ymeskhout

• ymeskhout 31 Jan 2026 17:36 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: Screwtape’s comment on: My Clients, The Liars

  I appreciate the review! For what it’s worth, you precisely described the exact reasons why I wrote this.

  If you are curious about how I handle confidentiality, I wrote a companion post called How I Lie to You

• ymeskhout 31 Jan 2026 17:30 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: Ruby’s comment on: My Clients, The Liars

  I think it’s funny that this title is referred to as click-baity because the title directly and transparently advertises exactly what’s contained within the essay!

  The examples outlined were pulled from a highly selective sample, and were not meant to be a representative sample of lying overall. Part of the thesis was to remind everyone of the willingness some liars pursue their craft — as in, the lack of deterrence even when they are incompetent and doing so from a highly disadvantaged position.

• ymeskhout 29 Sep 2025 18:31 UTC

  4 points

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  in reply to: CronoDAS’s comment on: Trans­gen­der Sticker Fallacy

  On second thought, I should’ve been more precise. I changed it to “Weight can be such an extreme determinative factor...”. Thanks for the note.

• ymeskhout 29 Sep 2025 18:28 UTC

  4 points

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  in reply to: sam’s comment on: Trans­gen­der Sticker Fallacy

  I’m transparent about using LLMs as an editorial assistant (Claude 4.1 for this essay) but that last parenthetical just now came to me naturally, as I suspect almost all the ones in this essay did.

  Interestingly enough, another reader asked me the same question on another essay but ended up citing a bunch of false positives: https://​​www.ymeskhout.com/​​p/​​beware-the-moral-homophone/​​comment/​​120595749

• ymeskhout 29 Sep 2025 1:46 UTC

  5 points

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  in reply to: CronoDAS’s comment on: Trans­gen­der Sticker Fallacy

  True but I made sure to qualify my claim as pertaining to boxing specifically.

Trans­gen­der Sticker Fallacy

• ymeskhout 3 Jul 2025 15:02 UTC

  6 points

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  in reply to: Viliam’s comment on: Slic­ing the (Kosher) Hate Salami

  I wrote a whole essay on proper & effective protest tactics: How to Protest Well

  The basic template to follow is to keep all these questions in mind:

  1. What exactly do we want?

  2. Who has the power to give it to us?

  3. How do we pressure them effectively?

  4. When do we admit our tactics aren’t working?

Slic­ing the (Kosher) Hate Salami

• ymeskhout 29 May 2025 19:53 UTC

  6 points

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  in reply to: ceba’s comment on: Be­ware the Mo­ral Homophone

  You’re correct that I did not intend to convey that this phenomenon is motivated by cynical self-interest. I don’t understand the Jordan Peterson connection.

Be­ware the Mo­ral Homophone

• ymeskhout 7 Mar 2025 22:07 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: Jiro’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  I already said I don’t consider alternative explanations on their own to be indicative of lying. I don’t know where you’re getting this notion that speculation is evasion, here’s what I said on the matter:

  If a client is either factually innocent or guilty-but-sober-minded, there’s no difficulty getting them to admit the incriminating nature of incriminating evidence. If a client is lying — whether to me, themselves, or just desperately trying to manifest a reality which doesn’t exist — it’s like pulling teeth.

• ymeskhout 7 Mar 2025 16:22 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: Jiro’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  If they have no idea what’s going on then there’s no need for this exercise. There’s other ways to cooperate in truth-seeking.

• ymeskhout 6 Mar 2025 17:34 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: Jiro’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  I don’t consider alternative explanations on their own to be indicative of lying, especially if the alternative theory as a whole more accurately comports with reality. This is why there are two parts to this exercise: surviving the gauntlet of facts and dethroning the other survivor (if any).

• ymeskhout 5 Mar 2025 18:42 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: Jiao Bu’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  Why would lying be a natural response for a non-liar falsely accused of lying?

• ymeskhout 1 Mar 2025 21:37 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: Trinley Goldenberg’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  I’ve never encountered this framework before but I’m curious. What do you find useful about it?

• ymeskhout 1 Mar 2025 21:37 UTC

  6 points

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  in reply to: nonwittyname’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  It’s certainly possible to just constantly amend a theory and keep it technically cohesive, but I’ve found that even dedicated liars eventually throw in the gauntlet after their contortions become too much to bear. Even if a liar refuses to give up, they still have to grapple with trying to unseat the truthful (and much less convoluted) theory. That’s why there’s two parts to this exercise: surviving the gauntlet and dethroning the other survivor.

• ymeskhout 1 Mar 2025 21:32 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: A. Weber’s comment on: Pro­nouns are Annoying

  I didn’t take a position on what balance between convenience vs ambiguity we should strike, it’s always context-dependent. That said, second-person pronouns like “you” tend to be significantly less ambiguous than third-person pronouns. Because you generally know who is talking to you directly (see what I did there?) whereas “they” can potentially refer to anyone in the world.

• ymeskhout 28 Feb 2025 16:15 UTC

  2 points

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  in reply to: Jiao Bu’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  I mentioned this in another comment, I used an unrealistically convenient example for illustrative purposes. A real-life application of my rubric on a real-life lie would be much more complicated and take multiple detours.

• ymeskhout 28 Feb 2025 15:45 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: Rana Dexsin’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  I’m unclear on what the distinction is exactly. This is a tutorial that works for catching a talented liar but also creating common knowledge between yourself and a bad liar.

• ymeskhout 27 Feb 2025 21:45 UTC

  5 points

  1

  in reply to: Dagon’s comment on: How to Corner Liars: A Mi­asma-Clear­ing Protocol

  The example was intended to be unrealistically convenient, since the goal there was just an illustrative example. Had I used an actual lie narrative from one of my clients (for example) it would’ve gotten very convoluted and wordy, and more likely to confuse the reader.

  I acknowledge there are limitations when you’re dealing with unknowable lies. Beyond that, it was really hard to figure out how rare “lies with convenient flaws” really are. I don’t know what denominator I’d use (how many lies are in the universe? which ones count?) or how I’d calculate the numerator.