Bullshit, Mr. Frankfurt!

Bullshit, Mr. Frankfurt!

by pongba (http://blog.youkuaiyun.com/pongba)

It was literally like stepping on a load of bullshit (at first I was going for “crap”, but then I thought it would be too impolite not to use the word “bullshit” you had proved so powerful in this book), Mr. Frankfurt, when I was reading your book “On Bullshit”. Yes, the name of the book painted quite a picture for me, didn’t it?

I was originally thinking you, as a Princeton philosopher, would impress me with some deep, to-the-point criticism of all the bullshitting nowadays. But I was wrong, the book is nothing but a pedantic etymological archeology, or what you might call “hot air”, which, by the way, you made it quite clear in the book, means below:

The reference in both definitions to "hot air" is more helpful. When we characterize talk as hot air, we mean that what comes out of the speaker's mouth is only that. It is mere vapor.

To be a little concrete myself. First you cited what Black meant by “humbug” and scrutinized its meaning. Then you compared it with the meaning of “bullshit”, trying to make a point which I don’t really get - are you trying to indicate that there’re certain sorts of sayings that can be categorized as bullshit and what those are can be found out by looking into the meaning of “humbug”? Maybe, but then what’s the use? To alert people that there’re words that are poisonous? But people already know that, don’t they? To specify the meaning of “bullshit”? I guess people already know that, for a long time, too. That’s why they invented the word “bullshit”, to attach a negative emotion to certain kinds of speeches. To me the elements of the definition you gave is pretty obvious. And you know what? I bet people all know what bullshit is, they can feel it, even though they may not be able to give a specific definition. Natural language works in a vague way; people define new word on an inductive basis. This has worked for hundreds of thousands of years.

The only value I can think of your argument has is to re-warn people that they should ascertain whether a speaker is trying to tell the truth as he/she thinks he/she knows or just trying to bullshitting his/her way through, which we, too, already know how to do.

Yet you rambled on for another 1/2 of the whole book to refine the definition of “bullshit”. You cited an anecdote about Wittgenstein and Pascal, just for the sake of proving that a bullshitter is one that doesn’t care whether what he/she says is true or false. Well, Mr. Frankfurt, everybody knows that; it’s so obvious. But maybe I was wrong; maybe you’re just trying to tell us that philosophy (well, philosophy according to you) is all about making simple things complicated and obscure.

After telling the obvious, you continued your little etymological journey, only this time you appealed to the dictionaries, the source of all the glorious authority. For Christ’s sake, give somebody else a chance, Mr. Frankfurt.

Then, after devoting another 1/3 of the book to comparing “bullshitting” to “lying”, to explaining what a “pure liar” means, and to a continued reiteration that the essence of “bullshit” is that the bullshitter doesn’t care about the truth, you finally arrived at a meaningful question - why is there so much bullshit?

Unfortunately, for the one useful question you posed in this book, you gave a superficial (that means “wrong”, Mr. Frankfurt) answer. First you attacked at the motivation of the crowds for expressing their mind. You “feel” that it’s because they feel obligated to have opinions and express them. This cheap short demonstrated nothing but your ignorance. People always want to say something about anything. There’s a deep force inside human mind compelling us to understand the world (i.e. everything), just as there’s one compelling us to make ourselves look smart. When it comes to expressing our minds, it’s almost solely for self-serving purpose (from covering the awkwardness to manipulating other minds). So yes, you’re right about one thing, people do that by their own propensities. Human beings are self-interested animals, Mr. Frankfurt; you can verify that anytime you want by asking yourself the one question “Why am I doing this?” (e.g. why are you writing the book, Mr. Frankfurt? Is it because it’s a pursuit of truth? But then why are you pursuing the truth?)

At the end of the book, instead of making a conclusion, you, again, pretentiously asserted, without giving any concrete - much less convincing - reason, that being sincere is no easier than being correct. Your argument goes thus: since we can’t know ourselves (be sincere) unless we know other things (be correct), we have to be correct before we can be sincere. This vacuous argument proves nothing. It surely sounds plausible, which all bullshit do. And people probably will buy it, as they do when it comes to bullshit, which is exactly why one can “bullshit his/her way through”. The reason the argument is flawed is that it failed to account for the fact that, to be sincere ourselves, we just have to pay attention to our emotions and always tell what we think is true. For example, when we feel awkward or embarrassed so that we feel the urge to say something to pass the moment, or to cover our ignorance, we should know that we’re just about to bullshit; when we feel like saying something just to sound smart, we’d better hold on for a second and exam our thoughts, for at least we can always try to tell the truth we’ve perceived (i.e. our truth). And that alone, Mr. Frankfurt, eliminates most bullshit.

As a simple fact, we, as human beings, usually don’t know the truths; and not a single one of us knows all the truths. But we can always encourage people to tell what they think is true, that is, to tell the truth, nothing but the truth. This wouldn’t help everybody become Socrates, but it’ll at least help one become a morally better person, thus making this world a much safer place to live.

Note that I’m not saying that being sincere is enough for everything. Fallacies may spread because of sloppy thinking. And sometimes it may cause dangers, or even disasters. But this is a different issue from that of morality (i.e. being sincere). For people to become clear thinkers, education is needed. In particular, critical thinking is required.

So, to put the two points together, first we have to be morally good people (i.e. to be sincere, or to tell what we think is true), and then we have to try to be good thinkers (i.e. to pursue the real truths).

Now let’s reconsider the last question posed at the end of the book: why is there so much bullshit?

It takes two kinds of materials to produce bullshit - the need to bullshit and the bullshit itself. Since we already know that people have always liked expressing their minds, it must be the latter factor that has changed.

I’m not one hundred percent sure, but with a little effort to ponder, I gathered it may be because people are having access to more and more information (thanks to the mass media and the internet), while not more skillful at critical-thinking. Here, by information, I mean convenient wisdoms, oversimplified reasonings, political non-senses that sound plausible, etc. which, combined with our simplified cognitive shortcuts and the tendency to repeat what others have said, can lead to all kinds of absurdities, ranging from fallacies to contradictory beliefs.

From this point of view, the definition of “bullshit” becomes clear:

Bullshit: to talk with an unjust motivation and an unsound argument (i.e. the reasoning structure is flawed or the “facts” he/she provided are faulty. Note: an unsound argument doesn’t necessarily mean the conclusion is false; it could be true, while the argument could still be unsound because the conclusion doesn’t logically follow the facts.)