The Pinocchio Sensation

Most of us tell the truth most of the time. Nevertheless, sometimes we lie, for good reasons or for bad reasons. For some people lying belongs to their profession. Or they tell half-truths, which is the same as telling half-lies. I think that politicians belong to this category, and I think that politicians tell half-truths and so also half-lies more often than the average person does. Also they can have good or bad reasons for doing so. They can lie in the interest of the state, but often they lie in the interest of themselves. For politicians strive for power; otherwise they wouldn’t be politicians. It can be that they want to promote a certain idea and they think that they can best do so in politics, or they can strive for power simply because they want to have power. Often it’s a mixture of both. But then it would be interesting to know what the real motives and plans of politicians are, especially in a state where we elect our representatives. Then we would like to know whether our representatives tell the truth or try to mislead us by telling lies, so that, once in function, they can execute their own agendas. Therefore, it would be nice to have a kind of lie detector. For example, did the Russian president Putin really want to chase away the Nazis from Ukraine in the present war or is it a pretext for his strive for power or for something else? Or, to give an example from my own country, the Dutch prime minister Rutte often says “I don’t remember; I haven’t an active memory of it.” Then, we would like to know, whether he really had forgotten the case concerned, or whether he doesn’t he want to tell the truth. Since we cannot force a politician to do a test with a lie detector, it would be nice if there were a kind of innate lie detector. The Italian writer Carlo Collodi tells us the story of Pinocchio, whose nose became longer, when he lied. But alas, it’s a fairy tale, not something that really happened. In this sense it’s a lie that Collodi told us, although for most people it’s an acceptable lie, since they like fairy tales. There are no noses that grow when lies are told. So, politicians and human beings in general can go on lying and we must simply believe them, unless we can prove that they lie.
Is it really so that noses cannot enlarge in this way? Yes and no. Noses don’t grow when people lie, but there is a psychological phenomenon that gives you the illusion that your nose grows, although not because you are lying, but because your nose is stimulated in a special way. The phenomenon is called the Pinocchio Illusion or Phantom Nose Illusion. There are several ways to evoke the sensation that your nose grows. Here is one way that you can practice yourself (quoted from this website, where you can also find other ways to evoke the Pinocchio Illusion):
Ask a friend to help you. “Since you will be the one experiencing the illusion, you will sit in a chair behind your friend. You should cover your eyes by either using a blindfold, or simply closing them. Next, you will reach out with whatever hand and simply find the nose of your friend, while using your other hand to touch your nose. At the same time stroke your nose as well as your friends using the same movement. In roughly thirty seconds to one minute, you may get a weird sensation that your nose is displaced from your body, or that your nose has grown super long. It is also possible that you might experience both of these outcomes!” (here you find another description with an illustration)
Did you try it and succeeded to enlarge your nose? Then you have enlarged your nose without telling a lie. In fact, it’s a way to become Pinocchio without lying. But, alas, it’s an illusion; your nose didn’t change and stayed as short or long as it was before you applied the trick. You simply confused your brain. The trick made your brain think that your nose became longer, while in fact nothing changed. Your nose doesn’t grow when you tell lies and it doesn’t grow when you apply psychological tricks. Nevertheless, you had the sensation that it did, and if you hadn’t known that you were applying a trick, you really would have thought that your nose had become longer.
There are many interpretations of the Pinocchio Illusion, but in the context of my blogs I think that this one is important. Besides the Pinocchio Illusion there are many other illusions that can mislead you, but I chose this one because it is clear and funny. In this case you know that you are deceiving yourself, but for many illusions you are not aware that they happen, if you are not told so, like the Muller-Lyer Illusion. Then you’ll probably think that the illusion is reality, and then fake has become fact for you. Things are no longer what they seem to be. If you then say that such and such is the case, this is not true, and so you are not telling the truth and so you are lying in a sense. You “lie” then, seriously thinking that you tell the truth. This can happen to everyone, including to politicians. If you mistakenly think that something is the case, but it doesn’t guide your actions, the consequences of this false belief are presumably limited. However, politicians like it to act and actions based on false beliefs can be fatal. Therefore, beware of politicians, for also when they don’t intentionally lie, their beliefs may be illusions.