When people indicate an assertion that isn't necessarily true to be patently obvious, they may have a hidden [purpose](purpose.md) to [obscure the truth](image-distortion.md). Other times, their [perspective](image.md) has a different set of [values](understanding-certainty.md) that define how their [bias](mind-bias.md) runs. Often, everyone is at least somewhat correct, though some are certainly more correct than others.


## Deception

We're constantly at risk of [lying](people-lying.md) to ourselves. We may not [understand](understanding.md) and think we do, or our [purposes](purpose.md) may be more [evil](morality-evil.md) than we realize. With [creativity](mind-creativity.md) or intelligence, we can maintain multiple [conflicting opinions](conflicts-inner.md) in our minds at the same time.

When someone can find other people who share their type of deception, they may form a [group](groups-small.md) around it. This [emboldens](understanding-certainty.md) everyone in the group to [believe](understanding-certainty.md) those thoughts even more.

Authenticity is the skill of [communicating](language.md) things that go beyond anyone's image, while wisdom is the ability to [perceive](understanding.md) it. However, some people preoccupy themselves so much with [reality](reality.md) that they forget how they look, so authenticity and wisdom don't always go together.

One of the easiest deceptions involves our use of time. We can see a minority of the instances of something and will [draw the conclusion](logic.md) that the rest of that time was [mathematically](math.md) the same:

- How often an employee is working versus what they're doing when the boss is absent.
- How late or early someone arrives to an event.
- What someone usually wears, compared to that first image of seeing them.
- How someone typically [says](language.md) things, versus what they said in response to the observer.