Truth is Simple

I was just thinking about the whole jail ordeal and all that... and it dawned on me that there is an entire booming business in believing what people say. Everything involved with crime can be whittled down to one basic understanding: people don't always tell the truth.

Think about that one. What if everyone were honest? What if someone, in some country not liberated by freedom, made a law that stated "if you lie about ANYTHING you will be killed. If you tell the truth the consequence will be less than if you were caught lying." Do you think people would evolve not to lie anymore?

Imagine this: you're in court, and the prosecutor accuses you of robbing a bank. You decide to lie, and then they find your fingerprints on the safe. You are immediately executed in front of everyone. Would that send a message? Perhaps people would stop lying. If the guy said "yes, I robbed the bank, I was desperate to feed my family and was not thinking straight." "okay sir, don't do this again, promise? You have to give all the money back now." Since the guy has to give all the money back, all he did was waste his own time. That in itself will encourage him not to rob another bank. Why would he want to waste his own time?

On second thought, that system probably wouldn't ever work. But what would work is a drug that prevents lying. If someone developed a drug that could be injected in someone thought to be lying, let's refer to it as a "truth serum," then the entire system used to prove that someone is lying would be out of business. The courts would be used only to sentence people, not to determine their guilt. That would be pretty interesting.

What if something like that were out there? I'd be willing to bet a truth serum would never come to market - think of the millions of lawyers who would pay top dollar to keep that off the shelves. It gets pretty political.

I suppose you could trace lies all the way back to the apple, but who wants to get into a Biblical debate about something that happened before history was documented?

My point, if any, is that people shouldn't lie. It complicates everything. I can't actually think of any good that can come out of a lie. Well, I could, but perhaps I'll wait to delve into that deep thought.