying", which means I must have told the truth at some point.
    - If that statement is the true: then I don't always lie, because I just told the truth.

    Thus one can never say "I always lie"

    Now let's add a bit of truth to the first statement.

    > "I mostly lie"

    Hopefully you don't know people in your life who mostly lie. But it's still possible for someone to do so.

    Very simple, a lie cannot exist on it's own; it requires some truth. In fact I would say that truth is the foundation of existence. But here is the catch, more truth is not necessarily better.

    Imagine I am pitching a business idea to you. Which one of these statements do you better understand:

    1. "We are creating a decentralized financial derivative exchange where institutions can trade inverse futures contracts without the requirement of a clearing house"

    2. "We are creating Robinhood for corporations"

    The first statement has more facts in it, but I would argue the second statement is more truth. Here the receiver matters (did the falling tree make a sound?) in the reality which the listener has constructed for themselves inside their own mind the lesser truth is transformed to a greater truth. This is also why we teach the standard model of atoms in school.

    The second statement is a half Truth. Half truths have good results. In fact half truth might be more lead to more truth, as shown in the example above. While true lies lead to less truth, regardless of their intentions.

    > "The liars punishment in that he cannot believe anyone else" Rumi

    ## Examples of true lies

    Here are some examples of lies which have been empowered by truths.

    ### Recycling

    Simply put, recycling was a lie created by the oil industry to sell more plastic. Yap, all those "Keep America Beautiful" campaigns, the green earth recycling logo on plastic bags were a big fat lie. Plastic recycling very simple does not work; only 10% of our plastic is recycled, If we are lucky.

    So many were passionate and spend so much time and energy making sure they recycled, and advocated for others to recycle. This sadly might have contributed to even more pollution. Recycling companies sell the garbage to developing Asian nation that attempts to extract the last remaining value before dumping it in the river and polluting the environment.

    ### Carrots

    True likes are more likely to spread faster. Take the following statement "carrots are good for you" there is a bit of truth to it, but it's mostly false. It's hard to investigate every fact that comes your way, and as long as it mostly checks out, you pass it along. Because you think it would be helpful to other and you are doing something good.

    Again the true lie does not have to start off maliciously, you could be a game of telephone where there are small mutations as the information gets passed along. And one of these mutations can cause cancer.

    ### Rat poison

    If you tried to feed a rat deadly toxins, they will have a visceral reaction and try to bit your finger. Here is what you should do instead, get some delicious rat food, and the add only the tiniest bit of poison. That rat will gobble up that poison like a pig. (And it still might bit your finger)

    The less you reduce the trace of poison, the more likely the rat would take the bait. The ideal rat poison has just enough toxins to get the job done.

    ### Your will power

    Not all true lies have to be malicious. In fact the best true lies are done with the best of intentions. The more you believe in your good intentions then the more permission you give yourself to bend the rules. You might think to yourself that you deserve it.

    You are trying to lose weight. So you start working out and eating healthy food. Your very proud of yourself; and then you see the devils temptation, chocolate. You tell yourself you need positive reinforcement to continue your routing. But here is what happens most often, You actually eat more chocolate than you did before you started your diet, and end up gaining weight.


    > “Misguided good men are more dangerous than honest bad men. It is because they are seen as good that, in and by good conscience, the mob will always, stubbornly back them without question.” Criss Jami

    ## How to tell true lies

    Let's take the Iraq war as an example

    ### Distract from a bigger idea

    The military industrial complex is losing it's important after the collapse of the soviet union. The oil industry is under squeeze due to the lack of viable oilfields to profit from?

    Don't worry about those silly questions. The French don't support our war, so let's replace French fries with freedom fries. For bonus damage, overwhelm them with this lesser truth; have it constantly replayed.

    ### Add in social norms

    You don't support the president? Then your a bad person who wants to see innocent people die, and you probably support terrorist. I guess your no longer invited to thanks giving. You are either with us or against us. (Take the Dixie Chicks protest as an example)

    ### Waits for the right time

    9/11 continuous to be the most shocking tragedy for many Americans. And after this event, emotions were high and people were ready to take action. Sadly this was exploited for the invasion of Iraq; despite the tenuous

    See also, "The Shock Doctrine"

    ### Swap one question for another

    Here is the question that needed to be answered:

    "Does Saddam have weapons of mass destruction?"

    Well we didn't know at the time. So we replaced this question with one which we know the answer to.

    "Is Saddam Hussein an unstable maniac?"

    Well yes. He invaded Iran in 1979 which lead to one of the deadliest wars of the 21st century, and then not long after he invaded Kuwait, a U.S. ally. So he must have weapons of mass destruction.

    Tragically, hundreds of thousands in the war. Just because of a lie that was given so much truth.

    > “The best lies contain within them nuggets of truth, enough to give a listener pause.” George R.R. Martin, A Clash of Kings
  • synthesis
    933
    Equal amount of good and bad in everything.
  • javi2541997
    4.9k


    This is just contradictory. You cannot put in one phrase truths and lies because they are supposed to be opposite
  • counterpunch
    1.6k
    Plastic recycling very simple does not work; only 10% of our plastic is recycled, If we are lucky.maytham naei

    In truth, all our waste could be recycled, if we had the energy to do so.

    I'm not saying recycling would return 100% of the waste materials to use, but that if we had the energy we could process all our waste, and plastic is very recyclable. It's only such a low percentage of plastic is recycled, because it's not economically viable, given the price of energy, and if its fossil fuel energy, the carbon economics are not profitable either, i.e more energy is spent on recycling a bottle than making a new plastic bottle.
  • Zophie
    176
    "I always lie" contains no intrinsic true/false value. It's a paradox because people need it to be.
  • synthesis
    933
    All opposites co-exist. You cannot have one without the other.

    Think about it.
  • maytham naei
    18


    It's good that we are thinking about recycling. We should continue to advance this technology even if it is not perfect right now, because hopefully one day it will be.

    The truth that "all of our waste could be recycled" add more potency to the lie "we should be recycling right now"

    As you said, we do not have the economics to handle the recycling that we have. We are being pushed to create larger and larger systems of recycling which do not produce the results that we want.

    Recycling reduces our guilt of using plastic, and it gives us a moral pass. As a result we consume more plastic and recycle more; which as of right now actually damages the environment
  • maytham naei
    18


    Another view is that lies are the absence of truth.

    if we make a connection between truth and reality. Then we could suggest that the polar opposite of truth is none existence.

    In this way, a lie is just a slider that measure how close we are to the truth.
  • maytham naei
    18


    Maybe one idea cannot exist without the opposite of that idea. For example, you cannot have the concept of darkness without light. Although you can have a totally dark room, which is defined as the lack of co-existence of light.

    Moving away from the light analogy. What I would like to discuss is that in a self contained boundary, a complete lie cannot exist, but in the same self contained boundary the complete truth can exist on it's own.
  • javi2541997
    4.9k


    Reality is something that depends on us. Inside this complex paradigm we build our lives between truths and lies. I guess you cannot extract reality itself just to compare it with false or the absence of reality because we could end up in a strange circle of if in my world does not exist then is a lie.

    In this way, a lie is just a slider that measure how close we are to the truth.maytham naei

    Interesting quote :up:
  • maytham naei
    18


    Can you help expand on that idea?

    I assumed that quote did have an intrinsic true/false value because it is a statement that can be verified.

    What does have intrinsic truth/false?
  • synthesis
    933
    Maybe one idea cannot exist without the opposite of that idea. For example, you cannot have the concept of darkness without light. Although you can have a totally dark room, which is defined as the lack of co-existence of light.

    Moving away from the light analogy. What I would like to discuss is that in a self contained boundary, a complete lie cannot exist, but in the same self contained boundary the complete truth can exist on it's own.
    maytham naei

    OK, let's say you and a blind person are in the same room with a bright light on. Does light and dark now exist at the same time?

    Give an example of a truth that can exist on it's own.
  • Zophie
    176
    How would you verify the truth or falsity of the statement "I always lie"?
  • maytham naei
    18
    From what I have read, individuals born with visual impairment do not have the concept of light or darkness. It's hard for us to imagine because when we think of nothingness we think of darkness. In their reality the concept of dark/light does not exist.

    For me who is visually able, the room is light. This is because the concept of darkness does exist for me outside of that room. Now if darkness did not exist outside of that room, perhaps I would be like the visually impaired individual.

    We are talking about two types of existence between a visually able / disabled in the room.

    Give an example of a truth that can exist on it's own.synthesis

    If I say "I always tell the truth" that statement could exist on it's own.

    It's possible for an individual to say "I always tell the truth" and actually always do say the truth.

    I do not need to add a lie anywhere in that statement to make it work. No logical paradox.
  • maytham naei
    18


    It's a statement that only needs one counter example to be falsified, and that counter example lives within the statement itself.

    Why can't you verify the statement "I always lie"? Perhaps you are an all knowing god, and you can verify that statement.
  • Zophie
    176
    But you will never find a counter-example since you are attempting to falsify a timeless object. I can't verify the statement because, as I maintain, it has no intrinsic truth value and I assume verification is in the business of truthmaking.
  • maytham naei
    18
    I guess you cannot extract reality itself just to compare it with false or the absence of realityjavi2541997

    I really like that idea. It's so meta.
  • maytham naei
    18


    Okay, I think I get what your saying.

    So if a statement cannot have a counter example, then it has no utility?
  • Zophie
    176
    If a statement seems paradoxical then it's probably just a speech act in which the meaning is contextual, not definitive. Something like that.
  • maytham naei
    18


    Cool, that makes sense. Thank you for the explanation.
  • BroAlex
    3
    I might add the idea of "exaggeration" to the mix of lies and truth. An exaggeration is an overstatement or amplification of what is true, and in this way might be said to be a lie.
    Does the exaggeration of the truth make the truth more true? Does a lie, which does not completely obscure the truth but rather make it more than it really is, give us truth?

    I am thinking of a book I read in high school, The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien. The book is written as though from a Vietnam War veteran, but it turns out Mr O'Brien did not fight in the war and exaggerates much of it. Of course, the book is fictional. But the idea that what is said in the book is "truer than the truth" is an interesting thought.

    Can something be a lie and yet "truer than the truth"? An exaggeration certainly seems to add something additional to the truth, which is not the truth, yet is intended to make some aspect clearer than it would otherwise be.
  • DingoJones
    2.8k


    Sure but opposites existing isn’t the same as “an equal amount of good and bad in everything”.
    Even if you want to claim there is some good and some bad in everything, how did you determine that the amounts are equal?
    What is the equal amount of good to the bad in the Holocaust for example?
    Even if you want to change your claim to just a general one about good and bad existing in a ying/yang sense as opposed to a specific thing like the Holocaust then you still need to explain how you can draw the conclusion that the amounts are equal.
  • synthesis
    933
    Give an example of a truth that can exist on it's own.
    — synthesis

    If I say "I always tell the truth" that statement could exist on it's own.
    maytham naei

    This is a false statement because nobody can know the truth as it is not accessible by the human intellect.

    It's possible for an individual to say "I always tell the truth" and actually always do say the truth.maytham naei

    See above comment.
  • synthesis
    933
    What is the equal amount of good to the bad in the Holocaust for example?DingoJones

    In the end, there will be an equal amount of good because the lessons learned by it will have saved millions. It's just how The Universe works.
  • DingoJones
    2.8k


    Surely you realise how weak an explanation “its just how the universe works” is...
    How do you know the lessons will save millions? By what metric did you measure the bad and good?
    In what way can you even say the lesson has been learned? By who? There are still genocides, still horrors of all the kinds so where exactly are these lessons saving millions?
    And again, how do you know it ends up equal?
  • synthesis
    933
    How do you know the lessons will save millions? By what metric did you measure the bad and good?
    In what way can you even say the lesson has been learned? By who? There are still genocides, still horrors of all the kinds so where exactly are these lessons saving millions?
    And again, how do you know it ends up equal?
    DingoJones
    Because it cost millions of lives. It really doesn't matter how you measure it, only that you apply it equally.

    Good makes bad. Bad makes good. One cannot exist without the other. You have to be able to see things in their totality. The effects of the Holocaust will last for centuries (perhaps millennia). Over that period of time, it will balance out.
  • DingoJones
    2.8k


    That doesn’t address what I said nor justify your position which you’ve been kind enough to repeat once again.
    Is there something confusing about what I’m asking you?
  • synthesis
    933
    When your significant other comes up to you and looks at you in a certain way, need more be said?

    Either you kind of get this kind of thing or you don't.
  • Deleted User
    0
    Being wrong can be dangerous, but being right, when society regards the majority's falsehood as truth, could be fatal

    Thomas Szasz
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