Robert Trivers devotes a whole chapter to the issue: Chapter 16 of
his book Social Evolution, which he chose to call "Deceit and Self
Deception".

Concepts on self-deception are wonderfully expounded in that
chapter, but more important, what he writes about "The Logic of
Self-Deception" (pp. 415-416) coincides almost exactly with research
on infant communication (Stern 1985).

Infants interact with their mothers or caregivers intersubjectively
from birth onwards. During the first 15-18 months of life this kind
of communication, is preserved from language interference;
therefore, all characteristics of communication tend to be
coherent.

When language turns up, what is seen and heard may interfere with
what is said, and contradictions pop up. Hence, the difficulty
inherent in consciously lying inadvertently. If, by means of
unconscious processes derived from the baby's interaction with his
attachment figure (Bowlby, 1973), what the baby is told becomes felt
as true in the face of objective falsehood, then the baby will
deceive himself to avoid rejection from his mother.

Psychopathologically, self-deception characterizes a mental
condition known as _psychopathy_ or _sociopathy_, which displays a
number of sub-syndromes spanning a vast range of external
manifestations: from crime and murder to manipulating others.

This is important, to my mind, since politicians and socially
successful people are almost invariably psychopaths of different
kinds of severity. Detecting them, penetrating the barrier of
self-deception is therefore of the utmost importance for a society
based on mutual cooperation.

References:

- Bowlby, John, (1973) Attachment and Loss vol. 2: Separation.
London: The Hogarth Press.

- Stern, Daniel, (1985) The Interpersonal World of the Infant, New
York: Basic Books

- Trivers, Robert, (1985) Social Evolution, The Bejamin/Cummings
Publishing Company, Inc.: Menlo Park, California.

JC Garelli
______________

In a message dated 29 Apr 97 at 15:37, Jay Hanson mailto:[log in to unmask]
says:

 > At 11:55 AM 4/29/97 -0500, Edwina Taborsky wrote:
 >
 > >First, I feel that homo sapiens is the only species on earth whose
 > >ability to live is primarily conceptual rather than genetic. By this
 > >I mean that human adaptive systems are learned rather than
 > >genetically stored. This gives an enormous amount of adaptive
 > >flexibility to this particular species. A deer must grow a coat of
 >
 > I have quite have a different view of humanity.  Modern
 > evolutionary theory argues that humans were selected to be the best
 > at getting their genes into the next generation.  In other words,
 > best at exploitation[1] and deception[2].
 >
 > I see the vast bulk of social theories as merely ways to
 > rationalize what we are genetically programmed to do.  Moreover, we
 > are still totally dependent on our natural life-support system.
 >
 > Jay
 > ------------------------------------------------------------
 >
 > [1] Exploit: To employ to the greatest possible advantage.
 >
 > [2] In the late 50s, the social scientist Erving Goffman made
 >     a stir with a book called THE PRESENTATION OF SELF IN
 >     EVERYDAY LIFE, that stressed how much time we all spend
 >     on stage, playing to one audience or another.  Goffman
 >     marveled that sometimes a person is "sincerely convinced
 >     that the impression of reality which he stages is the real
 >     reality."
 >
 >     What modern evolution theory brings to Goffman's
 >     observation is an explanation of the practical function
 >     of self-deception: we deceive ourselves in order to deceive
 >     others better.  In his foreword to Richard Dawkins' THE SELFISH
 >     GENE, Robert Trivers noted Dawkins' emphasis on the role of
 >     deception in animal life and added, in a much-cited passage,
 >     that if indeed "deceit is fundamental to animal communication,
 >     then there must be strong selection to spot deception and this
 >     ought, in turn, to select for a degree of self-deception,
 >     rendering some facts and motives unconscious so as not to
 >     betray -- by the subtle signs of self-knowledge -- the
 >     deception being practiced."  Thus, "the conventional view that
 >     natural selection favors nervous systems which produce ever
 >     more accurate images of the world must be a very naive view of
 >     mental evolution." pp. 263-264, THE MORAL ANIMAL ,Robert
 >     Wright; Pantheon, 1994; ISBN 0-679-40773-1.


Juan Carlos Garelli, M.D., Ph.D.
Department of Early Development
University of Buenos Aires

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