Anything That Sounds Too Easy or Too Simple Is Probably Bullshit
Or, how to handle, bypass, and ignore this art and its practitioners
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Today, let’s talk about bullshitting. I’m sure you’ve met someone at some point in your professional and personal life whom you couldn’t completely trust. There was something odd about this person — maybe they were too salesy, too chatty, too friendly, but never completely genuine or honest. Chances are this person was a bullshitter. While all of us engage in harmless bullshitting once in a while, some folks do it full time — folks who are worse than liars.
In the following paragraphs, I’ll discuss the philosophy (yeah that’s right) of bullshitting, why some people bullshit, how to deal with bullshitters, and how to keep ourselves from bullshitting. If you’re a big fan of Donald Trump (like I am), you’re gonna enjoy this.
Some people are prone to running their mouth, saying things without an iota of concern about its truth or falsehood because their goal isn’t really to communicate information. Their whole point is just to have something to say. This heedless attitude is the hallmark of what philosopher Harry Frankfurt calls Bullshit.
First, bullshitting is not lying. Even if both the liar and the bullshitter are trying to get away with something, lying is a conscious act of deception whereas bullshitting is unconnected to a concern for truth. It is impossible for someone to lie unless they think they know the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction.
Furthermore, a lie is necessarily false, but bullshit may happen to be a mix of truth and falsehood. Bullshitters are simply indifferent to facts, reasons, truth, and logic. This indifference is the true essence of bullshit.
And since bullshitters ignore truth instead of acknowledging and subverting it, bullshit is a greater enemy of truth than lies.
Some people are natural-born bullshitters. These folks are convinced that they must have opinions about anything and everything — so they make it a point to speak quite extensively about things they know nothing about. These are the folks who never do the work required to have an opinion.
The classic example is Donald Trump — whose disregard for self-consistency or facts pervades his speeches in a way that departs from the usual strands of bullshit we find in politics. His speeches have very little to do with what he says, and everything to do with the vibe or attitude he tries to cultivate. Trump doesn’t talk, he tawks.
Trump is neither on the side of the true nor on the side of the false. His focus — unlike an honest person or a liar — is not on the facts at all. His interest lies only in getting away with whatever he says. Like all professional bullshitters, he does not care whether the words that come out of his mouth align with reality or not. He just picks them out or makes them up to suit his purpose as he goes.
This clear contemptuous indifference of bullshitters towards reality is shocking — sometimes frightening. You see, a liar can at least be challenged or backed into a corner with enough evidence and careful reasoning. They might dance around a straight answer to deliberately mislead you, but with enough facts even the best lies can be pinned down and undressed.
A professional bullshitter, on the other hand, is immune to all the “inconveniences” of reality. For example, Trump happily lived in denial about the existence of the Coronavirus even when the US death toll broke records — thereby making the common folks bear the consequences of his bullshitting.
Now, Trump is the Sachin Tendulkar of bullshitting. He is in a league of his own, and has built his brand around bullshitting, so his purpose is understandable. But surprisingly, common folks like you and I also bullshit now and then.
Truth is, we often aren’t consciously aware of our lack of concern for evidence in some situations — especially when we are socially obligated to talk about things we know nothing about. Think “business” meetings. Speaking (albeit without adding any value) is good signalling in groups and some folks excel at it.
If I have to be completely honest, I have done it multiple times — not in meetings but in social gatherings. You see, I’m an introvert and I hate small talk (talks without any agenda), especially with strangers. Once in a while when I’m forced to “mingle” with random people I try to humour myself by bullshitting around. I ask “intelligent” questions, give “thoughtful” inputs, and “contribute” to the conversation without caring much about it.
In India, the most common topics in social gatherings revolve around politics in some form or the other, so it’s pretty easy to bullshit around. Other guests are most probably doing the same.
You see, we are very likely to bullshit when we expect to receive a social “pass” for doing so — which means we expect to get away with no repercussions.
But this type of bullshitting is harmless, and in some way beneficial as well. Like me, people often engage in some form of random bullshitting as part of a social bonding experience. This is harmless as long as it doesn’t encourage bullshitting while discussing important topics. For example, you’ll never see me bullshit when there’s an agenda. My circle of bullshitting is limited only to unnecessary small talks.
But occasionally, we have to take proactive measures to reduce the chances of somebody getting away with bullshitting, especially in high-stakes situations such as interviews. In such cases we often have to double down with a barrage of questions to figure out the depth of the person’s thoughts.
You see, someone who has done the work can present an answer or an idea at multiple levels. They will be able to go down to the nuts and bolts of a problem and also zoom out to see the big picture at the same time. If they are faking, they’ll get stuck somewhere. So yes, talking, questioning, and probing helps detect if somebody is bullshitting.
But you can’t question all bullshitters. How do you know if the leader of a state or a nation is bullshitting? Shrewd bullshitters can be virtually undetectable. As a rule of thumb, people who sell an easy answer to a hard problem are bullshitters. Think all self-help books, investment guides, or Trump building a wall to increase jobs. Anything that sounds too easy or too simple is probably bullshit.
Some classic examples can be found in India where several politicians and godmen have suggested simple methods such as taking a dip in the holy (yet extremely polluted) water of the Ganges, drinking “gaumutra” or cow urine, applying “gobar” or cow dung as a lotion on the body to fight off coronavirus. Although in their defence, I’m not exactly sure if it’s bullshitting or a sign of sheer stupidity.
All that is fine. But, what if we want to prevent ourselves from bullshitting? There may be instances when we want to engage in harmless bullshitting, but what if we want to prevent ourselves from bullshitting unknowingly so that we don’t waste other people’s time? Can we do something about it? You bet!
One approach I can think of is to figure out the values (or lack thereof) involved when you are engaged in a conversation. While conversing, speakers and listeners follow a set of unsaid maxims. What is said can be measured by quantity, quality, relevance, and manner.
Bullshitting is the act of breaking one or more maxims of conversation. For example, if the words convey not enough or too much information (quantity), are intentionally false or lack evidence (quality), are irrelevant to the current topic or issue (relevance), or are too obscure, ambiguous, or unnecessarily wordy (manner), there’s a good chance this is bullshit.
The bottom line is this. You don’t need to know the answers to all the questions in life. But don’t bullshit (yourself or others) that you do. Any smart person can spot an amateur bullshitter, and professional bullshitters either don’t scale or don’t work with smart folks in the long run. Be my guest if you are okay with that. Otherwise, if you don’t know something, just say you don’t know. You can always learn and get back. Don’t bullshit!
Interesting Finds
How to find time for learning? As you grow older, you have many responsibilities and at the end of the week, there may only be a few hours to learn. How do you find the time? Scott Young articulates four strategies: only have one project, make learning frictionless (by setting up your environment so you can get started immediately), integrate learning with your life (so that it fits within your existing work, social, or family pursuits), and remove time-wasting alternatives (by temporarily suspending any of the activities you normally spend time on). (Scott Young / Scott H Young)
There are two possible understandings of free speech: a political one and an expressive one. The political understanding is: we need the ability in society to freely and publicly speak about the broadest variety of issues with very little restriction. Then there’s an expressive argument: we have an intrinsic psychological need to express ourselves that should be free of social or political sanction. (John Ganz / Unpopular Front)
There are those who build and there are those who communicate. People who build work with a group of people whose job is to connect them with the information they need. Those connectors in turn work with people whose job is to collect that information in the first place. This pattern repeats throughout. The success of all these information connectors and collectors depends on precisely one skill: communication. (Andrew Bosworth / Boz)
We see faults in others that we remain blind to in ourselves. You criticise the splinter in your brother’s eye while ignoring the log in your own. But you are also more ready to forgive others for their faults than you are ready to forgive yourself for our own. (Meghan O’Gieblyn / The Paris Review)
When we are young, our skills tend to improve with age and experience. But once we are well into adulthood, it may start to feel as if it’s all downhill from there. With every advancing year, we become slightly more forgetful, somewhat slower to respond, a little less energetic. Yet, there is at least one important exception: in the emotional realm, older people rule supreme. (Tim Vernimmen / Knowable)
Quote to Note
“The greatest risks are never the ones you can see and measure, but the ones you can’t see and therefore can never measure. The ones that seem so far outside the boundary of normal probability that you can’t imagine they could happen in your lifetime—even though, of course, they do happen, more often than you care to realise.”
— Charles Wheelan, Naked Statistics
Timeless Wisdom
We achieve far more in the long run when we have slack. We are more productive when we don’t try to be productive all the time.
We waste the hours to prevent ourselves from wasting the years because those wasted hours are necessary to figure out if we’re headed in the right direction.
Being comfortable with not being 100% busy means we have time to think about whether we’re doing the right thing. Efficiency is the enemy.
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Send me tips, comments, questions, and novel ideas on bullshitting efficiently: abhishek@coffeeandjunk.com. 🤜🤛
Until next Sunday,
Abhishek 👋