Me and a couple friends on Facebook have been trying to figure this paradox out. My explanations from Facebook are below. You can see how my explanation changes a little each time, each time being more fine-tuned (the last explanation being my final and official one) What a brain workout! I’ll update it if/when the other participants reply; and I’ll ask if I can post their replies as well.
The initial paradox that I was presented with was “My nose is about to grow.” Then, down the line, I replied to “My nose is growing now”.
Disclaimer: I’m not claiming my explanation to be the correct explanation, just my own opinion. If anyone disagrees, has a better explanation, or the explanation, please post it in the comments below.
1. Mike:
I don’t think it would grow (sounds dirty lol) because he’s making a prediction and not explicitly lying; he doesn’t know when his nose will grow, he’s just saying “it’s about to” (anytime now…). And predictions can be “wrong” but they’re not a “lie”. A lie is when you know what the truth is, but you give an alternative “truth” that is false, usually with the intention to deceive others. So whether or not his nose grew immediately after stating that or later on in the day or year, he’s still not lying, but making a prediction. Pinocchio doesn’t know exactly when his nose will grow, so he can’t be lying about it, but he can be wrong about it.
2. Mike:
If he said, “It’s about to grow *now*”, then it wouldn’t be a prediction. Actually, I think it might still be one, because he’s still not claiming it *will* for certain, just that it’s “about to” and eventually “going to”. So, I still say when he says “about”, it’s always a prediction, because “about” refers to some uncertainty. If he said “It’s gonna grow right now”…. actually, that’s still a prediction, because he doesn’t know if it will or not. And in order to lie, you have to know the truth and tell an alternative one which is false, or pretend to know the truth when you don’t. Pinocchio would only be wrong, but not lying. If he actually knew for sure his nose was going to grow, he would say, “My nose will grow right now”, instead of having any uncertainty.
If Pinocchio pretended to know that his nose was not going to grow for sure, and he said to me, “My nose will grow right now”, then he would be lying to me, and his nose would then grow. His nose would grow even though he just lied to me about it (which would make you think that he actually told you the truth because he nose is actually growing like he said, and thus creating this paradox), because his nose would be growing as the result of lying to *me*, and not as the result of the actual growth of his nose.
If he pretended to know that his nose would grow, and he told me “My nose will grow right now” — despite his prediction being right or wrong, he would still be lying to me (because he’s pretending to know, when in fact, he cannot know, and he is telling me an alternative truth which is in fact false), and so his nose would grow.
But if he never makes an initial assertion to himself claiming to know, then he’s only making predictions.
Mike’s Final and Official Explanation
3. Mike:
Another variation is “My nose will grow now” and “My penis will grow now” (wishful thinking). These statements are all predictions. He’s making a prediction. And failing to predict accurately is not lying. But, it’s not about the prediction; the lying comes from his initial beliefs and what he already knows.
I liar has to have the correct information and decide not to tell that information, or just state that he knows the information when he really does not. If I told you that tomorrow I’ll be elected PM of Canada, I’m not lying to you. I’m making a claim of a future event — a prediction. The chances are that I won’t be, but it’s not impossible. For me to have lied to you, I would have to know for a fact whether or not I was elected or not (the truth), and then tell you the opposite (the lie). But there is no way that I could know. Even if I asserted for a 100% fact that I would be elected, it’s still a prediction, because I just cannot know for sure if I will be or not. It really does sound like lie, but it’s not.
BUT, he does know if his nose will grow or not, and he makes the claim that it will grow that very instant. But his nose won’t grow like he said because he didn’t lie for it to grow before he made the statement (unless he did in the movie, or whatever, and I’m not aware of it), thus making him a liar, and resulting in his nose growing — and he knows all of this, so he’s lying for sure. But if he is a little insane and actually believes that it will or will not grow, then he’s telling the truth — since you can’t lie if you truly 100% believe it (maybe he’s a little delusional lol, but I doubt it).
So, unless we knew his thoughts, we can’t be 100% if it’s a lie. But, since he likely wasn’t insane, and knew that his nose only grows when he lies, and he claimed that it will grow this instant for no reason his lying first, then he’s lying because he already knows the outcome, and he’s telling us something different, that it will grow.
Although his prediction would be correct afterwards, it wasn’t initially when he lied to me; so his prediction becoming true afterwards wouldn’t render him truthful — because he still lied to me; the lie is for his initial knowledge of the outcome of his nose and telling me different, and not because of his accurate predictions afterwards.
Then again, maybe’s is just a rhetorical statement lol. Then it wouldn’t grow lol. Or, since Pinocchio /probably/ doesn’t exist, this problem/paradox probably doesn’t exist either lol.
Here’s a programmer’s view of the situation.