Secrets and Lies

2014-01-29

From the highest levels of international and governmental affairs, to the most personal and intimate relationships, secrets and lies are often at the heart of so many narratives. We embrace privacy, yet we want truth. As individuals and as a society we spend enormous resources covering up unpleasant truths, only to find, as we seem to never learn, that the cover up is always tougher than the lie. Is there something in human nature or human psychology itself that makes transparency so difficult? Yet sometimes judg...

From the highest levels of international and governmental affairs, to the most personal and intimate relationships, secrets and lies are often at the heart of so many narratives.

We embrace privacy, yet we want truth. As individuals and as a society we spend enormous resources covering up unpleasant truths, only to find, as we seem to never learn, that the cover up is always tougher than the lie.

Is there something in human nature or human psychology itself that makes transparency so difficult? Yet sometimes judging from Facebook, we have a whole younger generation that shares everything. How do we square this circle and begin to understand the real power of secrets and lies?

That's what author and long time publishing executive Jane Isay set out to discover in Secrets and Lies: Surviving the Truths That Change Our Lives.

My conversation with Jane Isay:

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