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involves knowing something but also not knowing it, a seemingly impossible state of mind; and, second, that it involves intentionally perpetrating a deception without the intentionality of subverting the success of the act, a seemingly impossible process. Mele’s own argument is that these apparent paradoxes simply stem from an overcommitment to the analogy between self-deception and interpersonal deception. In fact, he says, we do not necessarily (although we may possibly) believe two things at once when we are self-deceived; nor do we deliberately set out to deceive ourselves. Instead, we might simply engage in actions—such as a faulty assessment of the evidence—that leave us self-deceived. He cites by way of example a teenager who wants to believe that he is a charismatic leader even though he is teased and disliked by his classmates, and who therefore unconsciously begins spending time with younger children, who are more likely to admire him. To some extent I find Mele’s argument convincing, but it doesn’t seem to account for the kind of situation we are often referring to when we talk about self-deception—the one in which there is a palpable tension between believing one thing and suspecting something else, and a corresponding effort to squelch those suspicions. For that reason, and because it seems more relevant to the experience of being wrong, I have relied on the more traditional understanding of self-deception.

“revelation machine.” Scheck et al., xv.

the science is starting to prevail. Genetic testing has now been a routine part of the criminal justice system long enough for a sobering statistic to emerge: more than 25 percent of so-called prime suspects are cleared by DNA tests before the prosecution can begin to build a case against them. Needless to say, this has disturbing implications for people who are accused of crimes in which no biological evidence was found, or those who were convicted before DNA testing was standard. “I don’t worry for our clients,” Peter Neufeld told me, “because our clients are going to get out. They’ve got the testing. A pig-headed prosecutor can say the earth is flat until the cows come home, but eventually we’re going to prevail. What’s troubling are all those cases where there’s no biological evidence available.”

a confident eyewitness. See e.g., Brian L. Cutler, Steven D. Penrod, and Hedy Red Dexter, “Juror Sensitivity to Eyewitness Identification Evidence,” Law and Human Behavior, Vol. 14, No. 2 (April 1990): 185–191.

Franz von Liszt. Sheck et al, 42–43. One of the most telling variants of Liszt’s study was conducted in 1973, when the local NBC newscast in New York City aired a short (acted) clip in which a young man in a hat, sneakers, and leather jacket lurks in a hallway, jumps out at a woman who is walking down it, grabs her handbag, and runs straight toward the camera. After the film, the station showed a lineup of six suspects with a phone number for viewers to call and identify which of the six was the “thief,” or to indicate that the suspect was not included in the lineup. The station received 2,145 phone calls before unplugging the phone line. The actual thief received 302 votes, or 14.1 percent of the total. If you assume seven options (the six people in the lineup plus the “not included” choice), the callers were almost exactly at chance (14.3 percent). Most disturbingly: Robert Buckhout, the Brooklyn College professor who organized the experiment, later showed the film to lawyers and judges as well. These legal professionals did just as badly as the general public—and then reacted to their poor performance by complaining that the thief was wearing different clothes in the lineup from those he wore during the film. Needless to say, most real criminals own more than one pair of clothing, too. See Scheck et al., 43–44, and Robert Buckhout, “Nearly 2,000 Witnesses Can Be Wrong,” Social Action and the Law, Vol. 2, No. 3 (May 1975): 7.

the error rate for DNA testing (FN). “DNA Evidence,” Encyclopedia of High-Tech Crime and Crime-Fighting, Michael Newton (Facts On