Karen Bennett (Philosophy, Princeton) reports that Harry Frankfurt is scheduled to be on _The Daily Show_, presumably promoting his book “On Bullshit”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691122946/ref=nosim/caoineorg-20. The date is now set to be March 14, though that doesn’t seem to be absolutely certain. Non-philosophers should feel free to be less overjoyed with excitement at a philosopher getting this much attention, but I think it’s rather fun, and that episode won’t end up being one of the _Daily Shows_ that I miss – or fastforward through the interview.
UPDATE: Scott McLemee has a nice review of “On Bullshit”:http://insidehighered.com/index.php/mla/views/intellectual_affairs__4, together with a discussion of Gerry Cohen’s reply, at Inside Higher Ed.
{ 22 comments }
Sven 02.21.05 at 5:45 pm
Frankfurt was on NPR’s On Point last week. The audio is available on the Web.
Strange Doctrines 02.21.05 at 5:59 pm
“that doesn’t seem to be absolutely certain”
When the topic is philosophy, there is no room for absolute certainty. At least, I don’t think there is.
Kieran 02.21.05 at 6:02 pm
When the topic is philosophy, there is no room for absolute certainty.
You obviously haven’t met many philosophers.
russkie 02.21.05 at 6:05 pm
What’s with the ” (Philosophy, Princeton) ” business?
Do Karen Bennett’s credentials somehow imply that she’s more reliable than TV Guide?
russkie 02.21.05 at 6:06 pm
What’s with the ” (Philosophy, Princeton) ” business?
Do Karen Bennett’s credentials somehow imply that she’s more reliable than TV Guide?
Chris Bertram 02.21.05 at 6:19 pm
When the topic is philosophy, there is no room for absolute certainty. At least, I don’t think there is.
Are you absolutely certain about that?
djw 02.21.05 at 6:22 pm
russkie, maybe because Frankfurt is emeritus at Princeton, so she probably knows him as such has inside information?
antoine 02.21.05 at 6:45 pm
Non philosophers – meaning people who are not philosphers or meaning philosophers who study non-philosophy?
FL 02.21.05 at 7:02 pm
I’ve talked to a few philosophers who are less than pleased that this is the philosophical topic in the popular press. Great– yet again we’re portrayed as those zany purveyors of cute intellectual tricks. “So, you’ve written a book on bullshit?” Har har har, etc. I guess I can kind of see this angle too.
ken 02.21.05 at 7:32 pm
Though it’s not as big a deal as being on the Daily Show or written up in the New York Times, Harry will aslo be on Philosophy Talk, also discussing BS. The date will be either April 19 or April 26th. Those shows happen during pledge week for our host station KALW. We will probably be giving away copies of Harry’s book — and lots of other goodies as well — as a thank-you to those who donate.
By the way in about a week, Philosophy Talk: The Blog will be up and running.
If you haven’t check out Philosophy Talk lately, do so.
Anderson 02.21.05 at 8:56 pm
I’ve talked to a few philosophers who are less than pleased that this is the philosophical topic in the popular press.
They would much prefer philosophers to be featured for abstruse speculations entirely devoid of practical, and in many cases intellectual, value?
I’m all for philosophers occupying the ivory tower and pursuing their metaphysics or what not, but to choose such esoteric specializations, and then mutter because they’re not the ones on The Daily Show, is a bit much.
FL 02.21.05 at 9:14 pm
Yes. Because so many philosophers think that everything is either
or
And, in fairness, the people who were grumbling weren’t suggesting that they should be on the daily show, or any other show.
Cryptic Ned 02.21.05 at 9:48 pm
And, in fairness, the people who were grumbling weren’t suggesting that they should be on the daily show, or any other show.
So they were saying that no philosopher should be on the Daily Show? Were they saying anything? Or was it just random grumbling?
Certain things are interesting to a wide audience, and certain things aren’t. That doesn’t mean they deserve to be, but it’s the truth.
FL 02.21.05 at 10:08 pm
Well, I don’t mean to be a pain in the ass about it, and this doesn’t really matter at all, but the grumbling was this sort of thing: “we actually do have some interesting and accessible things to say about matters of importance, dammit, but the goofy stuff keeps getting attention.” Like when muscle queens, rather than bland couples, get all the attention at Pride parades. But Frankfurt is a good philosopher, and if he’s enjoying himself, well, whatever.
Matt Weiner 02.21.05 at 10:25 pm
FL, I think that bullshit is important–but then, I work on a related topic. (I heard what you thought, and it’s been noted in the building.)
Seriously, it does seem like this is a case where Frankfurt can take philosophical methods and get interesting stuff about a topic that really is of general interest. Hopefully that’ll come across–I have some hopes that Stewart might refrain from the pure har-de-har-har angle.
Brian, I’m with Russkie. No need to separate the academic sheep from the goats in this setting.
Brian Weatherson 02.22.05 at 12:32 am
Ed note: Since this is not a thread on the Iraq war, I’m pruning those comments about that war. There are plenty of other threads to have those arguments in.
Strange Doctrines 02.22.05 at 12:42 am
“Are you absolutely certain about that?”
No, only reasonably certain. ;-}
Brian Weatherson 02.22.05 at 1:07 am
By the way, on Russkie’s point I certainly wasn’t trying to make any credentialling point. (Though in this case KB is better informed than the TV guide – it certainly doesn’t show interviewees three weeks in advance.) I just wanted to (a) give people a sense of who I was talking about rather than state a random name and (b) suggest why this person may have some knowledge of the situation. I don’t know why this could possibly cause such a fuss.
Aaron Swartz 02.22.05 at 2:07 am
Am I the only one who thinks this is all a little bizarre? A 20-year-old short essay which doesn’t appear to say much of any depth or substance is published as a book and the author, who decries people making stuff up to fill the space, is now paraded around all the various news shows essentially just that?
It would be one thing if Frankfurt had some concrete ideas on how to solve the problem, but instead we are subjected to the spectacle of a bunch of people bemoaning “bull” with no insight whatsoever.
seth edenbaum 02.22.05 at 3:45 am
What defines the opposite of bullshit?
Tell me that; then tell me what bullshit is.
This would all be well and good if the art of judgement were still a subject for philosophy, but as far as I can tell it’s been replaced by attempts to design mechanisms, logical and economic, that displace it entirely. It’s like space based missile defense: simplify the testing enough and you can prove you’ve modeled the world. And the whole sense that the subtleties of experience multiply in detail is lost.
—
M: “When I read a novel I know that it is a novel, a work of fiction. I do not believe that it is actually a true historical account BECAUSE I know it is a work of fiction. I may find novels and films ’believable’ or ’realistic’ but that is a whole order of difference away from believing it to be literally real or true.”
S: “You miss the point. Novels are descriptive [of the present] in that they are manifestations of the categories we choose to live by, rather than arguments for categories we would like to pretend we live by.
Stories are merely the invention of their author and as such are not true. But the language is the product of a community and a time, and the author’s use of that language is both a document and a fact.
The stories may not be true but the language is. That’s probably to complex for you I know. Philosophers are literalists these days. And they read children’s book for fun.”
—
I enjoy bullshit. It makes me laugh. And because I enjoy it, I’m not a rube.
The book is silly.
Zelph 02.22.05 at 3:25 pm
So is Bush lying or is he bullshitting?
A liar is engaged, obviously, in misrepresenting the truth about something. “Telling a lie is an act with a sharp focus,” as Frankfurt puts it. The liar must carefully determine just how much to distort, conceal, and fabricate in order “to insert a particular falsehood at a specific point in a set or system of beliefs, in order to avoid the consequences of having that point occupied by the truth.” For a liar to frame his lie halfway plausibly (let alone, get away with it), actually requires a fairly exacting degree of lucidity about truth and consequences.
seth edenbaum 02.23.05 at 1:16 am
Amazon blurb-
Jane Eisner, The Philadelphia Inquirer:
“The trouble with bullshit is that it undermines cultural respect for the truth. And what else does a democracy have? ”
It reads like Scalia.
And no one understands the problem?
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