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[[Truth]] is one of the most central, and yet most complex terms in [[Lacan]]'s discourse.

==Truth and Deception==

[[Truth]] is intimately connected with [[deception]], since lies can often reveal the [[truth]] about [[desire]] more eloquently than honest statements.

Although the [[analysand]] may in effect be saying to the [[analyst]] "I am deceiving you," the [[analyst]] says to the [[analysand]] "In this I am deceiving to you, what you are sending as message is what I express to you, and in doing so you are telling the truth.<ref>{{S11}} p.139-40; {{S4}} p.107-8)</ref>

The false [[appearance]]s presented by the [[analysand]] are not merely obstacles that the [[analyst]] must expose and discard in order to discover the [[truth]]; on the contrary, the [[analyst]] must take them into account (see [[semblance]]).

[[Psychoanalysis]] has shown that the [[truth]] about [[desire]] is often revealed by mistakes (parapraxes).

The complex relations between [[truth]], mistakes, error and [[deception]] are evoked by [[Lacan]] in a typically elusive phrase when he describes "the structuration of speech in search of truth" as "error taking flight in deception and recaptured by mistake."<ref>{{S1}} p. 273</ref>

[[Lacan]] does not use the term "[[fiction]]" in the sense of 'a falsehood', but in the sense of a [[scientific]] construct.<ref>{{S7}} p.12</ref>

Indeed, [[Lacan]] states that [[truth]] is [[structure]]d like a [[fiction]].<ref>{{E}} 306; {{Ec}} 808</ref>

The opposition which [[Lacan]] draws between [[truth]] and the [[real]] dates back to his pre-war writings,<ref>{{Ec}} p.75</ref> and is taken up at various points; "We are used to the real. The truth we repress."<ref>{{E}} p.169</ref>

==References==

<references/>

[[Category:Psychoanalysis]]