How to Spot a Liar Part I.

Questions

Yesterday while lying in bed on a lazy Sunday morning I stumbled upon a TED convention marathon. Now, the TED convention is basically a genius convention where all the biggest names in science, economics, and innovation come together to speak on a topic that is close to their heart, or something they specialize in. Well one of the speakers was Pamela Meyer, who studies liars and how to spot them in the act, and she discussed how others could do the same. She is quoted as saying “A lie has no power by its mere utterance; its power emerges when someone else agrees to believe the lie.” This got me thinking, what if most Americans decided they would educate themselves and not believe everything they hear? How would this impact our country? Would people no longer trust everything that comes out of politicians mouths? Or what if they decided to actually research what the media is telling them, before they believe it as fact? How would this change the way our country, and the entire world, operates? Would this make it harder on public figures, and would it mean they actually work for us, instead of the other way round?

The problem with this theory is the general population is good hearted, honest, and hardworking individuals brought up to think that those who have authority can always be trusted. They want to trust that everything is OK and the government has their best interest at heart. It is difficult to make people realize that this is not always the case. People like to be ignorant of facts; they feel like what they don’t know won’t hurt them. Mind your own business, we were told as children, and so as adults we say the same thing to our children. 

 

Break the Cycle

 Unfortunately this is the exact attitude that has allowed government to become the giant monster it now is. We are constantly being lied to by those who have our financial and physical lives in their hands. Why shouldn’t we want to know the truth behind the façade they show us? What’s wrong with being nosy with the lives of Politian’s? I’m sorry but I would like to know where my president was born. I want to see his birth certificate, whether he is black, white, or purple. Actually, especially if he is purple where are purple people from? I think as a nation we need to become more active in at least asking questions, instead of accepting everything as fact. Maybe if we did we wouldn’t be eating genetically modified food that hasn’t been properly tested, or maybe we wouldn’t bake our organs in tanning booths until we are cancer ridden.

The question I pose is, how can we as everyday people train ourselves to spot lies being feed to us daily? What are some ways to spot lying in news anchors, politicians, or other authority figures? I will cover this in the next chapter of this two part series.