The Art of Deception

Hoaxes, like any other lies, rely predominately on the amount of confidence, detail, and an counter arguements in preparation for scepticism. With regard to hoaxes, which tend to be more far fetched imaginative schemes of deception, certainty of the execusion is vital. Barnum is a genius when it comes to hoaxes. Barnum was very scrupulous in maintain credability to his schemes. With respect to Joice Heth, Barnum utulized newspapers, athoritative appeals, and “certificates” to give the allusion of Joice Heth’s age. Barnum ellaborated a web of elaborate lies through print to validate the fact that Joice was 161 years old. When seen through the print, and numerous newspapers, people would then lose doubt and would be more inclined to believe them. In addition, Barnum calimed to have “certificates” and well known people to vouche for Joice’s existance. For one thing, because Joice was so old, it would have been impossible to encounter anyone that could legitimately validate her age. Everyone she had presumably encountered all those years ago are no longer alive so there is no concrete proof. Those that figured this and doubted Barnum, would then be given the “certificates” that allegidly guaranted everything is valid. If one reads the certifiactes carefully, one can actually notice that the certifiactes are almost nearly identical in the content written to support Joice. Barnum was smart enough to convelute such a lie that there is truly no possible way to confirm its validity. Therefore, with details, confidence, and “proof” that can truly not be confirmed, hoaxes would be very hard to disprove and easy to convince the general public.