What is a Lie?
Let us deconstruct the False word box of the Liar.
First, Why is it False?
It is False because it deliberately tries to convey information
which is contrary to Reality, (whatever that is).
Example:
Parent: “Did you eat the cookies?”
Child, with cookie crumbs on their lips: “No, I didn’t eat the cookies.”
This is a Direct Lie because what actually happened is in direct conflict with the words.
More precisely, we could say that a Lie occurs when an Experience occurs and the opposite of this experience is intentionally transmitted.
True Component of Lie is Underlying Message
Let us apply the T/F Postulate to the False Statement. The False component is obvious. The Child’s words said that he didn’t eat the cookies when he did. The True component is a little trickier. It has to do with the underlying message, i.e. subtext, which is: “I don’t want to be punished for eating the cookies.”
Even the Liar’s words have both a T&F component.
Difference and Similarities between Liar and Propagandist
While the words of the Liar contradict Reality, the words of the Propagandist are true in a limited sense. However, the information that is conveyed is deliberately misleading. This is due to one simple reason. The Propagandist attempts to transmit the false component of his true words.
If we apply the T/F postulate to the False component, we arrive at the same structure as the Liar. The Liar goes directly to Falsehood, while the Propagandist merely implies Falsehood. However, they both intend falsehood. The Propagandist is just subtler.
Example: True and False Components of the Propaganda
The deconstructed statement has a False and True component.
The Propagandist intends the Populace to believe that the False component is True.
If the Propagandist is successful and the Populace believes False to be True,
Then the Populace will choose the behavior that the Propagandist intended.
Because the Populace behaves in the intended fashion,
The Propagandist's underlying message is true, i.e.
The Populace behaves as intended after hearing the Message.
Propaganda: The rate of increase in spending is slowing down = T.
The words are true.
The implication is false.
Implication: Spending is Decreasing = F.
While the implication is false, nobody would call it a lie – misleading, but not a lie.
However, the underlying message is true.
Underlying Message: Vote for me in the next election = T.
Of course basing a truth on a falsehood is like building your home on quicksand.
Propagandist Loves Lazy Thinkers
The Propagandist wants Us to jump from the statement to the conclusion without examining the false component. They love People who don’t like to think too much.
Example:
Let us examine a specific situation. Our voter is tired of high taxes which he feels are connected with excessive government spending. He is looking for a candidate who is committed to reducing Big Government by reducing spending. So the incumbent puts out the above Propaganda, which implies that the government is spending less money and so gets the vote of our Citizen.
However if our Citizen looked a little more closely, he would have realized that the rate of increase in spending is down - not spending. Indeed spending is increasing rapidly, albeit not as quickly as it had. The true component of the original statement leads to an entirely different conclusion, which would be to vote against the incumbent.
Thus the Propagandist doesn’t want to Us to look too hard, or his implication will evaporate. The truth will emerge and the Voter will reach the wrong conclusion, at least for the Propagandist, who serves the Powers that be. This is why the Propagandist loves lazy thinkers. It is easy to trick them into voting against their best interests.
Differentiating the Honest Person, Liar and Propagandist
Now that we have laid some groundwork, let us differentiate the different types of communication.
All communication is an attempt to transmit an experience, (which could also be the experience of an Idea) from one Person (or Group) to another. The Honest Person attempts to transmit the Experience as clearly and unambiguously as possible. The Liar attempts to communicate the exact opposite of the Experience. The Propagandist attempts to communicate as ambiguously as possible, employing Fat Truths.
The Honest Person employs modifiers to trim his Fat Truths to turn them Lean. He wants the Reader to understand the True component of his words. The words of the Liar blatantly contradict Reality. They are False. The Propagandist intends that the Listener inadvertently jumps to the false component of his Message, which is also false.
Therefore the Propagandist and Liar, both end up at the same result, which is the opposite of the Experience, ~E. This is False, a Lie. However the Propagandist ends up at falsehood going through innuendoes and half-truths, ETF, i.e., a statement that has not been pruned of its false or misleading component.
In contrast is the lean truth of the Honest man, ET, which has been reduced of its fat with modifiers or explication. Of course a lean truth can always be reduced more.
The Honest Liar
When we are just speaking of a direct experience, things are simpler. However, when we speak of an idea, i.e. the experience of an idea, things become more complicated. When communication is based upon direct experience, there is less ambiguity, while the experience of an idea is based more upon the ability to understand. This leads us to the topic of the Honest Liar.
With the Experience of an Idea the Propagandist might enlist the aid of an Honest Person to transmit Falsehood, Not Experience, ~E. In this case, the Propagandist transmits the false component of the Experience of an Idea deceptively, i.e. using all the logical fallacies at his disposal. Because he is so slick, he convinces the Honest man of the truth of the falsehood. The Honest man then transmits this information honestly to the next person.
This is the ideal for the master of manipulation, because then the integrity of the propagator is not in question.
Thus Falsehood, i.e. not Experience, ~E, is directly Transmitted by Liars, indirectly transmitted by Propagandists, and even less directly transmitted by Honest People, who directly transmits the misinformation fed them by the Propagandists.
The Honest Person will probably even give elaborate explanations to truthfully, clearly transmit the misinformation. There is a major difference between the Honest Person transmitting False information and the Liar and Propagandist. The L&P are deliberately spreading lies, while our Honest Person is not.
This is why the Propagandist loves to get the Honest Person on his side, i.e.. because he is unintentionally transmitting Falsehood. Therefore his transmission is more pure and less suspect.
Each of us spreads Cultural Propaganda Truthfully
Before leaving this topic, let us point out that while the Propagandist may be intentionally attempting to transmit the False component of his message, that he may be honestly transmitting Falsehood as part of his underlying message.
For instance the Propaganda that implies that the Republican party will control spending and reduce taxes so that the People will have more money is a deliberate Fat Truth designed to mislead the electorate. Its true component is that the Republican Party will reduce spending on social programs that go mostly to the working classes and the poor, while reducing taxes on the rich. This is intentionally confusing. However the underlying postulate that this whole way of thinking is based on, is that money will bring happiness. Anyone who has paid attention has seen that there is no correlation between wealth and happiness. The Establishment truthfully transmits this flawed foundation because they really believe it. Hence in this capacity they are Honestly transmitting Falsehood.
Similarly each of us Honestly transmits Cultural Propaganda regularly. We inadvertently pass on cultural ‘truths’ that we have accepted without question from our earliest childhood. This is why it is so important to purify our own conceptions before beginning transmission to others. In summary each of us from time to time honestly transmits cultural propaganda, whether Propagandist, Liar, or Honest Person. Therefore it wastes energy to lay blame, while it is more productive to expose underlying assumptions.
Filters of the Receiver
This leads us into the Filters of the Receiver. Every Message, no matter how clearly and logically it is presented, must clear the Filters of the Receiver before it will be heard as True.
Roughly this Filter is broken into two parts, the Content of the Message and the Source of the Message.
Content of Message filtered thru Belief Structure of Receiver
Each of these Filters is broken into more refined filters. The Content Filter has two components, i.e. a Logic Filter and a Past Beliefs Filter.
No matter how impeccable the Logic is, if the Message does not fit in with previous or past beliefs then it will tend to be rejected out of hand.
Our Receiver is no empty vessel. He does not evaluate the Logic of the Message dispassionately. In fact the Receiver expands into a complex of personal beliefs, past experience, and cultural conditioning - all of which are mixed up together. (R signifies the Receiver.)
If the Message contradicts this belief structure, then it will probably be evaluated as false regardless of any other factor.
The Emotional Content of Beliefs
While Pure Logic has no emotion attached to it, our belief structure is a mixture of logic and emotion. If our belief structure was based purely upon Logic then it would readily respond to Logical examination. However because our belief structure is also based in emotion, it resists change emotionally. Many times this emotion is connected with preserving the Personal Ego, who resists change, which is connected to death. Those who are attempting to change these beliefs are perceived as attacking the very existence of the Person. While the change of a belief structure has nothing to do with Being and the Direct Perception of Reality, the Person tends to become emotionally attached to his beliefs and actually believe that he is his belief system. When another attacks these beliefs, they resist as if their arm was being cut off.
The strength of the emotional reaction has to do with the depth of the attachment. As an extreme example, some would give up their lives to protect their money, thinking that they are their possessions. Other examples: healthy people become depressed when their personal wealth drops, due to the misconception that they are their financial assets. These are all examples of being infected by the Cultural Propaganda.
If our Receiver, R, has been infected by the Propaganda then no matter how impeccable the logic is, it will be rejected if it contradicts these emotionally invested underlying assumptions, i.e. implicit beliefs, of R.
Reiterating for emphasis: the Content filter has 2 components, Logic and Previous Belief Structure. The deductive reasoning of Logic is subservient to the Emotional content of Previous Beliefs and will be automatically rejected if it contradicts them.
Implicit Beliefs the source of Explicit Beliefs and the Disease
Let us now deconstruct the Past Belief Filter into two parts, the implicit and explicit beliefs.
The explicit beliefs are debatable, while the implicit beliefs are not. The implicit beliefs are the foundation of the external beliefs and are largely unconscious. They are deeply imbedded and have an extreme emotional response associated with them to protect them from attack. Most of the time they are the source of the Infection. It is these beliefs that need to be uncovered to cure our Self of this Disease.
Example:
In the western democracies, candidates are discussible, while the institution of democracy is not. Indeed it is written into law. It is just as illegal to question the democratic process in the democracies as it is to question Communism in the communist countries.
Let us review. The Content filter of the Receiver evaluates the Message to see if it fits in with the Receiver’s Previous Belief Structure.
If the Message only contradicts the Explicit beliefs, then it is passed onto the Logic Filter. While difficult, depending upon how infected the Receiver is, there is hope that Logic might change Explicit beliefs. However if the Message contradicts the Implicit beliefs, the Message is rejected. The Logic of the Message does not even come into play.
If(Implicit Beliefs = False) Then(Message = False)
If(Explicit Beliefs = False) Then(Logic of Message Evaluated)
If(Logic = True) Then(Explicit Beliefs Changed)
If(Logic = False) Then(Explicit Beliefs Not Changed)
We stress. The Logic of the Message is not evaluated independently and will be rejected out of hand if it contradicts the Implicit Belief Structure. Therefore if the Source attempts to change an external belief, but is inadvertently contradicting an internal belief - (In this case Implicit/Explicit are used interchangeably with Internal/External) - then he is doomed to failure. His only real strategy is to bring the implicit belief into consciousness, before attempting to reconstruct it. As soon as the implicit belief becomes conscious it becomes explicit and is by definition changeable. However implicit beliefs that have just become explicit are still heavily invested with emotion and so are highly resistant to change.
As an example
Those who debate rich versus poor have already adopted the underlying assumption that money brings happiness. Therefore any argument that brings up compassion is fated to failure because it contradicts this First Commandment of Materialism. Hence before the topic of compassion can even be brought up, the implicit connection between materialism and happiness must be exposed. This is not easy because it is so deeply embedded in our language, our law, our culture, hence our implicit beliefs.
The Source Filter: Appearance
Remember we have only been examining the Content filter of the Receiver, R. Now let us shift to the Source filter, which is where our discussion started.
It has two components -
Does the Source Appear truthful? and
Does the Source Behave truthfully?
The visual Appearance of the Source - many times determines whether he is Us or Them. If the Appearance identifies the Speaker as one of Them, then the Message is rejected. If the Appearance identifies the Speaker as one of Us, then the Message is evaluated further.
Source Filter: Behavior
Similarly with behavior. If the Source behaves suspiciously or is suspect the message is tainted. While if the Source behaves truthfully then the message is more likely to be accepted. This is why Propagandist attempts to enlist the assistance of the Honest Person, i.e. because they don’t have to ‘act’ honestly; they are already honest. They don’t give off any subliminal cues that make them seem suspicious - they have nothing to be suspicious about. Note that these Source filters have nothing to do with the Content of the words themselves and have only to do with the Behavior and Appearance of the Source.
Logic only a minor factor in evaluating a Message
In this model of communication the message is evaluated as True only if it makes it thru all the filters. The point is that Logic is only one of 5 filters of persuasion - and not the most important one at that, as we shall see.
If the Speaker possesses impeccable logic but
Either Acts suspiciously -
Or Appears as one of Them.
Or suggests ideas which seem to contradict our belief system,
whether implicit or explicit,
Then the message is rejected.
If(Logic = True) And If(Appearance = False) Then (Message = False)
If(Logic = True) And If(Behavior = False) Then (Message = False)
If(Logic = True) And If(Beliefs = False) Then (Message = False)
Logic is only a small part of persuasion. Logic is only a minor tool for evaluating the truth or falsehood of a message. Further because Logic is emotionless, it doesn’t have the passion of the emotional/cultural filters to block or pass information.
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