“One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit,” wrote Harry Frankfurt in his seminal 1987 essay On Bullshit. He bemoaned the rise of the “bullshitter” as somebody who was not interested so much in promoting false truths, but as someone who had no interest in the truth.
Unlike the liar who intends to propagate a false idea, the bullshitter is indifferent to whether or not their bullshit is true or false. They have “no conviction about what the truth might be” and “pays no attention” to what the truth could be. Instead, their bullshit serves as a distraction from the whole enquiry of truth seeking itself.
