I’ve spent decades studying human behavior and the brain and always felt I had a knack for spotting liars. But while watching You Can See Everything, Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s documentary about Elizabeth Holmes, I found myself momentarily wondering whether, despite her criminal conviction, she might be telling the truth.
It wasn’t her tears that persuaded me. Those seemed theatrical, in my opinion. Nor was it her need to interrupt an interview to rush and check on her baby, just before her partner, Billy Evans, raised the possibility of financial compensation from the film. Grandiosity, self-importance, fixation on success, and other traits that Holmes reveals are typical of narcissism, but those behavioral observations are not a diagnosis, and these personality traits alone cannot explain her actions.
Seeming Naïveté
What almost hooked me was her apparent naïveté. Holmes seemed genuinely bewildered by Abbott and Costello’s famous “Who’s on First?” routine and portrayed herself as uninterested in financial matters. Could this extraordinarily ambitious woman, who attended Stanford and built a multibillion-dollar company, really be so socially awkward and financially unsophisticated?
Some have speculated that Holmes might be on the autism spectrum, and I wondered that as well, though such observations are by no means a clinical assessment. Her behavior may have reflected an unusual way of processing social information rather than an attempt to evade responsibility, but these were fleeting impressions. As soon as a scene ended, my analytical mind jumped in and reminded me of the overwhelming evidence of her deception. For a moment, however, I had suspended my skepticism. The film doesn’t just show us how a persuasive individual can deceive people, but it draws us in, questioning her veracity, even when we know better.
I kept wondering how someone as devious as Holmes could persuade smart people who know better to overlook piles of evidence against her. She convinced Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, and other highly accomplished individuals to lend their reputations to Theranos, her so-called miracle company. How could they have been so thoroughly misled?
It may come down to how our brains reconcile emotion and reason. We know that Holmes was convicted of fraud, but when we observe her apparent vulnerability, it is tempting to believe her. To relieve this cognitive dissonance, we may search for explanations. Maybe she really is socially awkward and was manipulated by the men in her life. The more we sympathize with Holmes, the more tempting it becomes to reinterpret the evidence against her.
Faulty Memory
In clinical practice, I’ve encountered people whose accounts of events become increasingly fixed through repetition, particularly when those accounts protect a valued self-image. Over time, people may come to believe their own distorted versions of events.
Holmes repeatedly responds to difficult questions by claiming she doesn’t remember, and some of her responses seem remarkably convincing. But after spending much of my career studying memory, I know that our recollections can be far less reliable than we imagine.
Memory isn’t a video recording that we can replay. Each time we recall a memory, there is the potential to distort it by incorporating new information, feelings, and interpretations based on subsequent experiences. After repeatedly recounting an event, those distortions may feel authentic. This vulnerability is shared by all of us; it’s not just a feature of any personality type.
Consider former NBC News anchor Brian Williams, who repeatedly recounted being aboard a helicopter struck by enemy fire during the Iraq War. When his account was challenged, he acknowledged that he had been in a different helicopter and attributed the discrepancy to conflated memories. The controversy cost him his job as the evening news anchor.
Deception Essential Reads
When Holmes insists that she doesn’t remember something, we know from her past behavior that she is likely lying. But it is possible that she may be repeating a version of reality that she has come to believe.
The Men in Her Life
Holmes’s relationships with the men in her life bring up another question about who is in control. During her trial, Holmes described her former romantic and business partner, Sunny Balwani, as controlling and abusive. Her allegations were disputed, and they did not prevent her conviction. Now we watch Evans, her current partner, become an increasingly forceful defender of her narrative.
When the filmmakers return to Evans after an extended interval, I was struck by how his demeanor became more combative and suspicious. Was he protecting someone he believes has been unjustly treated? Has he become so invested in her version of events that he can no longer see disputing evidence or even question it? Or, maybe, Holmes is presenting herself as a woman controlled by powerful men, when actually she may be the one pulling the strings, leaving the men to shoulder responsibility for her actions. It’s hard to tell who’s really controlling whom.
Emotions and Judgment
Fielder and Oppenheim seem to understand how easily our emotions can influence our judgment. Holmes once offered investors an irresistible story about transforming medicine. Now she presents another: a misunderstood visionary, perhaps socially awkward, perhaps manipulated by others, and ultimately victimized by forces beyond her control.
Whether she consciously constructed that persona or has even come to believe parts of it herself is impossible to know. I began watching the film confident in my ability to recognize deception. I finished with a reminder of how easily even a psychiatrist’s skepticism can falter.
For me, the most unsettling thing about Elizabeth Holmes wasn’t simply her ability to make us believe her. It was her ability to make me want to believe her. The most effective deception doesn’t always overcome our intelligence. Sometimes it enlists our empathy.
