Different Kinds and Aspects of Bullshit Hans Maes and Katrien Schaubroeck, In Bullshit and Philosophy, 2006

Some excerpts from Bullshit and Philosophy to kick off discussion I offer these quotations because they were lines that struck me as interesting and important in exploring what BS is and how it functions. I will present these to you with the hope that you have reactions to these quotes. But first, I have some questions for you. Please feel free to react as you wish.

Question—take your time and think of your response. What is the essential difference between Frankfurt BS and Cohen BS? Hint: One is focused on a state of mind and the other on the text (p. 180)

Indifference to truth is not the only ingredient of bull; In a bull session, according to Frankfurt, people try out ideas without it being assumed that they are committed to what they say; Bull sessions are not bullshit; Bull sessions are not bullshit because there is no pretence that what they say and what they believe is sustained; Bullshit always involves a form of pretence or deceit; This is the second essential ingredient of bullshit; Harry Frankfurt on BS The Bull Session

Frankfurt on BS For Frankfurt the bullshitter essentially deceives people about his enterprise; What he cares about is for example what people think of him or what his motive is; What the orator represents is not a particular state of affairs but rather his particular state of mind; The truth-value of his statements is of but marginal interest to him; Something like winning votes is his prime concern; He does not admit this openly; For Frankfurt, to misrepresent what one is up to is an “indispensably distinctive characteristic” of the bullshitter, making it as central to the concept of bullshit as the tendency for indifference as to how things really are; Hence, Frankfurt’s view that bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies; That is, bullshit has no concern for the truth and at least the liar does;

A Different Take on Bullshit Referring back to the incident where Pascal remarked about feeling like a dog run over, is arguably not bullshit because Pascal is not trying to deceive anyone; There is no fakery or phoniness involved; In many conversations , it’s not so important what one is saying, but rather that one is saying something and talking to someone. It is about making the other feel comfortable, for instance, and not about trying to get things right (p. 175).

More on a Different Take on BS Maes & Schaubroeck say that Frankfurt is puzzled by the fact that “our attitude toward bullshit is generally more benign than our attitude toward lying” and leaves it to the reader to figure out why this is so; Maes & Schaubroeck think the asnwer is not so difficult. They say that in many circumstances the concern for truth and accuracy is not—and should not be—our primary concern; It shouldn’t be when someone is in pain and in need of comforting; A bit of bullshit from time to time might even be a good thing, e.g., bantering;

Bullsit may not be such a Bad Thing Maybe we should look upon bullshitting as a means to making contact with others or to keep the conversation going, a source of warmth; If we were always focused on the truth, conversations would be fatiguing; As Oscar Wilde said: “The truth is rarely pure, and never simple.” Polite formulas such as “nice to see you” are not meant as a report of my true feelings;

A Different Kind of Bullshit: Cohen Bullshit1 For Frankfurt, the most distinctive feature of bullshit is situated in the speaker’s state of mind; However, an utterance often qualifies as bullshit purely as a result of certain of its objective features independent of the speaker’s stance; This suggests there is another kind of bullshit that we need to explain not by reference to the state of mind of the producer but rather by pointing to to certain salient features of the “product” itself; This is the basic idea of Cohen’s response to Frankfurt; 1 G. A. Cohen, Deeper into Bullshit, In Bullshit & Philosophy, 2006.

Cohen Bullshit Cohen is most interested in academic bullshit; This sort of bullshit cannot be explained by reference to the indifference or insincerity of the producer; Often academic bullshit is the result of honest, academic efforts; What is missing in these efforts is the truth, not the state of mind of the producer but with connection to the text; For Cohen it is the unclarifiable unclarity of the texts that accounts for it being bullshit; The unclarifiable text is incapable of being rendered clear;

Does Frankfurt & Cohen Bullshit Account for Pseudoscientific Bullshit? No; Neither provides an appropriate explanation for this form of bullshit; Pseudoscientists typically have a firm and sincere belief in their practice; They go to great lengths to prove the truth of the doctrines they endorse; They are not indifferent to the truth; So Frankfurt’s definition does not seem to apply;

Does Frankfurt & Cohen Bullshit Account for Pseudoscientific Bullshit? Cohen’s definition also does not seem to explain pseudoscience because the predictions and statements of pseudoscience are often very specific and explicit as opposed to unclear and unclarifiable; The bullshit of pseudoscientists is at least as damaging and therefore as deserving of scrutiny as the bullshit produced by advertisers and academics; Yet pseudoscience bullshit is not covered by either Frankfurt or Cohen;

A Final Thought—your reactions, please. Perhaps in ordinary use of the concept bullshit we are not consistent and that is why firm definitions or theories of bullshit do not hold; Maybe in the case of pseudoscience we use bullshit to mean “not correct” or “I don’t agree”.