It’s called “psychic numbing.”
Our capacity for compassion and empathy diminishes as the degree of suffering increases. Our brains become overwhelmed when tragedy or trauma dramatically increase so we emotionally shut down.
World renown psychiatrist Robert J. Lifton coined the phrase “psychic numbing” in 1967 based on his research with Japanese survivors of the U. S. dropping of the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima that ended WWII.
What he found was the activity in the amygdala section of their brains that controls human emotions had diminished significantly as a defensive mechanism in response to the extraordinary trauma they experienced. He called it “psychic numbing.”
Now researchers have discovered that a similar process happens in the brain when it comes to the human response to extreme lying.
A report from Notre Dame’s Deloitte Center for Ethical Leadership says a team at University College London and Duke University found that when people experience a constant repetition of lies over an extended period of time the brain becomes desensitized to the dishonesty.
Similar to what happens in psychic numbing, the amygdala in the participants registered less and less emotional response as the number of times they lied increased. Participants initially felt bad about the lies they told, but the more they lied they less bad they felt.
The researchers concluded: “Adaptation makes it easier to do a bad thing. When lying no longer stirs up negative feelings, we are able to increase the magnitude of our lies. Then the additional, larger lies further deaden our sensitivity to the act of lying.” (https://ethicalleadership.nd.edu/thought-leadership/what-dishonesty-does-to-your-brain-why-lying-becomes-easier-and-easier)
Who knew that we would have a President of the United States who is living proof of the effect lying has on the person who lies all the time. Trump lies so much because it doesn’t bother him to do so. The amygdala in his brain has apparently completely atrophied.
I would argue that Trump is now at the point where he is so emotionally damaged that his problem goes deeper than lying not bothering him.
I think he has reached the point where he no longer possesses the capacity to tell the truth. This is why he lies when telling the truth would serve him just as well. He simply does not have the ability to tell the truth.
But Trump’s psychic numbing to lying is only half the story. The rest of it is about the impact his lying is having on Trumpers.
I think it is quite reasonable to suggest that believing all the lies Trump tells is having a similar impact on Trumpers as telling them has had on him.
This is why the rest of us find it so outrageous and totally unbelievable that they believe everything he says. The amygdala in their brains no longer registers any objection to them.
His lies just don’t bother them the way they do the rest of us. Asking themselves if what he says is actually true doesn’t even occur to them. They have drunk the cool-aid to the point where they no longer have the capacity to believe they are being poisoned with lies.
But it’s even worse than that. Something utterly unique in American history is happening. Dr. Gila Sher, Professor of Philosophy at the University of California, San Diego, says that for the first time in American history we are facing a political movement whose goal is “the erosion of respect for truth in everyday life.”
This erosion happens, she says, because lies “offers psychological rewards of certainty, a sense of belonging, and relief from doubt.” (https://today.ucsd.edu/story/a-philosophers-take-on-truth)
This erosion of respect for truth is so dangerous, she says, because truth is “a uniquely human value that acts as a social contract and contributes to our very survival.” It is literally weakening the moral glue that holds a nation together.
“What we lose in a post-truth world,” says Dr. Sher, “is…our human happiness or flourishing. We lose the ability to live a worthy life. And in this sense we lose our humanity.” In the process, she says, we lose even the idea of speaking truth to power. (“The Post-Truth Crisis” – Australasian Philosophical Review-https://doi.org/10.1080/24740500.2025.2567000)
The long and short of what all of this means is that Donald Trump is a dishonest person whose lies are not only affecting American life, but infecting it with a loss of conscience that will tear apart the moral fibers that are holding our nation together.
This is the issue of our time. More than the crisis of affordability, the Iranian war, or any other issue we face.
I know putting food on the table, buying clothes for children, paying for healthcare and health costs are all important, but losing our belief in truth, in pursuing truth, in telling the truth is an unparalleled crisis that will literally destroy us as a people.
I don’t know if George Washington actually said, “I cannot tell a lie,” but I do know that every time Trump speaks he is saying, “I cannot tell the truth.”
The fact that some 35% of Americans still approve of the job Trump is doing makes it obvious that a third of all Americans no longer believe in truth.
It’s up to those of us who do actually believe truth matters, that telling the truth matters, to out vote that 35% in November.
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