lies and falsehoods

all lies are falsehoods. but not all falsehoods are lies.

for example, if i told my friend al that the meeting would start at 7 p.m. tuesday, but that it started at 7:30 p.m. thursday, i told him a falsehood.

a falsehood has these three things:

• the teller believes it to be true.
• he told the listener with no plans to deceive or mislead.
• he should make all efforts to tell the listener the truth as soon as possible.
  

a lie, on the other hand, has these three things:

• the teller knows it's false.
• he told it to deceive or mislead the listener.
• he makes no effort to tell the listener the truth.

i bet it's not original. i believe other philosophers and men wiser than me have thought of this and told others about it. however, i realized it myself, without the help of anyone else.

it was one of the first times i used my mind and thought for myself, instead of depending on others to affect my opinion.