Why We Lie | We’re Wired That Way

I want to tell you a story try to swap
the lie when I was 21 I was piloting a
submarine in the western Pacific and as
the submarine started to descend that
bioluminescence rose up around us and
the light began to fade and out of the
distance this huge shark flew by it’s
the biggest shark I’ve ever seen it was
at least 50 feet long and that my
friends is when I discovered that the
prehistoric Megalodon is still alive
actually that’s a lie it never happened
did I get you
turns out the most adults have told at
least one lie in the last 24 hours
but what drives our deceptiveness what
makes us lie I’m Erica Bergman I am a
submarine pilot and a National
Geographic Explorer I’ve discovered a
lot of things but obviously not the
Megalodon this is we’re wired that way
20 years ago we found out that adults
lie one to two times a day on average
now you’re probably thinking that most
of the lies we tell are harmless meant
to hide personal shortcomings or protect
someone’s feelings and you’d be right
but most people have told at least one
big lie at some point in their lives
this is the kind of falsehood that
covers up an affair or adds a few extra
lines to your resume now if we break
down how frequently people lie by age
it’ll come as no surprise to anyone with
kids that teenagers lie more than any
other age group and that the youngest of
our species lie the least
we took better at lying as we get older
the more we do it the easier it becomes
like reading math or any other cognitive
function so why does our frequency of
line continually decrease as we age well
when we’re young we test the limits of
our deception we want to see how much we
can get away with
according to the experts by the time
we’re adults we’ve started to define the
limits which continue to become clear
as we age we understand the societal
norms of lying as well it’s why most of
us are okay with stealing a few pens
from the office supply closet but not
cool was stealing an entire computer
from work hey what did I just say so it
turns out that many of us lie throughout
most of our lives the big question is
why we can break it down and say that
most fibs are told so the people can
protect will promote themselves fewer
lies are tolls for the sake of others
and fewer still are told for reasons
that are unclear we can break down these
categories even further we do it to
cover our mistakes avoid others gain
economic and personal advantage to
promote a specific self-image and even
for the sake of humor the list goes on
but does it really get to the heart of
the matter the truth is we live because
it’s easy it’s part of our evolution
picture this you are the weakest
primitive human in your tribe you lack
the physical strength to find the best
mate find food or live in the safest
shelter then all of a sudden BAM
language is formed you have a new way to
communicate with your species if you can
trick people into giving you what you
want you no longer need to be the
strongest you just need to be the best
liar that’s even true today it’s easier
to trick someone into giving you money
than it is for rob a bank so why does
lying work so well turns out it’s just
as natural for us to trust others as it
is for us to lie I know it’s ironic but
think about how you navigate the world
most of the knowledge you’ve gained in
your life comes from trusting the word
of others parents teachers friends news
outlets and
videos like this most of the time what
we’re told is true and so we learned to
trust we’re even more likely to believe
a lie if it fits with our worldview in
other words if the lie is something we
want to hear
we’ll probably fall for it experts say
lying is hardwired into us as our
ability to communicate evolves so does
our power to deceive the two go hand in
hand got a cool story about lying to
tell more research to share sound off in
the comments below this video we want to
know what you’re thinking sorry for
calling you a liar earlier but it’s true
we all are we’re wired that way
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