“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

–Upton Sinclair

The topic of self-deception has long fascinated me. Linguistically speaking, it should not be possible to lie to oneself. Or at least, not successfully. To lie is to tell an untruth, knowing that it is untrue. If we lie to ourselves, knowing it is untrue, the jig is up, right? And yet. . .the evidence is pretty damning that we human beings (present company excepted, of course!) make a regular habit of lying to ourselves–and believing our lies. How can this be?

We see it all around us. Our friend who tells herself she loves her job when we can see clearly she hates it. Our cousin who insists they could stop drinking at any time and “just like the taste.” Our boss who insists he “doesn’t see race” but makes broad generalizations about racial groups.

A couple of the Christian folks around here regularly say that we atheists really know that God is real, but we refuse to believe in him. That we are lying to ourselves, basically. Some of us non-believers think it takes a whole lot of self-deception to believe that science supports a literalist reading of the Bible.

It’s easy to see when someone is lying to themselves. There is of course one exception: I am very bad at seeing when I lie to myself. Well maybe two exceptions. Perhaps you are, too.

So: Lying to ourselves is a contradiction in terms, and yet it is more common than dog food. How do we square that circle?

Buddhism teaches us that the self is an illusion.

Uh, yeah. I’m pretty sure I exist. 

But this is a core concept of a religion that has stuck around for a couple of millenia, so maybe we shouldn’t dismiss it too quickly. Like a lot of religious concepts, I suspect it operates at various levels. One is impermanence–on what basis do I assume that the “thing” I call “me” is the same thing that ten years ago I called me?

But even within this moment, what is this thing I call me? We tend to think of ourselves as one unitary whole. But in reality, we are a system of systems. The limbic system, the circulatory system, the nervous system, the bones, the muscles. . .the brain. The brain itself is a system of systems with–physiologically speaking–the amygdala, the frontal cortex, the prefrontal cortex, the cerebellum, the brain stem. . .and so on. Psychologically, we have constructs such as the unconscious, ego, superego, internal family systems, heuristics, defenses, cognitive biases. Truly, “I am legion, for we are many.” [Mark 5:9]

So is an illusory “I” lying to an illusory “me”? Is that just more confusing? I (🤔?) think it sorta makes sense if we view it as one system (basically, our defenses) lying to another system (our conscious beliefs), with a third system (the one that knows better) bullied into silence. 

Whaddya think? Do we lie to ourselves? Is the self an illusion? Do you ever catch yourself lying to yourself? (If so, how do you do it?) Does this systems business help resolve the contradiction in terms? If the self is an illusion–and/or a system of systems, what does this mean for personal responsibility? For what if anything happens to “us” after we die?

And by the way: Who are you?