007, Jr.

Kids are great bullshit detectors:

Studies have already shown that kids work as incredibly precise detectors of straight-up lies. Outside the realm of bold-faced falsehoods, though, children perform quite brilliantly, too.

Subtler and more elegant deceit—the kind where the truth is told but other important elements are shaded or concealed—doesn’t go unnoticed by six-year-olds either, according to a new study published in Cognition. Unbeknownst to their teachers and parents, young kids are apparently equipped with the perceptive powers of seasoned Cold War spies. The new paper suggests that they don’t appreciate when they’re being misled with lies of omission and even adjust their behavior based on a previous record of deceit.

Of course know this is correct thanks to an excerpt from my soon-be-self-published novel:

“My kid tries to eat the plastic outlet covers all over the house,” a guy with the world's dumbest beard said as he put his beer on our table.

“Never fails, right?”  I nodded my head along with everyone else’s.  “Kids can find the rusty, e-bolic needle in the plush cottony haystack.  These motherfuckers should work for the FBI - put 'em in a room full of people and they’ll instantly crawl onto the lap of the one who happens to be the world's most wanted terrorist: ‘Over here, jackass.’”