Lying

When did it become human nature to lie to others?

I have not yet heard of any animals that "lie" to one another, so clearly this must have been something we thought up after we acquired our so-called "higher intelligence".  However, it must have some roots in evolution (at least in a social sense) because of the fact that everyone lies at some point or another.

As children, we are taught that we must always tell the truth.  But soon, a child's honesty is reprimanded because they are often "too honest".  After that, we learn the beauty of the "white lie" and when it is appropriate to tell the truth and when it isn't.  Soon, we all develop into passive-aggressive individuals who yearn to listen to our inner child, but have experienced enough of the world to suppress such urges.  No wonder it is so difficult to maintain friendship and loving relationships, we want so much to tell the truth but we cannot fully express the truth without losing our friendships.  I know that this ironically leads to me losing friendships anyway.

When we are taught as children that lying is wrong, I wonder what has made it so wrong.  In some cases, it is obvious that we should not deceive people.  But what about the grey areas?  If we encourage our children (and ourselves) to be polite and respectful people through omitting comments and white lying, where is the line drawn?  Why can't we either tell the truth or not tell it?  I don't understand how this all became such a complicated measure.  Too many times have we encountered such dilemmas and often either choice results in negative consequences.

Then perhaps we should learn to avoid the whole process together.  Find out when a situation requires us to lie or tell the truth and then avoid such actions.  But then we realize that every single sentence, phrase, or thought we have can either be a lie or a truth.  Sometimes we can even lie to ourselves.

So where on earth is the "real world" in this complicated mass of lies and truths?  What on earth do we know and what do we really not know?  Each person has the choice of telling a lie or a truth and that could have a large impact on how we view our world.  What is a lie and what is a truth?  Could my view of a truth be someone else's lie?  Quite possibly.

How subjective our view of the world is.  I am convinced that there exists no "real world" or a universal acceptance of what our world is.  Perhaps when we break up into nothingness we will move beyond such trivial ways of communicating and truths and lies will cease to exist completely.

What do you think?  Are there universal lies and truths?  Or is our method of communicating with ourselves and others completely up to our own interpretation at all times?