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On Bullshit

Harry G. Frankfurt · 8 HN comments
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A #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit. Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted. Most people are rather confident of their ability to recognize bullshit and to avoid being taken in by it. So the phenomenon has not aroused much deliberate concern. We have no clear understanding of what bullshit is, why there is so much of it, or what functions it serves. And we lack a conscientiously developed appreciation of what it means to us. In other words, as Harry Frankfurt writes, "we have no theory." Frankfurt, one of the world's most influential moral philosophers, attempts to build such a theory here. With his characteristic combination of philosophical acuity, psychological insight, and wry humor, Frankfurt proceeds by exploring how bullshit and the related concept of humbug are distinct from lying. He argues that bullshitters misrepresent themselves to their audience not as liars do, that is, by deliberately making false claims about what is true. In fact, bullshit need not be untrue at all. Rather, bullshitters seek to convey a certain impression of themselves without being concerned about whether anything at all is true. They quietly change the rules governing their end of the conversation so that claims about truth and falsity are irrelevant. Frankfurt concludes that although bullshit can take many innocent forms, excessive indulgence in it can eventually undermine the practitioner's capacity to tell the truth in a way that lying does not. Liars at least acknowledge that it matters what is true. By virtue of this, Frankfurt writes, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are.
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Aug 15, 2021 · smitty1e on The Bullshit
Manadatory Harry G. Frankfurt "On Bullshit" reference => https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

It's a personal amusement of mine that the singnal-to-noise ratio on the internet is so terrible. Sorry, Tim Berners-Lee. The abysmal state of facts on the internet also seems a failure of capitalism of sorts: a low-distortion news channel doesn't seem an impossible business model, but here we are.

Correct Frankfurt link => https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

The referenced monograph is far less positive about BS, seeing it as an attack on the concept of truth as such.

"It can't be helped, but there's a lot of it about."--Pink Floyd

Jan 30, 2021 · smitty1e on Brandolini's Law
Harry G. Frankfurt offered a full philosophical theory of BS[1].

Key takeaway: the BSer isn't just sloppy or inaccurate with the hogwash. Rather, BS attacks the very concept of truth as such.

Looking at you, Postmodernists.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

082349872349872
Having attempted to understand postmodernism (it's been what, a good part of a century by now?), facile characterisation of postmodernism as anti-truth is itself BS.
smitty1e
OK, how about intellectual nihilism?
aabhay
It might not be anti-truth but it’s not anti-anti-truth, so to speak?
telesilla
Post-modernism isn't so much, there isn't any truth: more that there isn't any singular truth, as in, it's relative to perspective. This doesn't preclude outright lying, though - expounding false facts seems to be a move towards totalitarianism. I'm looking forward to a 21st review of the last 4 years by one of our bright philosopher/theorists and how it compares to the totalitarianism of the early 20th century.
Why do they have the right to use power to suppress viewpoint opponents with 100% flexibility in claiming an individual has wronged a group with no evidence, no clear definition of what the terms are, and no recourse?

It seems like terms like this and hate speech often boil down to “people that are effective at calling out my bullshit”.

It is unethical to with no evidence call republicans or classical liberals Nazis, and then use that as a justification to abuse your power to shut them up. Why not make an argument instead?

On this topic I really recommend Frankfurts [1] terse one hour read arguing that there are three types of statements; attempt at truth, attempt at lies, and attempt to just bullshit people with no regard to relate it to truth. This kind of attempt fall in the third category.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

asabjorn
It is quite telling how this is getting downvoted with no argument. Always judge people on their actions, and especially how their actions impose upon others.

Edit: and then this is also downvoted with no argument. A better demonstration of why this facebook policy is a terrible idea could have not happened.

anigbrowl
It's not a novel argument, it begs the question from the outset (boil down to “people that are effective at calling out my bullshit”), and ignores objective evidence about the content and aims of the speech in question.
asabjorn
Bullshitting is what many talking heads do on TV, YouTube and tumbler to generate content required for their job. Basically, truth seeking has not done its job on it so the person doesn’t know if it’s true or not.

People are right now most often in a biased content bubble and judging content from what they learn by emotionally mistaking what they learn from possibly bullshit content as objective might lead to injustice.

Most of us agree that people might say bad things and that it would be great if they didn’t, but my claims was that facebooks judgement of the content is unlikely to be objective because:

1) no clear definition of terms like white nationalism and hate speech is a recipe for bias. What liberal or republican haven’t been called a alt-right/Nazi at this point?

2) because of #1 there is a risk that a company that has a clear ideological tilt will most likely end up suppressing viewpoint opponents when the definitions are unclear, because too much is up to subjective judgement and no due process protects against these biases

3) no recourse is bad when things go wrong

In due process it’s the process that reduce bias so that we don’t get the mistakes of mobs of the past (eg people that think they are objective while not having an accurate mental model of what they judge), although it can’t eliminate it.

How do you think facebook has ameliorated these concerns so that they can be objective?

anigbrowl
I'm just telling you why your earlier posts got downvoted. I'm not interested in how Facebook has ameliorated these concerns until I see how they do at achieving their stated objective.
None
None
asabjorn
It is the stated objective that is highly problematic, because of the lack of truth seeking and humility in how they pursue their objective.

I think another outcome for Facebook is more likely because they seem to be forgetting that they are not the ones creating Facebook, rather they are capitalizing on part of the activity in the relationships amongst their users as long as they can express something relevant to them on Facebook.

They are effectively attempting logical rationing with a lack of emotional meaning to their relationships, and overvaluing what one can learn from subjectivity without truth seeking.

As they said I met a traveller from an antique land, Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand, Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed; And on the pedestal, these words appear: My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings; Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair! Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

alexandre_m
It's quite dangerous to be allowed to be judge, jury and executioner.

FB has become too large and ubiquitous, they shouldn't be all of those.

asabjorn
Exactly, and I am surprised they don't know they should have a better process that is feels fairer to their customers. This seems to be treating customers too logistically, without enough regard to your own potential mistakes and biases.
And if this piece speaks to you, you might also like Frankfurt's essay "On Bullshit" (https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...).
For the record, I use 'bullshit' as a technical term[1].

I can imagine why someone might dislike 'clownshow'. Frankly, I find it accurate, or I wouldn't have written it, and I didn't use such terms in the past to describe pols I disagree with - it is specific to what I see as a historically bad outfit.

"Clean up the mess" is "uncivil"? Sorry, that's silly, and another demonstration that politically correct language policing isn't just for lefty college-kids.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

anigbrowl
I also support this use of 'bullshit' as a technical term and recommend that book to anyone who will listen. Your language strikes me as disgruntled rather than incendiary, but then my political views are already closely aligned with yours.

Civility is important for discourse, but so is clarity of expression, and I do not consider it uncivil to express a firm opinion bluntly whether or not I agree with it.

Jan 12, 2017 · t_g on Calling bullshit
Reminds me of a good book I read in my ethics classes:

https://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/0691122...

a_humean
Yep, its one of the best essays I read during my undergrad, and in the era of Trump's never ending bullshit generation it has never been a more relevant a topic for study. 16 page PDF of the original article:

https://www.stoa.org.uk/topics/bullshit/pdf/on-bullshit.pdf

And Cohen's "Deeper into Bullshit":

http://learning.hccs.edu/faculty/robert.tierney/phil1301-6/b...

edit: now that the site is back up, I can see both are part of the week 1 syllabus!

FabHK
Not surprisingly, that's also one of Calling bullshit's sources:

http://callingbullshit.org/syllabus.html#Introduction

(Funny little story, btw: The NYT reviewed that book, without being able to ever mention its title or, well, subject :-)

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/14/books/between-truth-and-li...

Sep 30, 2015 · gry on On Bullshit (1986) [pdf]
This version is even better. :) http://www.amazon.com/Bullshit-Harry-G-Frankfurt/dp/06911229...

EDIT: no Amazon referral

icey
I keep a copy of this on my desk. When people start smelling like it's about to leak out in the middle of conversation, I'll casually pick it up and flip through the pages. It seems to work ;)
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