With the TV writers on strike, Pop Omnivore will watch almost anything, including the new Fox game show, The Moment of Truth. Before the show, a contestant is hooked up to a lie detector and asked 50 questions that range from mildly embarrassing (“Have you ever lied to get a job?”) to horribly humiliating (“Is there a part of your spouse’s body that repulses you?”). Then he or she is asked 21 of those very same questions in front of family, friends, a studio audience, and a TV camera. Then, based on the earlier lie-detector results, a robotic female voice delivers the verdict: “That answer is … [long, annoying pause] true.” Or false, as the case may be. Answer all 21 questions truthfully and you win half a mil! Get caught in a lie and kiss your winnings goodbye.

On the premiere, a charming ex-football player/personal trainer tripped up when asked if he’d ever touched a client inappropriately. He said “No” but his pre-show lie detector test indicated that “no” was a lie. Before he was kicked off the show for his lie, he revealed to the entire world that he has hit a car and not left a note, he thinks he’s the best looking guy among his friends, and he’s delayed having kids because he’s not sure his wife is his life partner. Tragic! Get this couple on Oprah, stat.

All this made us wonder just how accurate lie detecting might be. So we asked Maureen O’Sullivan, a professor of psychology at the University of San Francisco and an expert on deception.

Her first reaction did not bode well for the show. “They’re using the lie detector as their criterion for truth? Oh God!”

The premise of the lie detector, O’Sullivan explains, is that lying will make people anxious. To detect that anxiety, the lie detector measures heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, and other physical signs. She says that, in the hands of a highly skilled operator who asks lots of questions before, during, and after hookup to the machine and pays careful attention to the order of the queries, the detector can often be quite revealing.

But, she cautions, “It’s not 100 percent. There’s nothing that’s 100 percent.”

For example, if you’re just a very anxious person, you could appear to be lying. “And some people don’t feel guilty when they lie – they get what we call ‘duping delight,’” O’Sullivan points out. So … looks like they’re telling the truth even if they’re not.

Or a person can fool the lie detector. Think of some anxious moment when the lie detector operator is establishing your baseline pulse etc., and then if you do show anxiety when lying, the lie detector probably won’t be able to tell.

Meanwhile, just being on television and having a chance to win a HALF A MILLION DOLLARS!!! could make someone excited enough to register as a liar.

Will America tune in? I’d be lying if I said I knew the answer. But the show was a big hit in Colombia—and as a result, lie detection is a booming business in the Latin American country.

Pop Omnivore readers: How do you detect a lie? As a parent, I assume guilt at all times: “I know you dented the car/broke curfew/ate the last cookie and didn’t throw the bag away.” The child usually confesses in a heartbeat!

-Marc Silver

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