C'mon.. Lie to me...

The other day I came across this sitcom called "Lie to me". Its an investigatory series where the protagonist observes the body language of the accused / concerned people including facial expressions, posture to determine whether a person is lying. And as it is explained in the series, 'The question is not if the person is lying, the question is why is he lying'. And that's what this series is all about. This series is based on real life scientific discoveries of a scientist called Paul Ekman.

Every human being shows what is termed as microexpressions. These are involuntary emotions, usually lasting for about 0.1 seconds or even less. There is no need for the accused to even talk. And if we observe microexpressions closely, we can detect lies. There is a theory behind it and relevant proof to support the same. But, as is the case with all scientific theories, you can either accept it or reject it.

Some microexpressions / facts that I wasn't too aware of:

1. Raising one shoulder while talking - denotes that the person is lying / trying to lie
2. Making a fist (involuntarily) while talking - denotes hiding something that a person doesn't want to reveal
3. Raising your eyebrow momentarily while talking denoted a sense of sadness and so on.
4. The problem with polygraph tests is that they can also be false-positives. It can be due to any emotion like fear, anger etc not just guilt.

Now that's an interesting set of tools which can be fruitful in our day-to-day interaction with people.

Truth be told, I used to love the CID (Indian T.V. Series) series, for an altogether different reason - Humor. So, all you CID lovers out there who wants to watch real investigation without:

• forcing the killer to accept his crime,
• Daya opening doors with his bare hands / fist,
• ACP Pradyuman making circles with his index finger and sounding suspicious,
• Fredricks and his (supposed) humor,
• the same Toyota Qualis with different colors...

... This one is for you !!

"The Truth is Written All Over Our Faces"