> ...when you have no idea whether that's true I was referring to whether it's true that it's a lie or not, not whether the claim is true or not. I seem to hav

> ...when you have no idea whether that's true I was referring to whether it's true that it's a lie or not, not whether the claim is true or not. I seem to have not made that clear enough, sorry for that. If someone says something false but they believe it's true, that's not lying. On the other hand, if someone says something true but they believe it's false, that is lying. Whether what they're saying is actually true or false is irrelevant to whether they're lying. Lying is saying something different to what you believe, with intent to deceive.[0] It's about a difference between what you say and what you believe. I think getting things wrong is a lot more common than lying on this planet, and labelling every getting-wrong of things a 'lie' should be considered harmful. Getting things wrong is natural, unavoidable, 'innocent' - lying is not. [0] Or something like that - trying to make precise definitions is hard and not so useful.