Why do NTs believe each other's lies?

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Greentea
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23 Dec 2008, 11:13 pm

This is one of the enigmas I've yet to uncover about NTs... From direct observation, all NTs know that they're deceptive/manipulative and lie through their teeth in order to get their needs / desires met and escalate the social power ladder as much as possible. They also call it "being human", which means they believe/know that everyone else does it too.

Yet, they believe others' lies / white lies / manipulations (otherwise, things like kissing ass wouldn't be as effective as they are. Kissing ass is effective because someone is buying your flattery of them as genuine liking).

Has someone here deciphered this mystery and can enlighten me? The only idea I can come up with is that they get caught prey of "wishful thinking"...


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23 Dec 2008, 11:25 pm

Greentea wrote:
This is one of the enigmas I've yet to uncover about NTs... From direct observation, all NTs know that they're deceptive/manipulative and lie through their teeth in order to get their needs / desires met and escalate the social power ladder as much as possible. They also call it "being human", which means they believe/know that everyone else does it too.

Yet, they believe others' lies / white lies / manipulations (otherwise, things like kissing ass wouldn't be as effective as they are. Kissing ass is effective because someone is buying your flattery of them as genuine liking).

Has someone here deciphered this mystery and can enlighten me? The only idea I can come up with is that they get caught prey of "wishful thinking"...


I don't think that they buy each other's lies at all. For instance, I don't think that kissing ass is effective because the kissee has been duped. It's effective because the kissee understands the power that is being ceded to him/her by the kisser.

They simply accept each other's lies as perfectly natural, human, and expected. When I talk to my husband about this, he just shrugs and says, "What do you want? This is what people do." There are NTs who rebel against this sort of behavior. My husband doesn't participate. But it doesn't piss him off, either. He just accepts that people are different. He can understand why NTs work that way. He can see those tendencies in himself, even though he chooses not to act on them.

I cannot see those tendences in myself at all. People who lie because it's the way to go about the business of life drive me up the wall. The closest I can come to accepting it is to believe that we're all reincarnated many times, and we keep learning each time, so that people who lie through their teeth and sleep well at night have been here, say, once or twice, while people like Aspies have been through this many, many times and can see things more clearly.

I don't think it's fair, particularly, but that's my working theory... :wink:



ephemerella
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24 Dec 2008, 12:39 am

Not just NTs but other apes:

"A Highly Evolved Propensity for Deceit" By NATALIE ANGIER
Published: December 22, 2008

"...Deceitful behavior has a long and storied history in the evolution of social life, and the more sophisticated the animal, it seems, the more commonplace the con games, the more cunning their contours.

In a comparative survey of primate behavior, Richard Byrne and Nadia Corp of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland found a direct relationship between sneakiness and brain size. The larger the average volume of a primate species’ neocortex — the newest, “highest” region of the brain — the greater the chance that the monkey or ape would pull a stunt like this one described in The New Scientist: a young baboon being chased by an enraged mother intent on punishment suddenly stopped in midpursuit, stood up and began scanning the horizon intently, an act that conveniently distracted the entire baboon troop into preparing for nonexistent intruders. ...

... Great apes, for example, make great fakers. Frans B. M. de Waal, a professor at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center and Emory University, said chimpanzees or orangutans in captivity sometimes tried to lure human strangers over to their enclosure by holding out a piece of straw while putting on their friendliest face.

“People think, Oh, he likes me, and they approach,” Dr. de Waal said. “And before you know it, the ape has grabbed their ankle and is closing in for the bite. It’s a very dangerous situation.”

Apes wouldn’t try this on their own kind. “They know each other too well to get away with it,” Dr. de Waal said. “Holding out a straw with a sweet face is such a cheap trick, only a naïve human would fall for it.”

Apes do try to deceive one another. Chimpanzees grin when they’re nervous, and when rival adult males approach each other, they sometimes take a moment to turn away and close their grins with their hands. Similarly, should a young male be courting a female and spot the alpha male nearby, the subordinate chimpanzee will instantly try to cloak his amorous intentions by dropping his hands over his erection.

Rhesus monkeys are also artful dodgers. “There’s a long set of studies showing that the monkeys are very good at stealing from us,” said Laurie R. Santos, an associate professor of psychology at Yale University...."

According to the same article above, people do little better than 50% in detecting lies. The article suggests there is some evolutionary advantage to being gullible and not good at spotting liars.



Last edited by ephemerella on 24 Dec 2008, 12:43 am, edited 1 time in total.

oblio
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24 Dec 2008, 12:40 am

neshamaruach wrote:
Greentea wrote:
This is one of the enigmas I've yet to uncover about NTs... From direct observation, all NTs know that they're deceptive/manipulative and lie through their teeth in order to get their needs / desires met and escalate the social power ladder as much as possible. They also call it "being human", which means they believe/know that everyone else does it too.

Yet, they believe others' lies / white lies / manipulations (otherwise, things like kissing ass wouldn't be as effective as they are. Kissing ass is effective because someone is buying your flattery of them as genuine liking).

Has someone here deciphered this mystery and can enlighten me? The only idea I can come up with is that they get caught prey of "wishful thinking"...


I don't think that they buy each other's lies at all. For instance, I don't think that kissing ass is effective because the kissee has been duped. It's effective because the kissee understands the power that is being ceded to him/her by the kisser.

They simply accept each other's lies as perfectly natural, human, and expected. When I talk to my husband about this, he just shrugs and says, "What do you want? This is what people do." There are NTs who rebel against this sort of behavior. My husband doesn't participate. But it doesn't piss him off, either. He just accepts that people are different. He can understand why NTs work that way. He can see those tendencies in himself, even though he chooses not to act on them.

I cannot see those tendences in myself at all. People who lie because it's the way to go about the business of life drive me up the wall. The closest I can come to accepting it is to believe that we're all reincarnated many times, and we keep learning each time, so that people who lie through their teeth and sleep well at night have been here, say, once or twice, while people like Aspies have been through this many, many times and can see things more clearly.

I don't think it's fair, particularly, but that's my working theory... :wink:


All of this, I strongly believe is the real conspiracy - but it's not a 'deliberate' and basically not a conscious conspiracy. And all of that cannot be called lies - nor mistakes even. The main purpose of communication (this is the point about small talk - to be interpreted 'literally' as in-sign-ificant conversation), NOT the exchange of 'verbal' meaning. We commune by means of communication. As we are social animals, we need to commune, even if we do not really have anything to say. It's communication for communication's sake, that is normal existence.

Now sadly, language is very poor tool for that purpose, precisely BECAUSE language is referential ('significant') in nature. Is it really 'nice' to meet you? That is nonsense. Am I 'Yours, sincerely'? No thank you madam, or sir for that matter. All of that, the aspie mind would tend to regard as 'well, that remains to be seen' and at best we will arrive at a farewell "it was nice meeting you, hope to see you again".

Therefore, it could even be argued that EVERY conversation will start with language that is not only supposed not to be taken literally (which I find a very dubious word for the meaning it is supposed to convey) but also, and mainly, to be taken as NOT-referring to what is is referring. From that, one may conclude that everybody 'lies', or better 'does not speak in conformity with one's inner truth'.
Without even delving into the nature of semantics (e.g. to what extent do words actually 'carry' their intended meaning? i'm a sceptic), one may conclude that the usage of social language necessarily involves an amount of untruth.


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24 Dec 2008, 7:05 am

Maybe they think only they lie, and that all the others are just losers who don't.


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24 Dec 2008, 7:36 am

Because they have the ability to trust each other, I think. They are aware others lie, they do not sort everything into 'true' or 'false' as some autistic people maybe (?) do. They listen, store it for further use but they won't really believe it - but neither deny the possibility that it's true.

They cannot know what another is truly thinking either, but they nevertheless trust each other to be able to group and work together efficiently. A basis of trust is needed to be able to work with another or several other people, because it offers one the opportunity to share duties and responsibilities while being able to expect that they will be taken seriously.

But with too little trust or no trust at all, one wouldn't share responsibilities because other would be evaluated as somehow improper for the job. Usually because one thinks they wouldn't take it seriously or neglect the job for some reason.

Of course, as with every person (including some autistic people, I guess) they need a certain degree of flattery. Being loved. Liked. Whatever. People get traumatic if their parents rejected them, and it's the same effect that makes people want to be liked by taken seriously by their friends, co-workers among other people. They want to be appreciated as people.

Whether that appreciation is real or a lie can be of less importance if a person desperately needs such appreciation.

Another part of this is that people boast with abilities and characteristics of themselves. I do not understand why, but people claim they feel proud if they compare themselves to others and deciding they're better.

That pride about one's abilities that are comparable and being compared to other's abilities is the same as the need for appreciation from others with the difference that other people are not needed to appreciate one and are instead devaluation to revalue oneself.

Both forms of lies from others or to oneself are taken for granted if the gain is huge enough. In this case, feeling good, better and/or appreciated.


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24 Dec 2008, 7:39 am

Greentea wrote:
From direct observation, all NTs know that they're deceptive/manipulative and lie through their teeth in order to get their needs / desires met and escalate the social power ladder as much as possible.


ALL? All NTs? I feel sorry that you've had that experience, but I can assure you that ALL NTs are not like that. And those who truly do deceive/manipulate/lie 'through their teeth' just to get what they want are probably more likely to have an ABnormal psychology, to be fair.


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24 Dec 2008, 8:25 am

I think what we are not considering here is comfort zone. This is a true example.

I worked for this Printer as a bookkeeper. There was an owner, male, and a regional manager (for one office) who was female, and the regional manager was the previous bookkeeper. I did know this would suck when I figured this out on day one, but I was desperate for a job at the time.

I get into the books, and realize everything is bad. Outside of their depreciation being totally off, the cash ledgers were also false. They had two cash ledgers with two different balances, none of which would reconcile with the bank. As a result, this man had been overdrawing his account on several occasions without realizing it. When I brought this to his attention, he realized the bookkeeper, now the general manager, had been lying to him about how much cash he had.

I knew she had a low self esteem and seemed to be hateful bitter person who spent her whole paid day complaining about other people, talking to other people to find something to complain about, and watching news on the internet and then talking to other people about that, etc. One social skill I figured out through the years is if you meet someone who is complaining about other people all the time, you know they are complaining about you to other people. I try not to give them ammunition. IN this case, she was my supervisor, so I specifically asked that this man not demean her when dealing with it all. And I made the extra effort in being her friend.

My job was fine until we were all three talking about things with accounting, and he eventually called her an idiot based off all the mistakes I'd been fixing that she did. It really wasn't her fault that she didn't know how to do bookkeeping. It's his fault for assuming you don't need any experience to track the books. Anyway, I went from friend to enemy in point five, and I never lied to her. He did all the time. I didn't.

Anyway, she eventually told this guy that she was going to quit if he didn't fire me. It was her or me, and he had to make that decision now. He fired me.

The only thing I can assume is that even though I was truthful and fixed everthing for a very low pay, and I was friendly, and I had no ill intentions, I think the main point was seniority. She had seniority, so he trusted her more even though she lied a lot. Even though he was the one that called her an idiot, and I was the one that stood up for her in front of her, she didn't trust me because I was new. I think they were each other's comfort blankets in the workplace. I doubt they were sleeping together or any other variable like that because she was kinda manly looking for a chic, but I do think he was abusing drugs, and my guess was methamphetamines.

Just an FYI, after fired, I reported them to the IRS and moved on with my life. I don't think he's going to make it through this economic environment without filing bankruptcy.



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24 Dec 2008, 8:44 am

It's so tempting to say something meaningful in this thread, that other AS will recognize and connect with.

But I can't. There's so much NT-dominated parsing of any AS viewpoints that don't put NTs on a pedestal and describe AS as pathological defects, that it's more or less impossible to discuss this really interesting and important topic in a way relevant to us.

We cannot really analyze NT behavior, and discuss it in ways that break it down so as to be able to handle them. Because it pisses everyone off.

There are acceptable ways the socially disabled people here are allowed to talk about NT behavior and there are the ways they are not... unfortunately, the socially acceptable ways we are allowed to discuss NT behavior don't work for us (they don't work for NTs, either, b/c they certainly don't have a handle on lying, corruption and abuse, but what the hell)



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24 Dec 2008, 9:04 am

Cue the famous saying...

...If you look for the bad in people expecting to find it, you surely will!



NextFact
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24 Dec 2008, 9:33 am

they dont, depending on the situation they just play along rather then call the person out on it. thats what i do. sometimes its easier that way



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24 Dec 2008, 9:33 am

ephemerella wrote:
We cannot really analyze NT behavior, and discuss it in ways that break it down so as to be able to handle them. Because it pisses everyone off.


No... the reason we can't analyze NT behaviour is because it is far too diverse and varied. There are as many types on NT as there are types of non-NT people. It's simply DAFT to attempt to tar them all with the same brush. It's laughable!


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24 Dec 2008, 9:35 am

Tails wrote:
ephemerella wrote:
We cannot really analyze NT behavior, and discuss it in ways that break it down so as to be able to handle them. Because it pisses everyone off.


No... the reason we can't analyze NT behaviour is because it is far too diverse and varied. There are as many types on NT as there are types of non-NT people. It's simply DAFT to attempt to tar them all with the same brush. It's laughable!



ephemerella
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24 Dec 2008, 9:47 am

Tails wrote:
ephemerella wrote:
We cannot really analyze NT behavior, and discuss it in ways that break it down so as to be able to handle them. Because it pisses everyone off.


No... the reason we can't analyze NT behaviour is because it is far too diverse and varied. There are as many types on NT as there are types of non-NT people. It's simply DAFT to attempt to tar them all with the same brush. It's laughable!


I feel it is certainly possible to talk about lying and analyze the behavior. And there are features of the NT mind that allow them to lie more easily than we can. Hence, we cannot discuss this topic the way it should be discussed, in a way we can understand and spot it and not be so gullible in the future, without being bashed because we would have to portray ourselves as the defect and them as having the ability.

The proper way to discuss this topic is to describe what the features are about the NTs that allow them to lie and make them so willing to buy into each others' lies, and that would involve explaining more about their Egos and social hierarchies and how they trade favors and make alliances. And how AS people can deal with that and recognize when it is happening and what they are supposed to do in those situations.

But those are the kinds of discussions that get one attacked by NT-worshippers who fear that kind of talk from those who don't understand it.

People who go around saying that NTs are all different so we can't really discuss their behavior in those concrete terms that are useful to us, that help us figure them out, are imposing their intellectual limitations on others.

Thought policing is usually the imposition of limitations of discussions that others don't understand in subjects they fear. I.e. the limited and fearful imposing restrictions on those who do and can figure things out.



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24 Dec 2008, 12:06 pm

You're STILL trying to group 'NTs' (who are, supposedly, the grand majority, no?) into one unit with identical traits and behaviours. It doesn't work, and it's divisive. I am certainly no 'NT worshipper'. But I refuse to accept that 'NTs' as a complete group are inherently nastier people than those with ASDs etc. I feel you must have had a really traumatic experience with 'NTs' in order to cement your views that way - that NTs are liars/manipulative/etc.

What you're describing is NOT in fact an NT behaviour. It's a social construct, one of MANY social constructs that exist in both the NT world and the non-NT world.

And in fact, those who display pathologically manipulative/deceptive behaviour are, as I stated before, likely to be falling into a clinically significant non-NT functioning. It is NOT 'normal' NT behaviour.


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24 Dec 2008, 12:36 pm

neshamaruach wrote:
I cannot see those tendences in myself at all. People who lie because it's the way to go about the business of life drive me up the wall. The closest I can come to accepting it is to believe that we're all reincarnated many times, and we keep learning each time, so that people who lie through their teeth and sleep well at night have been here, say, once or twice, while people like Aspies have been through this many, many times and can see things more clearly.

I'm less blunt now because I see the pain and suffering I [needlessly] inflict in others by insisting on "truth"**. I've accepted that my rigidity and insistance (I'm not that far off the spectrum) wasn't actually morally in the right. In fact if you tell the truth to "get it off your chest", because you feel bad holding onto it rather, then isn't it actually a selfish thing to do? Or insist on it because of your ideals, the same?

EDIT: Do you maybe not realize the full extent of the pain you cause? If you do realize it, how do you justify that?

** In quotes because we very seldom actually know, much-less convey the fully objective truth of a matter.


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