Dear Gianna

Q: My partner and I have a beautiful relationship. He is my best friend, the person I confide in. We love each other, respect each other, have fun together, and trust one another. Yet, I discovered that he lied to me. While we were watching a video together on his phone, he received a message. He told me it was from a friend of his. After months, I found out it was from an ex of his. He regrets the lie, saying he did it only because he was worried I might get angry. The message was harmless, and I also know that they are still on good terms. The point isn't that I think he disrespected me, I just don't understand why he lied to me. Can I still trust him, or is a liar a liar, no matter what?

A: I understand—you’ve become tangled in the paradox of the liar. Epimenides of Crete asserts that all Cretans are liars. But since Epimenides himself is a Cretan, he must necessarily also be a liar, so it’s impossible that he is telling the truth about the other Cretans. But if he is telling the truth, his statement is still false. In practice, without delving into the various interpretations historically given to the liar paradox, what I mean is: lies confuse us. If you lie to me, you’ve set a precedent such that anything you say could be a lie. Even “I will never lie to you again” could be a lie. So, how do we get out of this? I believe that, rather than trying to solve this with logic, we could look at the imperfections of the human being.

In The Truth About Lying, the authors argue that lying is an innate attitude of living beings, to the extent that plants and animals weave deceptions with the means they have, and hungry infants deceive themselves by sucking their thumbs. We all lie, some more than others. But why? According to George Steiner, “Every form of communication is an interpretation between private worlds.” When I express a concept, I am sharing something that exists in my interpretation of the facts, but not in the interpretation of my listener. This means that many times we say things that aren't true, but not to harm the other person or manipulate them, but simply because we don’t understand the reality. We are convinced of what we’re saying, but we aren’t telling the truth. This cannot be considered lying.

According to Augustine of Hippo, to distinguish a lie from a simple false statement, we must analyse the will behind the statement. “A lie is not told by asserting something false that is believed to be true, but by asserting something true that is believed to be false.” That is, it doesn’t matter whether what I say corresponds to the truth or not; if I said it with the intention to deceive, it’s a lie. If I said it because I believed it to be true, then it isn’t.

But was your partner lying? It depends. Are he and his ex really friends? If so, he didn’t truly lie to you—he simply avoided telling you part of the story, leaving out a detail that is important to you, but maybe not to him. If his truth is that they are now friends, and it no longer matters that they were once a couple, then what he said is true. His interpretation of reality is different from yours, but that doesn’t make it false. According to Protagoras, “Man is the measure of all things, of those that are, that they are, and of those that are not, that they are not.” This means that man is the measure, the subject of judgment of the reality or unreality of things, of their being and their meaning. So, it’s plausible that saying “she’s a friend of mine,” in his interpretation of events, is indeed true.

In any case, when you discovered “there’s more to the story,” he apologised and expressed regret. This leads me to suspect that he was aware that he was omitting an important part of the story. Did he do it with the intention to deceive you? Perhaps. It’s possible that he lied, knowing that he was lying, so we need to ask another question: did he do it to harm you? To cause you damage? According to Luciano Manicardi, there are lies that are a form of self-defense, a protection of oneself, but that don’t aim to harm others. In the words of Rousseau, “To assert the false is to lie only if there is an intention to deceive; and even the intention to deceive, far from always being associated with the intention to harm, sometimes has a contrary purpose.” Your partner may have lied to protect your relationship. Yes, it was naive because, by trying to avoid instilling any doubt about his fidelity in you, he achieved the opposite effect. But, in my opinion, he simply misjudged the situation.

Returning to Steiner, “Language is the principal instrument by which man refuses to accept the world as it is.” Your partner made himself seem purer and more innocent in your eyes than he truly is. He created a reality in which there was no need to specify that the friend was also an ex. From what you’ve told me, your partner isn’t a pathological liar, a manipulator, or a narcissist. He’s just a guy who slightly altered the facts to tell you a nicer story.

Make sure he knows you’re disappointed and that if he continues lying, your relationship could suffer irreparable damage. Tell him the truth as well—how you felt, why you have doubts. But for this time, personally, I don’t think it’s necessary to declare the end of your relationship.

I recommend reading two books:

- Lying and Deception: Theory and Practice, by Carson Thomas L (click here)

- Communication Miracles for Couples: Easy and Effective Tools to Create More Love and Less Conflict by Jonathan Robinson (click here)