Great article from National Geographic on why we lie. I was thinking about J Smith and other church leaders (and me-self also).

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2017/06/lying-hoax-false-fibs-science/

Great article about why people lie. Lying is a big topic and one that gets too little attention. Lies have played a big role in the history of human affairs. Nathan Rothschild seized control of the Bank of England and much of the wealth of the London Stock Exchange because he lied. The Mormon Church has grown into a world wide religion with millions of members and it all originated with a big lie.

When I began to study the "conspiratorial view of history" I couldn't help but notice that liars often became the most prominent and wealthy people who rule over the rest of humanity. There are great rewards to those who can sell a lie to the masses. JP Morgan recognized the power of information and purchased a controlling interest of 25 of the Nations leading papers at the time.

When I began to realize the advantages liars receive through lying (think Joseph Smith, James Baker, Jimmy Swaggart, Nathan Rothschild and the list goes on forever...) I was initially pissed at the liars but as I have given more study to the problem and energy to trying to enlighten others to this problem I have become equally disgusted with the apathy of people in general for their credulous gullibility. The article explains why people are this way.

From the article in your link: Robert Feldman, a psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, calls that the liar’s advantage. “People are not expecting lies, people are not searching for lies,” he says, “and a lot of the time, people want to hear what they are hearing.” We put up little resistance to the deceptions that please us and comfort us.

Liars advantage: liars rule over believers of lies. There is so much more to say on this subject but I will finish my quote with a Mark Twain quote I like "A lie makes it half way around the world before the truth gets out of bed and puts its boots on."

I don't get my own mansion when I get to heaven ?

No, sorry. You'll be a house servant to Jeffrey R Holland, cleaning up after all his spirit brats.

Thank you for posting that. Great read. This is what goes along way to explaining my family:


"Other studies have shown that evidence undermining lies may in fact strengthen belief in them. “People are likely to think that familiar information is true. So any time you retract it, you run the risk of making it more familiar, which makes that retraction actually less effective, ironically, over the long term,” says Swire-Thompson."

My elderly parents have come across many of the unsettling facts regarding Mormonism--the laminate DNA, the versions of the vision, no evidence at all for the BoM, etc. At first they are unsettled, and then within a week it has increased their faith even though the facts or lack of them have not changed. The evidence seems to make them dig their heels in even deeper.

I think this is also why apologists simply studying the problems and talking about the problems with Mormonism strengthen the testimonies of some. It makes it all even more familiar and as also stated in the article, people attend to accept lies that support their preferred world view.

to Done and Done.

I've lived through the comments you made on your elderly parents. I never understood and never will. I was raised to think for myself but it didn't seem to work with my mother.

Of course, it is always the other guys that are lying.

I continue to discover ways I've deluded myself and others.

As stated above, we all have things we want to believe. So while we expose the lies of Mormonism, we promote the lies of statism or feminism or materialism or whatever.

Fascinating.

FM wrote: "Of course, it is always the other guys that are lying."

kenc: That's why I included this in my post: "I was thinking about J Smith and other church leaders (and me-self also)."

Like you it is so much easier to see and become indignant when others lie.

On the other hand however, I did devote 30 years of my life to employment in CES because of those lies. And needless to say, if I had it all to do over again, at age 20, I would investigate more and tell the Mormons "no thank you" and not convert.

So I do get a little testy (still) when I think about the Mormons guilting so many otherwise good people, into paying large sums of money and devoting large sums of time to their fake enterprises.

I have to admit I have never been able to lie well enough to get others to hand over their money or spend their time working for free, to better my circumstances.

I don't mean to over-rationalize, but I believe some lies are demonstrably bigger and more harmful. (I'm thinking of pyramid schemes like Bernard Madoff's, and the LDS Church.)