"On Bullsh^t"

[arteom]

Henry Frankfurts "On Bullsh^t"

A very interesting read about the differences between lying and bullsh^t.

" Her statement is grounded neither in a belief that it is true nor, as a lie must be, in a belief that it is not true. It is just this lack of connection to a concern with truth — this indifference to how things really are — that I regard as of the essence of bullsh^t."

How much do you bullsh^t in your daily life?

At the moment I work in retail as a salesman so it is kind of my job.

[jgk3]

Re: "On Bullsh^t"

Here's a good point to consider, concerning essentialism (the idea that every phenomenon/thing has an essence, leading us to ponder about the meaning of words, etc...) ...

Our language system is suited to provide meaning/insight by using words, or rather combinations of them, to describe a particular idea. However, when we start to run this process of describing to provide meaning/insight for a piece of the tools themselves that are necessary for this process, i.e. words themselves, then we're just running in circles... Besides, if bullxxxx was an unchangeable concept with a distinctive essence in the world... I wonder how well you'd fare in finding its exact cognate in other languages! To argue that this search is useless would be to say that only people who use the English language, are capable of bullxxxxting, calling bullxxxx on someone, etc!

Think about it, the "essence" of a word is prone to change throughout its period of usage by humans. Look at the word faithful for example... Traditionally, the word faith seems to have something to do with putting your trust in something/someone, and so being faithful would make sense to mean "to have this trust in something/someone". However, in modern day usage, faithful, far more often than not, seems to have something to do with not cheating on your partner! So tell me, what happened to the essence of the word faithful as its usage changed?

Different contexts for different words can appear overtime that did not exist in the mind of anyone priorly, and so this whole search for finding essence in a word, or rather, finding the truthful answer to an argument about the differences between bullxxxx and lies, tell us more about the individuals who are debating them than they tell us about anything in objective reality.

So... bullxxxx can mean anything you want it to mean, and trust me, we have no shortages of uses for that word.

so, I'll conclude with this... the idea that words/ideas have an essence to them, is....












....you guess it: Bullxxxx!

[zourna]

Re: "On Bullsh^t"

Think about it, the "essence" of a word is prone to change throughout its period of usage by humans. Look at the word faithful for example... Traditionally, the word faith seems to have something to do with putting your trust in something/someone, and so being faithful would make sense to mean "to have this trust in something/someone". However, in modern day usage, faithful, far more often than not, seems to have something to do with not cheating on your partner!

so, I'll conclude with this... the idea that words/ideas have an essence to them, is.......you guess it: Bullxxxx!

Bullxxxx! ))

First, I read no differences in the essence of what you put in words to describe the instance of faith in both of the above stated examples. The context, however varies.

Second, one assigns words to properties that exist in both realms; of thoughts (abstarct) or of palpable nature. So saying that words have no essence to them, in this very context, ammounts to saying that the very thing that you labeled does not exist to begin with, which is absurd.

No hard feelings ey, jgk3? just kidding there

[jgk3]

Re: "On Bullsh^t"

how is it absurd to suggest that an abstract idea, like faithfulness, cannot be found in the real world (palpable nature)?

The idea of faithfulness, like the idea of a house, car, plant, etc... are ecologically viable constructs of our own minds. We, as individuals, give them an essence, and it is likely that no two human being can give the exact same "essence" to a particular "thing in the world", based on our different experiences. It's just that thanks to the fact that we're human, we tend to experience things in a similar, but not perfectly identical way, and so we are able to relatively refer to the same things.

About the first point though, what is this idea of "essence" worth if you exclude the property of how it generates new "essences" in different contexts?

anyway, I have fun with these debates every now and then. I guess now that my school is over, I can see how well I've retain the concepts I learned in cognitive science.