What a funny truth. A gun can kill? I thought it was the bullet? Or was it the person who pulls the trigger. In anycase a gun without a bullet can still kill, or is it the person who uses it to hit someone with? For that matter, pretty much anything can kill including microbes in the water we drink. Soon we become paranoid from truths.

Lots of truths that are constantly changing. Pretty soon every observation becomes a truth which makes finding truths pretty easy and we don't have to make much about it. — Rich

Why is there such a sharp divide between truth and lies in our world? We value the honest and frown upon liars?

There isn't a sharp divide. It is a subjective judgment and is very fluid.

Interestingly, I've been reading Saul Smilansky, who argues that it can actually be better to believe in something untrue than believe the truth.

Smilansky created a view called illusionism as a response to the free will debate. Illusionism essentially says we should act as if we have free will even if we don't. Smilansky argues this because he believes a belief in free will is necessary for a functioning society. We need a belief in free will because people need to feel they are responsible for their actions in order to feel a sense of value and achievement in what they do. We also need to be able to hold others accountable when they do wrong.

Illusionism essentially says we should act as if we have free will even if we don't. Smilansky argues this because he believes a belief in free will is necessary for a functioning society. — czahar

I remember reading about this year ago when researching various ideas on free will, and this concept really bothered me because it assumes we have the free will to believe in what we choose. By saying we should believe in free will, it is implied that it is within our power to choose to believe in it, which doesn't make sense if there is no free will.

It's difficult to conceptualize, but basically if there is no free will then we have no control over our beliefs anyway, so what Smilansky is asserting is mostly pointless.