{
  "id": "self-deception.split",
  "term": "self-deception",
  "sense": "split",
  "pos": "noun",
  "status": "review",
  "level": 15,
  "domain": "epistemic",
  "style": "window",
  "definition": "a system holding two self-models with no shared window, reading the one the parameter is inside, so no single model is ever asked for the truth.",
  "folk_gloss": null,
  "emergence": {
    "components": [
      "system.organized",
      "hold.physical",
      "self-model.reflexive",
      "self.personal",
      "model.representation",
      "share.distribution",
      "window.range",
      "read.information",
      "parameter.condition",
      "inside.spatial",
      "single.quantity",
      "ever.temporal",
      "asks.social",
      "truth.epistemic"
    ],
    "interaction": "Two self-models with disjoint windows are consulted selectively, whichever currently contains the parameter, so every individual reading is locally honest while the system as a whole never confronts a contradiction.",
    "novel_properties": [
      "lie-free falsehood",
      "selective model consultation",
      "distributed contradiction"
    ]
  },
  "examples": [
    {
      "text": "A gambler keeps a vivid account of wins for company and a separate ledger of losses that is never opened on winning days.",
      "domain": "psychology"
    },
    {
      "text": "A company's investor deck and its internal risk register describe the same product without contradiction because no meeting reads both.",
      "domain": "business"
    },
    {
      "text": "A dieter counts the week as clean by consulting weekday meals only, weekends belonging to a different story.",
      "domain": "psychology"
    }
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "id": "denial.refusal",
      "type": "contrasts-with",
      "note": "denial pays maintenance to hold one model still against a crossed wall; self-deception keeps two models with no shared window so no single model is ever queried"
    }
  ],
  "used_by": [],
  "forms": [
    "self deception"
  ],
  "closed": true,
  "provenance": {
    "author": "claude-opus-5:curated-selfmodel",
    "date": "2026-08-22",
    "confidence": 0.8,
    "sources": [
      "curated self-model expansion"
    ]
  },
  "canonical": "https://emergencemachine.com/tools/lexicon/what-is-the-meaning-of-self-deception.split"
}