Lying is good... more or less

Vastet
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Lying is good... more or less

"Kids with juvenile delinquencies tend to be poor liars," says Kang Lee. "Kids who lie early, who lie better, are the kids who are going to develop normally.

"If you discover your two-year-old is telling a lie, instead of being alarmed, you should celebrate," says Lee, the director of the Child Development Research Group at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. "Your child has arrived at an important stage of his or her life."

Lee has spent more than 20 years studying how and why children lie.

He's found that by age two, about 30 per cent of kids are able to pull off a convincing lie. By age three, about 50 per cent can lie successfully. And by four, about 80 per cent can do it.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/kids-lying-healthy-ideas-1.3412815

I'm happy to see a study on this. We need more. I've known lying is an oft beneficial skill for a long time, and not just for people. A great number of species only survive because of lies.

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Brian37
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 Oh the irony, comming from

 Oh the irony, comming from someone who has called me a liar for a long time.

I agree lying can be a benifit, but that doesn't make lying right in every single context. Evolution does produce deception as a survival skill. It is what leads some species to have camouflage which can make them blend in and look like other life to hide from preditors, or allow them to prey on other life.

 

That does not make lying moral in every single context. The lie in camouflage benifits the individual or the colony, but it sucks for the victim.

 

It is why for example, it is ok to lie to protect an abused kid or spouse, but not ok for a rapist or child molester to use deception to assault a victim.

 

Evolution works, unfortunately with both force and cooperation. Lies can be used to protect, and attack. 

 

It is also why you cant understand why religion is poison to human thought. It is what allows, for example, someone to value the horrible morality of the story of Saul/Paul, Romans 3:7 "

 

 

Romans 3:7 "For if the truth of God hath more abounded through my lie unto his glory; why yet am I also judged as a sinner?"

Evolution is why we lie, but gap filling religious explanations allow humans to justify all sorts of cruelty to spread the religion, regardless if it completely made up. That lie based on a naked assertion also works in creating groups and thus allowing offspring.

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iwbiek
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in your case, brian, "liar"

in your case, brian, "liar" is synonymous with "liar who lies unnecessarily and unsuccessfully."


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I'd like to see more details

I'd like to see more details on the purpose for lying, which is often the justification of the liar, such as a government who might say they did it for the greater good of a nation. People lie for items like surprise birthday parties and call it a "little white lie" as an attempt to justify it.

People in poker lie in a sense, by bluffing or by verbally misdirecting the opponent. People lie to get others to leave them alone, such as a bible thumper on a Saturday morning. People even lie to help others such as a attempted suicide or if they have just broken up with a romantic partner.

Lying can be very benefical.


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I'll add my

3.1416 cents. A predator with colors and patterns allowing it to blend in with the environment is saying--"I'm not here", that's a natural lie. Lieing gives the predator the advantage. It works well in business also. Polititians, banks, wall streeter insiders all rely on deception and exaggeration to fuction. Civilization depends on it. In the US one cannot lie to a police officer--but they can lie to us. It gives them the advantage.

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Lies are nothing more then falsehoods searching for the truth


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Old Seer wrote:3.1416 cents.

Old Seer wrote:

3.1416 cents. A predator with colors and patterns allowing it to blend in with the environment is saying--"I'm not here", that's a natural lie. Lieing gives the predator the advantage. It works well in business also. Polititians, banks, wall streeter insiders all rely on deception and exaggeration to fuction. Civilization depends on it. In the US one cannot lie to a police officer--but they can lie to us. It gives them the advantage.

A predator with colors and patterns isn't a lie. It's a natural selection giving an animal more food or avoiding a predator.

You can lie to a police office provided the lie doesn't obstruct justice. If a cop asks what my favorite football team is I can tell him anything I want.


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But Wouldn't

a comoflage covering to hide be a deception. In this case the lie isn't mental but an attempt to decieve. In the military camo is used extensively to cover and conceal. Isn't that an attempt to say-we're not here. In our case we apply camo by intent, so it still is tracable back to the mind. A lie can work both ways, to protect one's self or to decieve another for gain and advantage. I understood the cop thing. The dots on a fawn conceal for protection, while the dots on a leopard hide to decieve.

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Lies are nothing more then falsehoods searching for the truth


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Old Seer wrote: a comoflage

Old Seer wrote:

a comoflage covering to hide be a deception. In this case the lie isn't mental but an attempt to decieve. In the military camo is used extensively to cover and conceal. Isn't that an attempt to say-we're not here. In our case we apply camo by intent, so it still is tracable back to the mind. A lie can work both ways, to protect one's self or to decieve another for gain and advantage. I understood the cop thing. The dots on a fawn conceal for protection, while the dots on a leopard hide to decieve.

The difference between a lie and camouflage is a bit of a stretch. Snakes don't pick their camouflage. It is natural selection. The snake with yellow dots dies out because the rabbits see him coming. However if the snake has brown dots it is able to hide and wait for the rabbit to come closer. Thus it eat more, more offspring survive.

I understand what you are saying, but lying is a conscious act. 


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Brian37 wrote:Oh the irony,

Brian37 wrote:
Oh the irony, comming from someone who has called me a liar for a long time.

Continued proof of Brian's inabiiity to read or comprehend anything. If he had read and understood the article, he'd understand that his lies do not fall under the beneficial category.

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Vastet
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Not true. Snakes DID choose.

Not true. Snakes DID choose. It's natural selection. Billions of individual snakes chose camo over what they had previously. They weren't bred that way against their will. Noone programmed their genes in a lab. You can't say snakes had no choice when snakes were the only ones making the choice.

There is nothing in the definition of deception or lie that requires a conscious choice and knowledge of the consequences. A lie is simply an untruth. A falsehood. One can lie without being aware they are lying.

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digitalbeachbum
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Vastet wrote:You can't say

Vastet wrote:
You can't say snakes had no choice when snakes were the only ones making the choice.

One can lie with out being aware they are lying.

No snakes did not have a choice.

Lying requires deceit. Lying is the act of both knowingly and intentionally/willfully making a false statement

 


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Yes they did, else noone and

Yes they did, else noone and nothing ever makes a choice, thus making it impossible to choose to lie. Some mighty strong cognitive dissonence you're showing. You literally couldn't be more wrong if you tried.

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 Since I became an athiest

 Since I became an athiest I've done a lot less lying. I would lie to Christians about my true feelings and beliefs. Go along to get along.

I think lying starts as a child as a way to resist authority and assert independence. It continued as a young adult due to insecurity. I thought I had to lie to get money, sex, friendship, love, etc.

Now that I am older(maybe wiser). I really don't want to have relationships with anyone where I can't be authentic, where I have to lie about what I really think or who I am. Anyone that doesn't like me being me can go fuck themselves.

The only think I am tempted to lie about these days is to the government. I can justify lieing to an unjust and discriminitory authority.

Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen


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Lying to

EXC wrote:

 Since I became an athiest I've done a lot less lying. I would lie to Christians about my true feelings and beliefs. Go along to get along.

I think lying starts as a child as a way to resist authority and assert independence. It continued as a young adult due to insecurity. I thought I had to lie to get money, sex, friendship, love, etc.

Now that I am older(maybe wiser). I really don't want to have relationships with anyone where I can't be authentic, where I have to lie about what I really think or who I am. Anyone that doesn't like me being me can go fuck themselves.

The only think I am tempted to lie about these days is to the government. I can justify lieing to an unjust and discriminitory authority.

an entity that does nothing but lie, and on top of that- exists on lying, one is forced to lie to be independent. To be truthful to a lier gives the lier the advantage. I think children lie to escape judgement/scrutiny. With 7 secret agencies snooping and crawling through everyone's life for anything and everything and then lying about the reasons they do it --they deserve everything they get back from the public. If you skunk on taxes --hoooray, everyone in government does the same---only "you" are supposed to be truthful. Authoritairans (polititiians) have this mental trick that they aren't responsible for the laws they make and make it look like "the law" is a seperate entity then they. Bullwhacky. The law is representative of them and how they think and not some obscure person off in the distance oiut of their sight. It's the same with corporations, making the responsibility for the foulups an abscure person off in the distance out of sight that's responsable for their decisions. They rob stockholders blind by fudging their pay and bonuses at the loss of others. The it's not thier fasult for the failures illegal or other wise. The supreme cout is within the staus of the elites, and favor thie kind over the masses. It's obviou when these type of decision they made favor there kind. Money is NOT freedom of speech. The founders intended that we can critisize authority, and that's verbally or by the press. They by no means ment that money can equal freedom to speak one's mind/self. He who dies with the most money wins.  The court is deciding things from their mindset and staus level, not the constitution.

 

The only possible thing the world needs saving from are those running it.

https://sites.google.com/site/oldseers

Knowledge trumps faith and I'm not a Theist

Lies are nothing more then falsehoods searching for the truth