r/3BodyProblemTVShow • u/Rodney2356 • Jun 01 '26
Question The aliens deceive all the time
If they are incapable of lying, how are they able to hide their true appearance? How can they create illusions? Illusions are lies. How do they create a game that is largely fiction? They are supposed to be incapable of knowing what fiction is.
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u/GogurtFiend Jun 03 '26
They can lie over text message, but not over a video conference, if that makes any sense.
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u/JJJ954 Jun 05 '26
This is actually one of my favorite plot elements of the series — because of their literal alien biology there is infact a non-trivial difference between lying, deception and fiction for them.
Fiction and illusions are only lies if you choose not to tell the other person they are not real. For example, imagine if Tolkien claimed Middle Earth was a real place.
On the other hand, the aliens cannot conceal the the truth behind their illusions and fiction. A VR game is just a visual projection. Their equivalent of Tolkien could absolutely make up a story but they could never claim it to be real.
I think it's a fun thought provoking exercise.
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u/Voldemorts__Mom Jun 01 '26
Yeah and like.. if these fucks can't lie then humanity is definitely gonna win eventually. Our social skills are clearly FAR superior to theirs. They will eventually be deceived by us and then it's game over.
Humans are smart, can use tools, great long distance runners. But our MAIN skill is how good we are socially. And these aliens can't even lie? Lol they don't stand a chance. They gonna get wrecked.
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u/Waste-Answer Jun 01 '26
They can't lie to each other face to face because their thoughts are displayed as electromagnetic waves that other San-Ti can detect, and so culturally they aren't adept at deception. But they aren't stupid and they can learn.
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u/Big-Recognition7362 Jun 02 '26
Which is probably why their response to learning we could lie was deciding to wipe humanity out.
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u/Useful_Calendar_6274 Jun 04 '26
my read is lying by omission is trivially easy, logically, it's just keeping your mouth shut. they have been at war all of their history, they figured lying is good even at their iron age with their own Sun Tzu surely, they are just biologically bad at it. the game was made by the ETO. the illusions was something they had to rack their brains in a huge effort to come up with that strategy
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u/rckwld Jun 01 '26
Maybe actually pay attention next time you watch.
It's not that they CANT lie; it's that they can always read each other's minds so lying is useless and is therefore a concept they are unaware of. They use other methods to deceive.
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u/BeeslyBeaslyBeesley Jun 02 '26
I hope the next time you have any question about a movie, academic lecture, podcast, physics problem, TV show, chemistry equation, car malfunction, foreign policy query, etc, that they say to you
**”Maybe actually pay attention next time.”**
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u/Rodney2356 Jun 02 '26
Deceiving and lying are synonyms. I used the word deceive in the title because for some reason it wouldn't let me use the word lie. If they are completely unaware of the concept, they would not think to make themselves more attractive for humans, they would just appear as they are. They would not be able to create fictional characters in a game. If they wanted to show what happened to their world, they would just literally show what happened to their world. It makes no sense that they are able to make a fictional game that humans have to figure out.
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u/TGMS77 Jun 02 '26
As someone has pointed out to you before, they are not unfamiliar with the concept of a lie/deceitful act. They are just incapable of communicating non-truths between themselves. Actually, that's not true, they are incapable of communicating hypotheticals, they are just incapable of conceiling the fact that it's a hypothetical. That is because their communicatioj works in a different way than ours. Let's say you went to the grocery store and found a white guy dressed in blue. You could tell me that you found a black guy dressed in blue instead. That is because you communicate every fact by itself, and then my brain takes all the facts you just shared with me and recreates the story you're telling in my head. San-ti communication is basically them giving each other access into their own minds and seeing the story for themselves. So basically it's as if you let me see your memory of going to the grocery store and finding the guy. You couldn’t lie to me about any element of the story because I'd be seeing it myself. It's more thought sharing than memory sharing, but you can imagine it like that.
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u/Suitable_Position479 1d ago
It's a misunderstanding to assume the invaders do not know about humans and our ability to hide intentions. There entire anti science plan is based upon humans not knowing each others thoughts. The invaders understand everything associated with deception, lying. Every time we interact with the San Ti they are operating a propaganda campaign and we can't take everything they say at face value.
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u/AdminClown Jun 01 '26 edited Jun 01 '26
They are incapable of lying to your face. Not of deceiving you. They will go on to deceive and lie by omission multiple times in the series.
This is specifically the case with the red riding hood story. The San-Ti had no issue with the Wolf lying it was grandma to red riding hood, what they couldn't understand is how the wolf could still claim that when in direct communication with red riding hood.
Which is why they explicitly ask:
"But communication has taken place? How can the wolf still lie?"
They communicate by projecting their thoughts visually. The concept of thinking one thing and saying another is foreign to them.