Lie Detector: Difference between revisions

For almost all cases, real life polygraphs are simply "Unreliable, Unscientific and Biased", according to the National Academy of Sciences, their findings not being admissible in court. So, this is an [[Inversion]] of [[Truth in Television]].

 

 

Professionals also argue that the term 'lie detector' is misleading altogether because the actual purpose of the polygraph is to register certain involuntary reactions of the human body, not to interpret them. In other words, interviewer may only note that a particular question causes ''some'' unusual reaction but cannot really answer why it is so (e.g. the question 'did you drown the victim' may cause reaction because the suspect really drowned the victim or because he witnessed drowning of a friend and is still haunted by the experience). In real life, polygraphs usually help to narrow the range of possible leads to ones that appear most certain and require complex set of precise questions although you almost never see it in fiction.

* ''The Sentinel''. Basically the first plot twist. Secret Service Agent Pete Garrison is blamed for treachery and has to go on the run because he failed a polygraph test. Why? Because he was scared they'd find out he's been having an affair with the first lady!

* One character in ''[[Anatomy of a Murder]]'' has taken a lie detector test, but its results are not admissible in court.

* In one of the ''Ocean's Eleven'' films, the team nerd has to pass a polygraph test as part of a scam, and spoofs the system by keeping a thumbtack in his shoe and pressing his foot down on it while answering the calibration questions. The testers remark that his results are screwy, but they don't catch on to why.

 

* In the Stephen King novel ''[[The Waste Lands]]'', Roland and company are on board a high speed train run by a sophisticated A.I. The A.I. informs them it can tell with great accuracy when they are lying by monitoring voice stress patterns.

* [[H. Beam Piper]]'s ''[[Little Fuzzy]]'' series has the veridicator, which shows blue for truth, red for lies, and mixed patterns for half-truths. The veridicator is an accepted and vital part of the judicial system, to the point that trying to prove that it works on the Fuzzy race is a major plot point in the third book—otherwise they can't legally testify in court.

{{quote|"This is a veridicator. That globe'll light blue; the moment you try to lie to us, it'll turn red. And the moment it turns red, I'm going to hammer your teeth down your throat with the butt of this pistol."}}

* [[Robert A. Heinlein]]'s novel ''[[The Star Beast]]''. A "truth meter" is used on witnesses during a court trial. When the subject lies, a needle swings into the red zone, a ruby light flashes, and a warning buzzer goes off.

* ''[[Gilligan's Island]]'': The Professor builds a lie detector out of—what else? -- [[Bamboo Technology|bamboo and coconuts]] and tests all the men to find out who sent Mrs. Howell a love letter. One of the gags is The Skipper passing until he says, "See? I always tell the truth," which sets it off.

* Avoided in ''[[Alias (TV series)|Alias]]'', which features a more realistic lie detector—that is to say one that doesn't explicitly say "Truth" or "Lie", but just provides raw data such as heart rate and blood flow in particular areas of the brain, requiring the interrogator to use his own judgment to decide on the truth of a given statement, and being much harder to fool. Then, outright subverted, when the difficulty of tricking the device almost gives away the protagonist, when after extensive training and practice with her handler her results look ''too'' perfectly honest during the real interrogation.

* Maury Povich has [[Flanderization|devolved]] into using a lie detector on nearly every episode of his talk show (when he's not doing paternity tests or asking you whether she's a man or not...)

** Steve Wilkos has as well.

* From back in da day, the lie detector was the plot point of an episode of ''[[Barney Miller]]'', as an entire police division was being randomly tested (a procedure that was the Hot Topic of the Day in the 1970s). Det. Wojohowicz failed miserably due to being nervous and deliberately provoked, while Det. Dietrich passed perfectly (despite claiming to be from outer space) simply by remaining calm.

* ''[[Star Trek: The Original Series]]'' had a Lie Detector hooked up to a computer in the episode "Wolf In the Fold" ... ''SUBJECT IS RELAYING ACCURATE ACCOUNT''.

* Parodied in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_2KUXDACoU this sketch] on ''Mr. Show With Bob And David''; prospective employers are interviewing a job applicant and putting him through a lie detector test. They're soon flummoxed when the applicant - who answers everything in the affirmative - begins confessing to the most ludicrous things, including being addicted to every hard drug known to man, stealing 'space plans' from NASA, killing a man with his mind, and eating a train piece by piece after first derailing it with his penis. All the while, the lie detector is silent, indicating that he is telling nothing but the truth. {{spoiler|Eventually, the employers - who are revealed to be the operators of a shoe store - give him a job, and the applicant claims that he loves shoes - BUZZZT!}}

* In the short-lived sitcom ''Quintuplets,'' two of the brothers, Pearce and Parker, try to make a lie detector in order to find out which of the two their mutual crush likes better. Unlike most detectors, when someone lies, the detector makes toast. Pearce is the one to put the thing together, and tests it out on himself. He sets it up, and tells Parker to touch it. The detector gives Parker a (very painful) shock. Pearce tells Parker, "I had no idea that was going to happen." Toast pops out, leading Pearce to gleefully exclaim "It works!" [[Hilarity Ensues|Hilarity (and disaster) ensues.]]

* The TV show ''[[Lie to Me (TV series)|Lie to Me]]'', which bases its detection off people's faces, hates polygraphs. The characters point out that your reaction is going to be altered if say, a hot chick walks in and takes over the lie detector exam. Also that you might as well use a large egg being held in your hands as one, because if you are under stress and squeeze and break it, that could indicate that you're lying. In one episode, they show it's possible t beat a polygraph by taking a depressant to decrease your body's stress reaction.

** In a later episode, they use a (fake) polygraph on a suspect who he knows is going to try to trick the system. The idea is that he'll focus on trying to trick the polygraph instead of the people reading his facial cues.

{{quote|"We're gonna ''neutron'' this son-of-a-bitch!" }}

* At least once on ''[[Law and Order]]''.

** The show alludes to its fallability and inadmissibility in court, at least.

{{quote|"I feel my opponent is a decent man." [BUZZ!] "He's an okay man." [BUZZ!] "He's a man." [BUZZ!] "He's bisexual."}}

* An episode of ''[[Tek War]]'' had a police detective use a combination lie detector/shock collar. If it detected a lie, it gave the wearer a painful zap. It's used once on a known criminal, who gives truthful information. Later it's used on a hotel maid that they suspected was concealing evidence. Despite her persistent denials, the device kept shocking her until she passed out.

* In ''[[Psych]], Lassiter uses one on Shawn with excuse that he's just testing whether the machine is working or not to figure out whether Shawn's secretly dating Juliet. The machine appears at first to be a typical hyper-accurate bit of [[Hollywood Science]] ([[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming|registering an honest response when Shawn blurts out that he's in love with Juliet while hooked up to it]]), but promptly subverted when Lassiter follows up with the question [[Wham! Line|"are you psychic?"]]. Shawn lies and still passes the test. A flashback at the end of the episode reveals that learning how to beat a lie detector was one of the many skills Henry taught Shawn as a young boy (namely, trying to believe in the lie so that the polygraph registers an honest response).

 

* The Disney [[Three Little Pigs]] short ''The Practical Pig'' (1939) features a lie detector, which notably goes off on Practical when, while punishing his brothers, he proclaims "This hurts me more than it hurts you!"

* ''[[Beavis and Butthead]]'' were forced to take a lie detector test after being suspected of taking money from the Burger World cash register. Before they took the test, Butt-Head told Beavis that they can trick the lie detector by holding their breath. When Butt-Head steps up, the lie detector buzzes when he claims that he understands how the lie detector works but dings when he gets the number of fingers the man holds up wrong; when asked if he ever stole anything in his life, he passed out before he could answer. When it was Beavis' turn, he successfully convinced them that he was a serial killer from the 1960s.

* In one of the episodes of ''[[Fairly Oddparents]]'', Timmy's parents suspect him of stealing and he whips up a Lie Detector. Which works against him of course. Timmy's Dad asked where he got the detector and Timmy, [[Running Gag|out of habit]], says "Internet".

* ''[[Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy]]'' strap Johnny to one of these in the [[Pilot Episode]] when they suspect him of stealing possessions from the children of the cul-de-sac.

[[Category:Universal Tropes]]

[[Category:Truth and Lies]]