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#172557 01/14/08 08:31 PM
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Wendy J Offline OP
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Can someone tell me the definition of a person who invents lies, and then believes them to be fact. Inspite of evidence to the contrary? Is there a medical term for this mental disorder?
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Wendy J

Wendy J #172562 01/14/08 10:15 PM
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Let me make sure I understand what you're saying. A lie is different than a falsehood. A lie is a KIND of falsehood. A falsehood is only a lie, if the person communicating it knows that it's false.

Oddly, I have known people who, because they think something up, that it must be true. They're not aware that they're just making stuff up. It was a rude awakening for me. These people are delusional.

But to make up a fact and consciously recognize that you are making it up, that while you are making it up you are aware that it is contrived and then later to forget that ever fabricated it, like in 1984. This is a very odd thing. A politician? An O'Brien?

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Don't some pathological liers wind up believing their own lies? Or not being able to remember what was a lie and what was a truth?

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thanks for the great feed back. It's strange because I know a person who practise such behaviour to the point of being quite slanderious toward people. The scary thing is she ends up believing her own lies. Go figure!!!!

Wendy J #172594 01/16/08 01:03 PM
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Originally Posted By: Wendy J
thanks for the great feed back. It's strange because I know a person who practise such behaviour to the point of being quite slanderious toward people. The scary thing is she ends up believing her own lies. Go figure!!!!


Sounds positively scandalacious. In psychology and medicine, the term confabulation is used to describe the process of inventing fabrications that one believes to be true. Several dictionaries mention "...to fill gaps in one's memory.". One medical example is a test for confabulation in which a physician holds his hands with his fingers and thumbs pinched together as if he were holding a string. He then asks the subject, what color is the string? One who is confabulating might name a color rather than simply say that there is no string.

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Interesting sort of mental disorder. What if you don't want to disappoint the physician with his pantomime show and choose a color even though you're positively aware that there is no string?
I hope there are more tests to find out the true 'confabulator', for this one does not seem totally waterproof.

BranShea #172602 01/16/08 08:18 PM
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Originally Posted By: BranShea
Interesting sort of mental disorder. What if you don't want to disappoint the physician with his pantomime show and choose a color even though you're positively aware that there is no string?
I hope there are more tests to find out the true 'confabulator', for this one does not seem totally waterproof.


Well, sure, one swallow does not make a summer you know. This is but one little test. A doctor might also ask a patient which of the Spice Girls has the most talent, for example.

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Aye! That would be a tough one.

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A doctor might also ask a patient which of the Spice Girls has the most talent, for example. Dang--had to wipe down my keyboard after that one!

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Originally Posted By: Alex Williams

Well, sure, one swallow does not make a summer you know.


That is cute. I like it!

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