Bullshit, deception and sincerity

Abstract

Forty years ago, Harry Frankfurt published the first systematic study of the bullshit phenomenon. The purpose of this article is to collect much of what has been said in the discussion that followed this publication, with several purposes: (i) to clarify how the bullshitter’s lack of commitment to or interest in the truth should be understood; (ii) to argue that a necessary condition for bullshit to exist is an intention to deceive the audience; and (iii) to propose a new characterization of bullshit that includes a clause about the context of its emission, thus filling a void that has led to many of the debates in recent years about this phenomenon.