Philosophy of BS

Interesting book I came across at nearly 3am the day of my calculus midterm:

On Bullshit Harry G. Frankfurt
FROM THE PUBLISHER

One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit. Everyone knows this. Each of us contributes his share. But we tend to take the situation for granted. Most people are rather confident of their ability to recognize bullshit and to avoid being taken in by it. So the phenomenon has not aroused much deliberate concern. We have no clear understanding of what bullshit is, why there is so much of it, or what functions it serves. And we lack a conscientiously developed appreciation of what it means to us. In other words, as Harry Frankfurt writes, "we have no theory."

Frankfurt, one of the world's most influential moral philosophers, attempts to build such a theory here. With his characteristic combination of philosophical acuity, psychological insight, and wry humor, Frankfurt proceeds by exploring how bullshit and the related concept of humbug are distinct from lying. He argues that bullshitters misrepresent themselves to their audience not as liars do, that is, by deliberately making false claims about what is true. In fact, bullshit need not be untrue at all.

Rather, bullshitters seek to convey a certain impression of themselves without being concerned about whether anything at all is true. They quietly change the rules governing their end of the conversation so that claims about truth and falsity are irrelevant. Frankfurt concludes that although bullshit can take many innocent forms, excessive indulgence in it can eventually undermine the practitioner's capacity to tell the truth in a way that lying does not. Liars at least acknowledge that it matters what is true. By virtue of this, Frankfurt writes, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth thanlies are.

Seems like a book that I would've loved to write. Cause I know so much about the topic in question :)

soliloquy of a moment

the quicksand of destruction beckons
a lonely solemn tune hymned by the last butterflies
while violins scream from shadows
from my hand grows an innocent, child-like flower
it shies away from God revealed
petal's tear off themselves from their home
fall to the ground and wish they weren't born
my hand closes to hide the remains

scared little child with diamond eyes
a ray of hope shines through
as the movement nears the end
the last notes are being played
and light abruptly reveals its fallacy
for us to witness
the eyes lose purpose; same as with the rest
knowledge remains
an implicit understanding and an acceptance
denial is of the past
the soul displays its burden
it weeps for the story it contained within
a silent passenger for so long
haunted sounds it begged to plead
a solemn oath became its destiny

the sun takes its last decent
yet to the few aware it has no decent
the end of is as the beginning of
time
is as the moment contained in a ballerina's last step
no rise, no decent
it dances a separate path
a separate melody of divine rhymes
which we ourselves journey around
eventually returning to our home
wishing we weren't born
the moment before we tear ourselves off
and have our remains cared for
in the gentlest of hands

for we remain forever
in the gentlest of hands