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"On Bullsh*t" by Harry G. Frankfurt; Princeton University Press.
Let's add further casual definitions. Whatever publishers and broadcasters think will attract prosecutors or repel readers and viewers. Whatever a visiting boyfriend or girlfriend thinks will estrange the beloved's parents at first meeting. Whatever produces a mental image of your own Mom and Dad furiously shaking their fingers.
Linguistic scholars know that the distinction between obscene and non-obscene words, both of which evolve metaphorically from concrete descriptions, remains a matter of usage, custom, etiquette and happenstance rather than anything intrinsic to a word itself.
A word that sounds like "tuck -- a kindly thing we do to children every night -- relates to the Middle Dutch "fokken," to thrust, and appeared in reputable English dictionaries until the 18th century. The worst epithet one can hurl at a woman simply meant a "hollow space" in Middle English.
With that background, it's easy to understand the sudden liftoff of "On Bullsh*t" by retired Princeton University philosophy professor Harry G. Frankfurt.
In tame language that reflects his career as an analytic philosopher specializing in the ideas of Spinoza, Frankfurt argues that we "have no theory of" "bullbabble," no "structure of its concept," and need one. He then immediately lowers the goalposts. Acknowledging that because we use the word "quite loosely" and often "with no very specific literal meaning," he states that "no crisp and perspicuous analysis of its concept can avoid being procrustean" -- that is, falsely stretched or expanded to fit a precise definition.
He offers instead to be "helpful" rather than "decisive." But he immediately goes wrong because of those analytic instincts, which make one fonder of logical truth conditions than the messiness of life and language. Frankfurt cites the essay "The Prevalence of Humbug" by sainted, deceased analyst Max Black, and decides that the difference between "humbug" and "bullsh*t" is merely rhetorical (i.e., related to language) rather than "literal."
He thus announces that he will henceforth assume "there is no other important difference between the two."
That constitutes a misstep in two regards. It suggests that Frankfurt thinks "bulltripe" may also be a mere synonym of "drivel, balderdash, hogwash, horsefeathers" and a host of other "quaint equivalents," when these words in fact possess distinguishable histories. Second, it hints that Frankfurt will prove more procrustean than he admits, and less willing to listen to life and language than he might.
All told, Frankfurt's approach suffers from excessive privileging of what one might call an "internal point of view" -- that of the speaker of bullbunkum. That said, one can only applaud Frankfurt for, so to speak, dumping the discussion on a grateful public.
I bullrot you not.
ANALYST PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ELDERLY AND IGNORANT MAGISTRATE PHILOSOPHY PROFESSOR HARRY G. FRANKFURT MAX BLACK SPEAKER PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS BERTRAND RUSSELL Trending this week:
A Ph.D. discourses on meaning of B.S. | StAugustine.com
Search A Ph.D. discourses on meaning of B.S.
"On Bullsh*t" by Harry G. Frankfurt; Princeton University Press.
Let's add further casual definitions. Whatever publishers and broadcasters think will attract prosecutors or repel readers and viewers. Whatever a visiting boyfriend or girlfriend thinks will estrange the beloved's parents at first meeting. Whatever produces a mental image of your own Mom and Dad furiously shaking their fingers.
Linguistic scholars know that the distinction between obscene and non-obscene words, both of which evolve metaphorically from concrete descriptions, remains a matter of usage, custom, etiquette and happenstance rather than anything intrinsic to a word itself.
A word that sounds like "tuck -- a kindly thing we do to children every night -- relates to the Middle Dutch "fokken," to thrust, and appeared in reputable English dictionaries until the 18th century. The worst epithet one can hurl at a woman simply meant a "hollow space" in Middle English.
With that background, it's easy to understand the sudden liftoff of "On Bullsh*t" by retired Princeton University philosophy professor Harry G. Frankfurt.
In tame language that reflects his career as an analytic philosopher specializing in the ideas of Spinoza, Frankfurt argues that we "have no theory of" "bullbabble," no "structure of its concept," and need one. He then immediately lowers the goalposts. Acknowledging that because we use the word "quite loosely" and often "with no very specific literal meaning," he state
s that "no crisp and perspicuous analysis of its concept can avoid being procrustean" -- that is, falsely stretched or expanded to fit a precise definition.
He offers instead to be "helpful" rather than "decisive." But he immediately goes wrong because of those analytic instincts, which make one fonder of logical truth conditions than the messiness of life and language. Frankfurt cites the essay "The Prevalence of Humbug" by sainted, deceased analyst Max Black, and decides that the difference between "humbug" and "bullsh*t" is merely rhetorical (i.e., related to language) rather than "literal."
He thus announces that he will henceforth assume "there is no other important difference between the two."
That constitutes a misstep in two regards. It suggests that Frankfurt thinks "bulltripe" may also be a mere synonym of "drivel, balderdash, hogwash, horsefeathers" and a host of other "quaint equivalents," when these words in fact possess distinguishable histories. Second, it hints that Frankfurt will prove more procrustean than he admits, and less willing to listen to life and language than he might.
All told, Frankfurt's approach suffers from excessive privileging of what one might call an "internal point of view" -- that of the speaker of bullbunkum. That said, one can only applaud Frankfurt for, so to speak, dumping the discussion on a grateful public.
I bullrot you not.
ANALYST PRINCETON UNIVERSITY ELDERLY AND IGNORANT MAGISTRATE PHILOSOPHY PROFESSOR HARRY G. FRANKFURT MAX BLACK SPEAKER PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS BERTRAND RUSSELL Trending this week: