Steven Pinker Quotes

That's the problem with the truth," Darcy said. "Liars and honest men both claim to have it.

One can be absolutely truthful and sincere even though admittedly the most outrageous liar. Fiction and invention are of the very fabric of life.

Truth is a great flirt.

No man has a good enough memory to be a successful liar.

No lying knight or lying priest ever prospered in any age, but especially not in the dark ones. Men prospered then only in following an openly declared purpose, and preaching candidly beloved and trusted creeds.

While all deception requires secrecy, all secrecy is not meant to deceive.

The greatest truth is honesty, and the greatest falsehood is dishonesty.

If I could only give three words of advice, they would be, 'Tell the truth.' If I got three more words, I'd add, 'All the time.'

I'm okay if everything is honest and truthful and relatable. If it's fabricated and ill-motived, it's not good.

Truth is the silliest thing under the sun. Try to get a living by the Truth and go to the Soup Societies. Heavens! Let any clergyman try to preach the Truth from its very stronghold, the pulpit, and they would ride him out of his church on his own pulpit bannister.

For every good reason there is to lie, there is a better reason to tell the truth.

I've always operated under the notion that audiences don't always know when they're being lied to, but that they always know when they're being told the truth.

You cannot tell an audience a lie. They know it before you do; before it's out of your mouth, they know it's a lie.

I don't want to lie. I dislike dishonesty. And I work in Hollywood, a town and a business that relies on a lot of falsehoods with people hiding behind different facades. I don't want to be a part of that.

It is such a relief to be told the truth.

It is unfortunate, considering that enthusiasm moves the world, that so few enthusiasts can be trusted to speak the truth.

I don't do interviews under false pretenses.

A German is someone who cannot tell a lie without believing it himself.

It's discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit.

Don't lie if you don't have to.

If you want to be thought a liar, always tell the truth.

I can take any truth; just don't lie to me.

I don't like to tell lies.

For me, the greatest fault would be to tell somebody something I'm not.

The only thing that I have is the truth, so the only thing I fear is a lie.