Hume, David
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
A Treatise of Human Nature
Hussein, Saddam
Huxley, Aldous
Eyeless in Gaza
Ibsen, Henrik
Hedda Gabler
The Wild Duck
if-then reasoning, and framing effects
information cocoons
inquiry
definition of
as social activity
inquisitorial legal systems
inspirational stories, and truth
intellectual expertise, role of, in resisting bullshit
Intelligent Design (ID) movement
as bullshit
and concern for truth
and creationism
as “getting away with something”
goals of
disguising
successive reinvention of
Iraq war, official reasons for
irony, impossibility of
Ishiguro, Kazuo
The Remains of the Day
James I, King
Johnson, Philip
Darwin on Trial
on modernism
Jones, John E.
Kant, Immanuel
Kennedy, Edward
Kennedy, George A.
Keynes, John Maynard
Kierkegaard, Søren
Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District
Kuhn, Thomas
Laden, Osama bin
Lakatos, Imre
language
pragmatic aspects of
semantics of
law, as cousin of rhetoric
Leary, Timothy
Leno, Jay
Leroy, J.T.
letters of reference, as bullshit genre
liars. See also bullshit: and lies
goal of
tactic of
Limbaugh, Rush
Loman, Willy (character)
logical positivism
on metaphysics
on unity of science
Lomborg, Björn
The Skeptical Environmentalist
Luther, Martin
MacKinnon, Catharine
Mamet, David
McCarthy, Joseph
McLean v. Arkansas
McLuhan, Marshall
Mele, Alfred
Self Deception Unmasked
Mencken, H.L.
method of common sense
Meyer, Stephen
Mill, John Stuart
Miller, Arthur
Miller, William Ian
on apology
Faking It
on politeness
Moore, G.E.
Principia Ethica
Nagel, Thomas
narrative, as structuring understanding
Newton, Isaac
Principia Mathematica
Nietzsche, Friedrich
Thus Spake Zarathustra
on Truth
Non-Bullshit Marxism Group
No-True-Scotsman Move
Nussbaum, Martha
Oberst, Conor
Olbrechts-Tyteca, Lucy
The Onion
“open society,”
Orwell, George
Nineteen Eighty–Four
Pacino, Al
Pascal, Blaise
Pascal, Fania
Peirce, C.S.
Penny, Laura
Your Call Is Important to Us: The Truth about Bullshit
Perelman, Chaim
performative bullshit
Perry, William
personality disorders
and bullshit
effect on social relations
distortion in
in DSM–IV
maladaptiveness in
rigidity in
and self–distraction
types of
persuasive definition (PD)
backfiring of
and change of sense or reference
disguised argument in
and semantic negligence
and tone
persuasive quasi-definition (PQD)
changing tone in
philosophy
as anti-bullshit
and bullshit
semantic studies in
philosophy of language
intension and extension in
sense, reference, and tone in
Pinker, Stephen
How the Mind Works
Plagiary (academic journal)
Plato
The Republic
on rhetoric
on Truth
politeness, role of
politicized science
and lack of universal standard of proof
Popper, Karl Raimund
pornography
Model Law definition of
positivism
postmodernism
pragmatists, philosophical
on truth
Pratchett, Terry
product placement
professional bullshit
and pseudo-value
pseudoscience, as bullshit
pseudo-sentences
pseudo-statements
public discourse, debasement of
rape, changing definitions of
realism, philosophy of
redefinition, low and high
Reid, Thomas
reliability, as bullshit concept
republic of philosophia
rhetoric
as associated with bullshit
contemporary study of
as examining effects of language
learning
as metalinguistic
as misunderstood discipline
rhetorica docens
rhetorica utens
Rich, Frank
risk aversion
Rorty, Richard
Ruse, Michael
Russell, Bertrand
Schiappa, Edward
Schudson, Michael
science
inquiry in
lack of universal standard of proof in
and policy-making
confusion over
difficulty of
and context
science-policy interface, bullshit in
scientific attitude
scientific fraud
scientific method
and distrust of authority
self-bullshitting
and personality disorders
and self–distraction
self-deception
and inflated self-image
paradox of
semantic diligence
semantic negligence
and backfire
semantics
September group
sham reasoning
as different from bullshit
“Shut Up” (song)
sincerity, impossibility of
Singer, Fred
Singer, Peter
skepticism, philosophical
Socrates
Sokal, Alan
Sophists
split-brain patients
confabulation in
Stevenson, Charles
Stewart, Jon
Stoic view, of emotions
Strauss, Leo
Thouless, Robert
tone, in language
Tonight Show (TV show)
truth
as fatiguing
as offense
pluralism of
as situational
value of, to good relationships
truth-lie dichotomy, as oversimplified
Unitarianism
university mission statements, bullshit in
Utilitarianism
Vienna Circle
as anti-bullshit
“Scientific World-Conception” (manifesto)
Wason selection tasks
and framing effects
‘we are waging a war on terror’, parsing the mec
hanism of
Weber, Max
Wilde, Oscar
Wilson, E.O.
Winfrey, Oprah
Wittgenstein, Ludwig
bullshit in
Woolf, Leonard
word of mouth advertising
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Zola, Émile
ALSO FROM OPEN COURT
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1
“On Bullshit” first appeared as an essay in The Raritan Review VI:2 (1986), and was then reprinted in Frankfurt’s The Importance of What We Care About (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), pp. 117–133. In 2005, “On Bullshit” was published as the book, On Bullshit (Princeton: Princeton University Press). Throughout Bullshit and Philosophy, all references to On Bullshit are to the 2005 edition.
2
Among the many books critical of the second Bush administration are several by former Washington insiders and United Nations officials who offer first-hand accounts of alleged manipulations of intelligence used to promote the Iraq war. There is, for example, Richard A. Clarke’s Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror (New York: Free Press, 2004); John W. Dean’s Worse than Watergate: The Secret Presidency of George W. Bush (New York: Little, Brown, 2004); Scott Ritter and Seymour Hersh’s Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the UN and Overthrow Saddam Hussein (New York: Tauris, 2005); and Hans Blix’s Disarming Iraq (New York: Pantheon, 2004).
3
René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy: With Selections from the Objections and Replies (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 12. Emphasis in original.
4
David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1993), p. 114.
5
Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung. Der Wiener Kreis. Translated as The Scientific Conception of the World. The Vienna Circle, and reprinted in S. Sarkar, ed., The Emergence of Logical Empiricism from 1900 to the Vienna Circle (New York: Garland, 1996), p. 321.
6
Rudolf Carnap, “Überwindung der Metaphysik durch Logische Analyse der Sprache,” Erkenntnis 2 (1932): pp. 219–241, translated as “The Elimination of Metaphysics through Logical Analysis of Language” in A.J. Ayer, ed., Logical Positivism (New York: The Free Press, 1959), pp. 60–81.
7
Originally published in S. Buss and L. Overton, eds., Contours of Agency: Essays on Themes from Harry Frankfurt (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press), pp. 321–339. Reproduced as Chapter 8 of Bullshit and Philosophy. Throughout Bullshit and Philosophy, all references to “Deeper Into Bullshit” are to the work as it appears in this volume.
8
Frankfurt himself has also replied briefly to Cohen: “Reply to G.A. Cohen,” in Contours of Agency, pp. 340–44. Here Frankfurt arguably cedes ground to Cohen’s critique, but maintains the significance of the intention-oriented bullshit he defined. Truth-indifferent bullshit, Frankfurt insists, much more than the kind of academic obscurity Cohen targets, threatens our “respect for the distinction between the true and the false” on which the very “conduct of civilized life” depends (p. 343).
9
The essay is in The Collected Essays, Journalism, and Letters of George Orwell, Volume 4 (Harcourt, Brace, 1968), pp. 127–140.
10
G.A. Cohen, “Deeper into Bullshit,” Chapter 8 in this volume, p. 118.
11
See Frankfurt’s “Reply to G.A. Cohen,” in Contours of Agency, pp. 340–44.
12
Thanks to my colleague Erich Freiberger, who got me started on this topic, and my wife Tonia Cook Kimbrough, who improved an earlier draft and, in general, calls bullshit whenever I have it coming.
13
Oprah Winfrey, January 11th, 2006, during a CNN broadcast of the Larry King Show.
14
The Oprah Winfrey Show, January 26th, 2006.
15
The difference between what Frankfurt cites as Wittgenstein’s reaction to suspected bullshit, with what I will claim is Moore’s, is instructive.
16
The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell (London: Allen and Unwin, Volume 1, 1967), p. 61.
17
Sowing: An Autobiography of the Years 1880–1904 (London: Hogarth, 1960), pp. 110–131.
18
Keynes, Two Memoirs (New York: Hart-Davis, 1949), p. 85
19
“Hedonism,” in Tom Regan, ed., The Elements of Ethics (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1991), p. 41
20
“My Early Beliefs,” in Two Memoirs (pp. 88–100). But Woolf takes exception to some aspects of Keynes’s recollections. D.H. Lawrence, mentioned in the passage, had met the young men at Cambridge at the turn of the century and was violently disgusted by what he thought was their lack of reverence, an interesting connection, conceptually, to the topic here.
21
Moore’s “A Defence of Common Sense” was originally published in 1925 in J.H. Muirhead, ed., Contemporary British Philosophy (London: Allen and Unwin).
22
On Bullshit, pp. 60–61.
23
Frankfurt was interviewed on WBUR’s “On Point” (17th February, 2005).
24
A useful introduction to the ID movement and its critics is Robert T. Pennock, ed., Intelligent Design Creationism and Its Critics (Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2001).
25
Philip Johnson, Darwin on Trial (Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 1991). For writings on “complexity” and related concepts in ID theory, see those by either Michael Behe or William Dembski (readily accessible on the internet).
Bullshit and Philosophy Page 32