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Comment by jessriedel | Hacker News Reader

FYI: Philosopher Harry Frankfurt wrote the classic essay "On Bullshit", defining the concept. Unlike lying/fraud, where falsehood is instrumental, Frankfurt defined bullshit as potentially false speech where the truth simply wasn't important. Bullshit is characterized by giving the surface appearance of confidence, intelligence, or a convincing argument; whether it's actually true or not is besides the point.

The essay is only 20 pages and available here:

http://ruby.fgcu.edu/courses/twimberley/EnviroPhilo/bullshit...

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I've always thought of bullshit as being more about what you don't say than what you say. It's a lot easier to get away with bullshit when your bullshit consists of truths with a healthy dose of leaving important details that affect the implications of your statements out.

Such as something like, 'we've seen a dramatic increase in revenue' while leaving out the dramatic increase in expenditures and downplaying that profit hasn't really changed.

Or the kind of bullshit large companies use with the environment or social issues. Things like, our company uses 75% recycled products and cares about diversity, while leaving out that they destroy thousands of hectares of natural ecosystems, pollute land and water, oppress developing nations and murder their protesting citizens in the jungle while employing their children as slave labour. Meanwhile, they tell you how much they care about your rich, empty, disconnected technocrat concerns about the world and make you believe you're making a difference by buying their garbage and investing in their company.

That's not the type of BS the author means, what you're referring to is called "falseness" by the author, eg. deliberate misleading statement. BS is more like sitting around with people telling stories and embellishing with some details that are irrelevant, or in the more useful case, discussing an idea that is incomplete without fear of the potential falsehoods impacting the creative process of exploring that idea. Say you're unsure of which car to buy, you could BS it in some story about your cousin buying that car (cousin actually bought a truck but that isn't the point of the story) and see how the people around you respond to it. Everyone who hates that car, while BS'ing with you is free to state it, but when you own that car already they have to hedge their opinions.

There's a kind of limbo zone where non-bullshitters internalize bullshitting as the normal pattern of communication and that's where the damage can really happen vis a vis genuine competence.

A manager might sit down with their team and say something like, "We are targeting 10% growth in our department revenue for next year." Someone raises the question on how that 10% growth will be achieved; what is going to be done differently next year than now.

There's a big difference between a person that can whip out their 10-page growth plan with concrete marketing and operational plans to explain how their proposed changes will lead to the desired growth versus one that simply states, "10% growth is a reasonable target for our division".

The latter is just parroting superficial, general information and (critically) thinks this is a sufficient or even desirable way to set goals (set a target and let the team hit it!). The former lets their quantitative conclusion "10% growth" follow from the actual work of building out a plan.

I wouldn't worry so much about what the "real" meaning of BS is. People clearly mean different things by it, and there's no reason to think there's one true answer. The interesting question is "Is the concept called 'bullshit' by Frankfurt a coherent idea that's useful for understanding the world?". If so, then in the present context we can call it "bullshit in the sense of Frankfurt", or "bullshit" for short, and get on with the non-semantical discussion.

It is important per the article. In all other cases I agree.

> "potentially false speech where the truth simply wasn't important"

i couldn't make sense of this, which motivated me to actually look at the essay, thanks :) i recommend the bit with Wittgenstein – it's what made the proposed distinction between "bullshit" and "lies" click for me. (at least i hope it did!)

what i got from the essay is:

bullshit may contain false statements. but their falseness is ultimately besides the point, because, unlike a lie, the bullshitter isn't trying to convince the bullshittee that those false statements are true; they're just props, parts of a scheme to convince you of something else.

explaining it in the abstract gets kind of unreadable (the essay suffers from this a bit imho), so here's an example:

---

say i'm doing a (bullshit) pitch for my new startup, "Uber for cats", and lead with one of these two sentences:

• "Facebook kick-started the social media revolution." (probably true)

• "Facebook created new jobs for marginalized communities." (probably false).

i'm saying something like that because i'm trying to create an impression that:

• I'm a visionary who aims to revolutionize stuff / cares about positive social change

• My startup is, at least to some degree, worth comparing to Facebook

and notice: it doesn't matter whether that opening sentence is true or false. either way i'm bullshitting – using that sentence to create an overinflated image of my startup. i might even build my bullshit out of entirely true things, arranged in a misleading way – anything works, as long as it gets you to invest in Uber for cats :)

In your example the falseness is not besides the point. Even if you wouldn't technically lie, using deceptive language as a tool to raise capital is extremely unethical. You might be able to dodge lawsuits by this kind of deception, but ethically you are the same as a liar.

The thing in my eyes that separates bullshitting someone from lying to them is that when you lie, you know what you are saying is probably or definitely false but when you are bullshitting someone, you just don't know if it's definitively true.

Provided a chance to prepare a proper response, one should never bullshit anyone and doing so is quite disrespectful however when put on the spot, sometimes it does more damage to just say "I have no idea" than it does to make an argument based on assumptions.

A piece of advice that I received when I was younger that I've since taken to heart is this:

Never say cop out phrases such as "I think", "maybe", "possibly", and "I hope". The only purpose they serve is to shield you from the consequences of what you say if you are wrong. If you don't want to deal with those consequences, don't be wrong. If you can't answer with a reasonable level of accuracy, the only valid response is something to the effect of "I will find out".

This advice easily was some of the most useful advice I'd received for being able to hold my ground in a professional environment. If you know the answer, say it. If you are willing to bet the answer is true, say it. In all other cases, find out and get back to them. Very few people will press you if you can't answer something and will in most cases see you with more credibility. Nobody has all the answers so why should you have to pretend you do.

In this sense, bullshitting isn't so much about lying, it's just guessing that you are right. Should you do it often? Probably not, but if it's ultimately of low consequence and you believe you are mostly correct, it is only slightly worse than saying something incorrect on accident.

> ‘Never say cop out phrases such as "I think", "maybe", "possibly", and "I hope". The only purpose they serve is to shield you from the consequences of what you say if you are wrong.’

that’s terrible advice, as life is anything but absolute. we make statements all the time that include our degree of confidence in them. they’re still often very informative. you can always tack on an “i will find out” after any of those statements and have the same effect of affirming more definitive follow-up.

good bullshit though. almost had me.

Of course life is anything but absolute. We know that as a fundamental aspect of life. The point of avoiding those statements is that they don't add anything of value when used in the best case and in the worst case weakens the strength of the points you are making by sowing uncertainty. Note that expressing degrees of certainty is still fine as long as it actually expresses the degree of certainty. Additionally, note that this is for professional discussions. In everyday speech use whatever is most comfortable but removing these phrases from all aspects of your professional life can be immensely helpful.

As examples:

"I/We think X is (possibly) the cause of Y issue." Why should anyone care that you think X is the cause? Even more so if you only think that it might be or could possibly be the cause? Instead you should be answering "I/We know A, B, and C are happening which all point towards X as the source of Y." The difference is that by avoiding "I think" you are forced to provide a summary of the facts/evidence that brought you to your evidence. If this is too technical for the discussion, you are going into too much detail. In that case, instead go for "We have tracked down a source of issue Y and are taking steps to resolve it." and if necessary go into the externalities of this such as how much time and resources you will need to resolve issue Y. An important differentiation is that this approach to explaining the issue forces you to demonstrate your progress and not just speculate as you either go into details, you don't go into detail and they have faith in your team, or they ask you to explain and you have a neat trail of facts and evidence to detail your progress.

"We've just about wrapped up preparation for the launch and we hope everything goes smoothly." For most people in leadership, this sets off alarm bells. In the back of their heads they are asking "What do you mean we hope everything goes smoothly? What if it doesn't? What then?" It should be evident to everyone in the room that everyone hopes the launch goes smoothly. It may not be the intent but in this case, your expressed hope is suggesting that you haven't prepared for things not going as planned. The alternative is either just dropping off everything after the "and" in that sentence or replacing it with a brief summary of how you've prepared for if things go wrong.

I include these as examples particularly because I've both heard people get bitten by saying these and myself getting bitten by it as well. I would have come up with more examples however I'm too tired to at the moment.

Ultimately the purpose is avoiding meaningless filler, not discrediting your knowledge or performance, and avoiding speculating in such a way that you are dodging responsibility in the case that your speculation was wrong. This is by no means an end all rule but as a habit to train yourself to maintain your appearance and avoid putting your foot in your mouth, it is an excellent tool.

> "Ultimately the purpose is avoiding meaningless filler, not discrediting your knowledge or performance, and avoiding speculating in such a way that you are dodging responsibility ..."

this is a better framing of purpose than the advice provided. as you've laid out, the advice needs too many caveats (i.e., it's too specific) to be so absolute. i generally agree it's better to minimize bullshitting under duress, for reputation, responsibility, or otherwise.

good leadership focuses on laying out purpose, providing examples and intuition, and letting teammates determine the needs and implementation(s). bad leadership tries to distill desires into rules to follow, short-circuiting the creativity needed to adapt to dynamic circumstances.

embracing and adapting to uncertainty is a hallmark of good leadership, and politics (like blaming others), a sign of bad leadership.

It is terrible advice because those words won't shield you from the consequences of what you are saying if you are wrong.

Don't you mean "I think that's possibly terrible advice?" :)

ha, yes, i'm glad you caught that little contradiction!

Meanwhile, I wish people said maybe more often when they are not sure instead of acting like they are sure and making me waste time.

> The thing in my eyes that separates bullshitting someone from lying to them is that when you lie, you know what you are saying is probably or definitely false but when you are bullshitting someone, you just don't know if it's definitively true.

This is obviously a false statement, because once you expose bullshit to the ones who provide it, they never go back and say "oh sorry, I did not know it was not true", which makes them de facto liars and they are always well aware of it.

I can't speak for everyone but if someone points out I said something incorrect, I generally respond well to it. Whether I am 100% sure about it or making assumptions, unless I have definitive evidence on hand to make a counterpoint, there's not really a good way to avoid making a fool of yourself other than just honestly listening to what the person has to say.

I may not agree with what they are saying but I might as well take it to heart and reconcile the difference between my and their points after the discussion. In practice I find that assuming Occam's razor works wonders in discussions. In these discussions one of us is wrong but very rarely is it malicious in intent and to be entirely honest, in a professional environment I would rather be wrong than those I am working with/over/under being wrong.

Note: I should clarify that I am by no means a paragon of virtue and open-mindedness and I don't mean to imply that in my post. I have struggled with getting caught up on certain ideas in the past and still struggle with it but I try my best to step back at each chance I get to think "Why do things not add up? What am I missing and why am I stupid for missing it?". It works surprisingly well at knocking the senses back into you.

oh, i didn't mean "besides the point" legally or morally! lying is lying (though @jacoblambda makes a great point in a sibling comment), it's just useful to distinguish this specific kind for some purposes

>using deceptive language as a tool to raise capital is extremely unethical

Isn't it also the most common method, used in 99% [1] of cases?

[1] Estimation, actual number may vary.

Everyone expects startup pitches to be over-inflated and over-confident. Because something is wrong (e.g, the entrepreneur is dispassionate) if they aren't. Which sets up this "they have to be full of themselves, but it's meaningless and no measure of their true ability" situation. It's odd.

I think it's more "if they dont care they'll quit when it gets hard" thinking.

You don't need to express over-confidence to deeply care about something. Everyone has their own way of expressing emotional investment.

I know you don't need to laugh to think something is funny but to most people observing you that's the measure needed.

Bullshitting is priming someone to agree with you even though they have reasonable doubts. When trump implies that a Chinese reporter may have ties to the Chinese government it’s not something that has any evidence behind it, but he’s basically making your subconscious engage with the idea (as even a low percentile chance could be true). Then, he applies the same to the pitch he’s making.

something like "fake it until you make it"

Convincing bullshit is often a single truth stretched thin in a logically consistent manner.

A bullshitter, for instance, might know nothing about Picasso or cubism or even art. But if he knows about continental Europe in the 1900s, he can bullshit his way into convincing someone similarly ignorant that Picasso's Blue Period was, indeed, a reflection of Europe in the wake of WW1 (never mind that the Blue Period was years older).

It's not true, but it takes a truth and stretches it in a logical direction to be convincing.

> as long as it gets you to invest in Uber for cats :)

Where do I sign up ?!

i think i've read this at some point but taking a quick look to refesh myself, i was struck on the first page by the word procrustean, which apparently means something like "rigidly but arbitrarily specified"[0], possibly obliquely related to hard-shelled sea creatures. neat word.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procrustes#Cultural_references

It's from Procrustes, the guy who chopped your feet off to make you fit in the bed in greek myth. You find Procrustean analysis in mathematics, where you try and find the closest approximating matrix with a certain property to another given matrix (like it is a rotation matrix etc).

Procrustes was really one of the first slasher horror villains.

Try reading AntiFragile. You will be very sick of that word by the time you finish the book.

GA Cohen wrote "Deeper into Bullshit" as a sort-of reply to Frankfurt, which drew attention to what I find the more interesting kind of bullshit, namely pseudo-academic and/or pseudo-technical bullshit. This, Cohen sensitively observes, is always found to have the property of "unclarifiability" - which is just exactly on the money. Very much worth the read. Frankfurt published a reply to it, as well, as I recall.

http://www.professorsapp.com/cohen--further-into-bullshi.pdf

Thanks! Here is a longer/complete version of Cohen's article, along with Frankfurt's reply.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/592b5bbfd482e9898c67f...

I have this in hardcover; it’s tiny, but eminently useful and a conversation piece on my desk at work.

So what about the famous subtype of bullshit which is obviously false but which is accepted for its entertainment value.

Management?

“Whoo-oop! I'm the old original iron-jawed, brass-mounted, copper-bellied corpse-maker from the wilds of Arkansaw!—Look at me! I'm the man they call Sudden Death and General Desolation! Sired by a hurricane, dam'd by an earthquake, half-brother to the cholera, nearly related to the small-pox on the mother's side! Look at me! I take nineteen alligators and a bar'l of whiskey for breakfast when I'm in robust health, and a bushel of rattlesnakes and a dead body when I'm ailing! I split the everlasting rocks with my glance, and I squench the thunder when I speak! Whoo-oop! Stand back and give me room according to my strength! Blood's my natural drink, and the wails of the dying is music to my ear! Cast your eye on me, gentlemen!—and lay low and hold your breath, for I'm bout to turn myself loose!”

― Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi

“I went camping with Brasky, his wife, and his daughter Debbie! Debbie Brasky. She’s 7-years-old, goes about 3’5″, 55 pounds. So, I’m in the back of a pickup with Bill Brasky and a live deer! Well, Brasky, he grabs the deer by the antlers, looks at it and says, ‘I’m Bill Brasky! Say it!’ Then he squeezes the deer in such a way that a sound comes out of its mouth – ‘Billbrasky!’ It wasn’t exactly it, but it was pretty good for a deer!”

It's like you're narrating my dreams!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tall_tale

Kayfabe: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22796845

Important in professional wrestling and Anglosphere politics.

> and Anglosphere politics.

Most politics, really. Take a look at Rodrigo Duterte, the President of the Philippines, or the guys in charge of Malaysia, or much of the grandstanding and propaganda surrounding the PM of India. Plenty of pure BS in Italian politics, and if you want to go back a bit, the rest of Europe.

Grandiose speeches and pandering aren't exclusive to the Anglo world.

> where the truth simply wasn't important

That's a criteria that should be agreed upon by both parties; otherwise to the person recieving the "bullshit" it's indistinguishable from a lie.

Edit: where did I make a moral statement? Let's call a spade a spade: we're talking about "potentially false speech". If it's a false speech where the receiving party thinks the truth is important, then from their perspective they were lied to regardless of what the speaker thinks.

Not every useful distinction need be relevant to moral judgement.

Bullshit is different than lying, but that doesn't mean anyone is arguing that it's moral. The fact that the listener might be led to believe something false is just one negative aspect of bullshit.

"Should" generally gets read as moral, especially when you bring in a comparison to lying, which is clearly a moral issue.

I think Hacker News needs to believe that bullshit and lying are different things.

Why do you think that?

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