Comment by choeger

In the Western culture, lying is primarily connected to deception. In cultures where Semitic religions have not influenced, lying and deception are not same: one can lie, without intending to deceive. That's how one has to look at.

One can lie for multiple reasons. For instance, to avoid conflict; or because one is not in a mood. Deception is one among many reasons.

Why the western culture focuses so much on the unity between lying/falsehood and deception? This has to do with the secularization of Christianity: Christian ideas becoming less Christian, more 'universal'. Satan, falsity, lying, deception--all form the unity in Christianity; in secular thinking, Satan is pushed out, but the unity between lying, falsehood and deception is present. This unity does not exist for Inuits or Chinese or even east Indians. It is part of child rearing practices in China and in India, to teach kids to lie.

This isn't a lie- it's mythology. The information is stored in the emotion and values presented in the story, not the literal details.

Most native american cultures have a complex mythology that explains the worldview, values, and philosophy of the culture. This is how the culture is transmitted, and even young children in these societies are used to mythology, and understand how to use it without interpreting it as a simple literal explanation of 'fact.'

The 'literal truth' doesn't work in place of mythology, it is hard to remember and interest kids with unless they've experienced it directly... unlike mythology, it fails to serve as a stable and effective way of transmitting cultural values over long time spans. The emotional content is critical for memorization, and attention... and also serves as a sort of 'checksum' where erroneous changes to the story generally reduce the emotional content, thereby causing the original 'correct' version to remain dominant.

Humans are really bad at estimating certain kinds of dangers.

Invisible and slow acting dangers are consistently under-estimated, immediate & physical dangers are recognized easily.

Teaching a very young kid that even if they are warm right now (especially inside, before going outside, or in the sun) that they still need to keep their hat on because they might lose it or not put it on correctly when it becomes cold and cold can kill.

Cold is invisible, it's not immediate. Replacing it with a captivating story about a mythical monster that will come and get you should serve to stay in their mind better & they might even enjoy hearing about it.

This isn't a lie in the way we'd typically talk about lies. It isn't meant to deceive. It's a myth.

As a child grows and discovers that there isn't really a monster in the sea, are they going to resent their parents when they understand the explanation?

I think that's the difference here.

It's just reverse Santa Claus.

Besides, I think of education as a series of increasingly small lies anyway. If you can get the kids to model correct behavior, you're just helping them visualize success. Is it a self delusion to visualize success for yourself? Maybe, but so what?

That's what I took away as well. At some point all these stories have to be retracted and the truth told. It was a big deal for us as kids about Santa, the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, etc. What if there were hundreds more though? What if the parent only corrected a portion of these? What if the situation never arose again where the child would identify the lie and instead propagate it to offspring?

Perhaps we've just solved how religions start... /s

You could compare oral cultures to mnemonics (memory aids) — the more extreme the story, the easier it is to remember / recall the underlying message. That's how our brains work. I recommend a book about oral cultures (and storytelling) called: The Spell of the Sensuous.

If you told a child "you see, when you go in the water, your lungs stop being able to absorb oxygen and your brain shuts down - after long enough - we cannot start it back up again" they aren't going to understand.

Using allegories you can put things into terms the child understands more easily. As they get older you can explain the truth behind the "lie" or story, if you like.

I remember in high school learning electrons were balls. Then, later I learn they are actually fields. Was I lied to?

I suppose you'd count the exclamation of pain after strike that a parent asked their child make against the parent as a lie, too.

But, then I would know for sure you have missed the point.

You can just base the story on the truth, you don't have to lie.

Curious on your comment... Do you do Easter bunny, Tooth Fairy or Santa with your kids?

So you told your kids Santa Claus doesn't exist at the first possible opportunity? There are many positive reasons to lie.

You mean like how we lie about Santa Claus?

> why not tell them the (horrific) truth?

Because kids are not capable of understanding it.

Do you not let your children read fiction books, since they are just filled with lies that the author imagined? Your comment about 'never lying' sounds like you take it to almost a pathological level.