1. Bullshit as a practical strategy for self‐deceptive narrators.
- Author
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Howe, Leslie A.
- Subjects
- *
COMMUNIST self-criticism , *DISCUSSION , *SOCIAL problems , *APPLIED sociology - Abstract
This paper argues that bullshit is a practical resource for self‐deceiving individuals, or those who merely prefer to avoid self‐examination, insofar as it is able to provide a mask for poor doxastic hygiene. While self‐deception and bullshit are distinct phenomena, and bullshit does not cause self‐deception, bullshit disrupts the capacity to interrogate the motivational biasses that fuel deception. The communicative misdirection engaged in by ordinary social bullshitters is applied reflexively by the self‐deceiver to distort, evade, and obfuscate the self‐deceiver's self‐accounting. This discussion presupposes a broadly narrative approach to self‐awareness and discusses how a motivated susceptibility to bullshit offers an explanation how our reports about ourselves can be frequently at odds with reality, and suggests that a complacency about rational validation of belief outside of self‐certainty, i.e., the prevalence of bullshit, is even more of a threat than Frankfurt thought it to be. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2022
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