#53 – How to detect bullshit

By Scott Berkun, August 9, 2006

Everyone lies: it’s just a question of how, when and why. From the relationship saving “yes, you do look thin in those pants” to the improbable “your table will be ready in 5 minutes”, manipulating the truth is part of the human condition. Accept it now.

I’m positive that given our irrational nature and difficultly accepting tough truths, we’re collectively better off with some of our deceptions. They buffer us from each other (and from ourselves), avoid unnecessary conflicts, and keep the wonderful confusion of our psychologies tucked away from those who don’t care. White lies are the spackle of civilization, tucked into the dirty corners and crevices our necessary, but pretentiously inflexible idealisms create. Small lies prop up and support our powerful truths, holding together the insanely half honest, half false chaos that spins the world.

But lies, serious lies, should not be encouraged as they destroy trust, the binding force in all relationships. One particularly troublesome kind of lie is known as Bullshit (BS). These are unnecessary deceptions, committed in the gray area between polite white lies and complete malicious fabrications. BS is usually defined as inventions made in ignorance of the facts, where the primary goal is to protect oneself. The aim of BS isn’t to harm another person, although that often happens collaterally. For a variety of reasons BS can be hard to detect, which is why I’m offering this missive as a crash B.S. in BS detection. But be warned: to keep you on your toes there are several bits of BS tucked inside this essay which you will have to find for yourself.

Why people BS: a primer

The first lie in the Western canon comes from the same joyful tome as the first murders, wars and plagues: the Old Testament. Despite my distaste for trips into religious texts, this one has supreme tragicomic value.

To recap from the book of Genesis, God tells Adam and Eve not to eat fruit from the tree of knowledge, as pretty as it is, for they’ll die. He wanders off to do some unexplained godlike things, as gods are prone to do, leaving the very tempting, and non pit-bull or electrified fence protected, tree out for all to see. Meanwhile Satan slinks by and convinces Eve apples are good: so she and Adam have an apple snack (the bible refers to them only as fruit, apples are a western addition). God instantly returns, scolds Adam, who blames Eve; resulting in everyone, snakes, people and all, getting thrown out of Eden forever.

Please note that in this tale nearly everyone lied. God lied[1], or was deceptively ambiguous, about the apples (they weren’t fatal in any modern sense, as if i tell you reading this essay will kill you, you’d expect I mean sometime today – please read the footnote if you’re still pissed off so saying there are lies in this part of the bible). Satan misrepresents the apple’s power, and Adam, approximates a lie in his wimpy finger pointing to Eve. It’s a litany of deception and a cautionary tale: in any book that makes everyone look bad in just a few pages, is it really a surprise how the rest plays out?

People lie for three reasons; the first is to protect themselves. They may wish to protect something they want or need, a concept they cherish, or to prevent something they fear, like confrontation. There is often a clear psychological need motivating every lie.

A well known fib, “the dog ate my homework”, fits the BS model. In the desperate fear driven attempt not to be caught, children’s imaginations conceive amazing improbabilities. Fires, plagues, revolutions, curses, illnesses and absurd reinventions of the laws of physics and space-time have all been summoned by children around the world on the fateful mornings when they find themselves at school, sans-homework. It’s an emotional experience, this need to BS: as logically speaking, the stress of inventing and maintaining a lie is rarely easier than accepting the consequences of the truth.

Which leads to the second reason people lie: sometimes it works. It’s a gamble, but when it works, wow. Did you lie to your parents about girls, boys, fireworks, drugs, grades, or where you were till 2am on a school night? I sure did and still do. My parents still think I’m a famous painter / doctor / professor in London (shhh), and my best friend still believes his high school girlfriend and I didn’t get it on every time I borrowed his car[2]. Even my ever faithful dog Butch used to lie, in his way, by liberating trash from a house-worth of garbage cans, then hiding in his bed, hoping his lack of proximity to the Jackson Pollock of refuse that was formerly my kitchen would be indistinguishable from innocence.

Which gives us the third reason people lie, a truth saints and sinners have known for ages: we want to be seen as better than we see ourselves. Sadly, comically, we also believe we’re alone in both having this temptation, as well as the shame it brings with it (e.g. “We’re not alone in feeling alone“). The secret truth is everyone has moments of weakness: times when fear and greed melt our brains and we’re tempted to say the lies we wish were true. And for that reason the deepest honesty is found in people willing to admit to their lies, or their barely resisted temptations, and own the consequences. Not the pretense of the saints, who pretend, incomprehensibly, inhumanly, to never even have those urges at all.

Ok, enough philosophy: lets get to detection.

BS detection

The first rule of BS is to expect it. Fire detectors are designed to expect a fire at any moment: they’re not optimists. They fixate on the possibility of fires and that’s why they save lives. If you want to detect BS you have to swallow some cynicism, and add some internal doubt to everything you hear. Socrates, the father of western wisdom, based his philosophy around the recognition, and expectation, of ignorance. It’s far more dangerous to assume people know what they’re talking about, than it is to assume they don’t and let them prove you wrong. Be like Socrates: assume people are unaware of their own ignorance (including yourself) and politely, warmly, probe to sort out the difference.

The first detection tool is a question: How do you know what you know?

Throw this phrase down when someone force feeds you an idea, an argument, a reference to a study or over-confidently suggests a course of action. People so rarely have their claims challenged, that asking someone to explain how they know sheds light on whatever ignorance they’re hiding. It instantly diminishes the force of a BS driven opinion. It works well in response to the following examples:

  • “The project will take 5 weeks“. How do you know this? What might go wrong that you haven’t accounted for? Would you bet $10k on this claim? $100k?
  • “Our design is groundbreaking.” Really? What ground is that? And who, besides the designers/investors, has this opinion?
  • “Studies show that liars’ pants are flame resistant..” What studies? Who ran them and why? Did you actually read the study or a two sentence press clipping (poorly) explaining the results? Are there any studies that claim the opposite?

When you ask a flavor of “how do you know what you know?” often they can’t answer quickly. Even credible thinkers need time to sort through their logic, separating assumptions from facts: an an exercise that works in everyone’s favor.

Of course it’s fine to hear: “This is purely my opinion” or “It’s a guess, as we have no data”, but those are far weaker claims that most people, especially if they’re making stuff up, typically make. Identifying someone’s opinion as speculation, rather than fact, disarms the threat of most kinds of BS.

The second tool is also a question: What is the counter argument?
Anyone who has seriously considered something will have seen enough facts
to fit their current argument as well as alternative position: ask for them. It’s a grade school assignment, intended to show there are many reasonable ways to interpret the same set of facts. However, someone who is bullshitting you won’t have researched or thought through anything: they’re making things up. Asking for the counter argument will force them to either back up their position, or to end the discussion until they’ve done due diligence. (If they claim there is no counter argument, end the discussion. They are not only BS’ing you, they think you’re a moron).

Similarly useful questions include: Who besides you shares this opinion? What are your biggest concerns, and what will you do to address them? What would need to change for you to have a different (opposite) opinion?

Time & Pressure

A good thought holds together. Its solid conceptual mass maintains its shape no matter how much you poke, probe, test and examine. But BS is all surface. Like a magician’s bouquet of flowers, it’s pretty as it flashes past your eyes, but its absence of integrity become obvious when you hold it in your hands. Anyone creating BS knows this, and will tend towards urgency. They’ll resist reviews, breaks, consultations or the suggestion of sleeping on decisions before they’re made.

Use time & pressure, the third tool of BS detection, in your favor: never allow big decisions to be mismanaged to the point where they must be made urgently. Ask to withhold judgment for a day, and watch the response. Invite people with expertise you need but don’t have to participate in decisions to add intellectual and domain pressure (Hiring them if necessary. The $500 you pay a lawyer, accountant or consultant to review something effectively becomes a well spent BS insurance fee).

Be a leader in creating an environment unpleasant for BS. If everyone knows the gauntlet of friendly, but rigorous, intellectual curiosity claims must run through, BS will be discouraged while still in the minds of the tempted.

Confidence in reduction

Especially in business and technology, jargon and obfuscation hide huge quantities of BS. Inflated language is a technique of intimidation. The bet is that if you don’t understand what they’re talking about, you’ll feel stupid, or distracted, and give in to the appearance of their superior knowledge. This is, of course, entirely bullshit. To withstand BS you have to have an inner core of self-reliance, holding on to your doubts longer than the BS’er holds onto their charade.

For example:
Our dynamic flow capacity matrix has unprecedented downtime resistance protocols.

If you don’t understand what the hell this means, err on your own side. Don’t assume you’re missing something: assume they are. They’re either hiding something, communicating poorly, or don’t themselves understand what they’re talking about. BS deflating responses include:

  • I refuse to accept this proposal until I, or someone I trust, fully understands it.
  • Explain this in simpler terms I can understand (repeat if necessary).
  • Break this into pieces you can verify, prove, compare, or demonstrate for me.
  • Are you trying to say “our network server has a backup power supply?” If so, can you speak plainly next time?

Assignment of trust

The fourth tool of BS detection (derived from the rule of expecting BS) is careful assignment of your trust. Never agree to more than your trust allows. Who cares how confident they are: the question is how confident are you in them? It’s rare that there isn’t
time for trust to be earned. Divide requests, projects or commitments into pieces. It’s not offensive to refuse to take someone’s word if they have no history of living up to it before (especially if they’re trying to sell you something).

And trust can be delegated. I don’t need to trust you, if you’ve earned the trust of people I trust. Anyone skilled in the BS arts has obtained that skill through practice, diminishing the odds that many BS-proof people have been successfully deceived by them in the past. Nothing defuses BS faster than a collective of people that help each other detect and eliminate BS. If a team of people witnesses the complete evisceration of someone’s BS few will attempt it again: they’ll know your world is a BS free zone. Great teams and families help each other detect bullshit, both in others and themselves, as sometimes the real BS we need to fear
is our own.

Footnotes

[1] One popular interpretation of Genesis 2:17 is that God meant “you will be mortal” when he said “you will surely die”, so its not a lie – this is in line with the many who believe in the omnibenevolence of god or the perfect nature of the bible. While I question these positions, they are popular views and deserves mention. More to my point, in the context of Genesis, there is no reason Adam could know, when told by God he’d surely die, any of the interpretations of God’s words, or the symbolic meaning of all these things, we know now in the present.

[2] This is of course, complete bullshit. I have never lied to anyone ever.

The link about apples not being in Genesis was added on 3/6/2012. I’d known about this common erroneous assumption, but didn’t see the need to call it out until now.

The phrase, “or was deceptively ambiguous”, was added 9/25/2006.

The phrase “..they weren’t fatal in any modern sense… ” was added 6/30/2010

References

Photo credits:Bullfighting arena, Razorback’s Ozarks, Tricorder, Bulls for sale.

Leave a Comment / What do you think?

Your email is never published nor shared (comments policy).

164 thoughts on “#53 – How to detect bullshit”

  • Lee - July 19, 2010 at 11:24 am #

  • This is probably one of the best blog posts I have read in a while and that is no BS.

  • Reply
  • David - July 7, 2010 at 11:02 am #

  • I agree that God did not lie, mislead, dissemble, speak ambiguously or anything else of like nature. That which does not and never did exist is incapable of such behaviour. (Stand back and watch fireworks!). Why, instead of getting frothy about some biblical nonsense, don’t readers concentrate (and test) the message being given within the article itself?

  • Reply
  • Benjy - June 30, 2010 at 8:41 am #

  • Scott, In regard to the Genesis episode, Adam and Eve died spiritually (in their separation from God) as well as eventually a physical death. You talk about “curling up and dying “(in response to one of the comments), however, God did not give any timeframes, nor is/was He obliged to. He merely stated what would happen and it eventually did. He didnt say,”You will die in the next second after you eat the fruit” to justify your comment about it being BS. Its quite obvious that Adam couldnt have read Romans. I do think its curious that Adam didnt ask God for an explanation especially when you consider that he had ‘ownership’ of pretty much everything else he could see , but he didnt and there’s no use in conjecture. Imagining motives and intentions behind God’s statement and using that as a foundation for an article about BS is , ironically, in itself, a load of BS. At the end of all this, i’ve actually forgotten the rest of your article !! Pity considering that the rest of your posts are pretty good.

  • Reply
    • Scott Berkun - June 30, 2010 at 10:34 am #

    • Benjy: If I told you if you “when you put on your underwear tommorow morning, you’ll surely die”, would you think I mean instantly? Sometime that day? Or was simply making a vague commentary on your mortality?

      Casting aside what we know now, if you were Adam in the story, and someone told you eating a banana would kill you, what would you take it to mean?

      > Imagining motives and intentions behind God’s statement

      I don’t think I did this. Mostly it seems people criticizing me for not understanding the metaphoric meaning of the story and God’s intentions are using those meanings and intentions to make their arguments.

      My fundamental point is, from Adam’s perspective in the moment, God was at best ambiguous, and at worst deceptive. If being deliberately vague isn’t the same as a lie to you, I can accept that, but it’s not quite a useful truth either.

    • Reply
  • Wiseguy - June 9, 2010 at 10:10 am #

  • In reference to your ill-conceived theory as to the first Lie, here’s a thought for the sake of debate, purely. God did NOT lie, in fact, your literal representation due to lack of knwoledge on the matter is somewhat insulting, seeing as how the death was that of their innocence, because in eating the fruit they would know the difference between good and bad, they also realized that they were nude. Without this TRANSGRESSION, they would not have been able to procreate and we would not be here today. Think twice before questioning the motives of our Lord and maybe if you actually read the book you would not be so naive.

  • Reply
  • Arn434 - June 1, 2010 at 1:48 pm #

  • Great article! Well-written, informative, and very humorous. I especially enjoyed your 2nd footnote. I knew you BS’d the line about your best friend’s gf, but I found it hilarious to find a footnote about it, with a good example of classic BS (Never lied to anyone). Great job keeping true to your word and keeping us on our toes!

  • Reply
  • Andy Blackstone - April 19, 2010 at 5:01 pm #

  • I’m late to this party, but I’ll comment anyway. The focus on other people’s BS, both in the essay and in the comments,is interesting. In my experience, it’s been more important to first stop believing my own BS; the tests you describe here will give me some new ways to achieve that goal.

  • Reply
  • jhalbach - April 17, 2010 at 11:23 pm #

  • All in all I’d have to say a great post. Who would have guessed people would be so uptight about using something from the bible as an example though. Honestly, why focus so hard on that small piece over the integrity of the entire article. At the beginning the author says that there are several bits of B.S. tucked into the article, maybe that was one of them.

  • Reply
  • LK - April 2, 2010 at 5:51 pm #

  • Not everyone lies. Many business people and businesses are honest, if only because they know it keeps customers.

  • Reply
  • Alan Grano - March 17, 2010 at 4:54 pm #

  • What no sources cited? Great essay. Proof never to BS a BSer. Keep up the good work.

  • Reply
  • Kay - February 11, 2010 at 8:32 pm #

  • God did not lie! They did die. How is that lying?

  • Reply
    • Scott Berkun - February 12, 2010 at 2:38 pm #

    • Kay / Anthony:

      If you put yourself in the place of Adam, when God tells us we will die, I’d logically assume my life will end.

      Yet instead of dying, God casts Adam and Eve out into the world, where they live out their lives.

      I understand the various metaphoric and symbolic meanings of what God said, but there is no indication Adam is aware of them. I’m reading the book of Genesis, in this case, as if it actually happened, and taking what people say literally, as I think any of us would if we were actually in that situation. We’re not told that God did the air-quotes thing when he mentions death – he meant we’d be pushing up the daises.

      Adam certainly could not have read Romans 3: 16, as Anthony points out, because, well, at the time, it was several thousand years before the birth of Jesus, much less the writing of the New Testament.

      If Adam were to die, his story should end right when he bites into the apple. He doesn’t die in any conventional sense of the world. Call this a lie, a deception, a manipulation, or whatever you like, but it’s certainly not a telling of the plain simple truth.

    • Reply
  • Anthony - February 6, 2010 at 10:33 pm #

  • Ah, I’m only 14, and I’m still more intelligent than the author of this article. God did not lie to Adam and Eve. The ultimate punishment for their eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was death. Because they disobeyed God, they allowed sin into their lives. And, had you read the entire Bible, you would know that in the Book of Romans, Romans 3: 16 to be exact, states “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our lord.”(KJV) bottom line: they ate from the tree; they disobeyed. Disobeying God is a sin, the consequence of sin is death. You would have been more accurate in saying the first lie was Lucifer (the devil) telling Eve, “ye surely shall not die.” Educate yourself before posting.

  • Reply
  • David Kelly - January 5, 2010 at 9:08 am #

  • This is a B.S.(beautifully scribed)article. Thank you!

  • Reply
  • Doug - December 26, 2009 at 9:10 pm #

  • Pretty good article until you apply it’s own BS tests to…. itself :)

  • Reply
  • JK - November 15, 2009 at 5:06 am #

  • In re to the Genesis quoting, God referred to their souls dying, their innocence. not actual death. If you’re going to quote consider the context.

    Satan didnt slink along to say it was good, he slinked along to say you can be god if you have this apple, you can be just as mighty. So, pride, before the fall.

    Dont write about what you dont have any understanding of.
    Cheers.

  • Reply
    • Scott Berkun - November 15, 2009 at 10:02 am #

    • Hi Jessica:

      You’ll have to explain to me how you are so certain what God was or was not referring to. The Bible says only this:

      17: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
      (From Book of Genesis, King James Version)

      Whatever context you are referring to doesn’t come from the bible itself.

    • Reply
  • Stephenie LaMaina - October 19, 2009 at 3:18 pm #

  • I saved this on my computer to remind myself, if is sounds like it might be BS, it probably is.

    Stephenie LaMaina

  • Reply
  • T - September 30, 2009 at 7:06 am #

  • B.S Is a part of your everyday life. You may detect it but you can’t stop it. People always have something to hide and will use B.s to cover it up. :)

  • Reply
  • Alex Schleber - July 12, 2009 at 8:21 am #

  • Great post, the depth and breadth of this is quite surprising:

    “White lies are the spackle of civilization, tucked into the dirty corners and crevices our necessary, but pretentiously inflexible idealisms create. Small lies prop up and support our powerful truths, holding together the insanely half honest, half false chaos that spins the world.”

    My perspective on a number of things just shifted!

  • Reply
  • David - July 6, 2009 at 12:01 am #

  • What a great read, thanks.

  • Reply
  • Fred - July 3, 2009 at 6:43 am #

  • Just found your blog through a RT by Tony Blauer…terrific post!
    Thanks!

    Fred

  • Reply
  • Saurabh Garg - July 1, 2009 at 12:24 am #

  • So sorry for bumping an old post but I got this link from today’s post.

    I only have one reservation against being a bullshit buster. I dont want to become overly critical to arguments and ideas. I risk shooting down a new idea sooner than it requires (to mature, to fructify, to work, to create, to start delivering results). I also risk becoming someone who is close to newer perspectives.

    BS, how so ever bad it may be requires tremendous amount of creativity. A 25 year old can never think that a dog might eat his report but a 5 year old can imagine a dog eating the homework. I will be lot more open to newer ideas if I dont immediately shoot it down as BS.

    And an awesome essay for sure. Bookmarked, and forwarded.

    Regards,
    SG

  • Reply
  • Jen - March 13, 2009 at 8:55 am #

  • “First off, God did not lie because both Adam and Eve both died. They simply did not die instantly, rather death was now apart of their lives since they sinned.”

    Good. Here’s the difference between a LIAR and a BULLSHITTER. As God is not a liar, he more precisely is a BULLSHITTER. Why? Because as a liar he would be interested in covering the truth, which he doesn’t because as a bullshitter he just does not care … which is even worse as it does not show any respect for truth.

  • Reply
  • Otto - March 8, 2009 at 10:40 am #

  • Better than to accept lies, is to learn to handle unconvenient truths. Face it.

  • Reply
  • Scott - March 7, 2009 at 12:56 pm #

  • Not lying: it’s a shame all the liars ruined your true excuse :)

  • Reply
  • Not lying about this - March 7, 2009 at 12:53 pm #

  • My dog did so eat my homework.

    Once.

    In _college_

    This is how I learned the dog we’d had for 7 years liked paper.

  • Reply
  • CK - March 7, 2009 at 11:55 am #

  • First off, God did not lie because both Adam and Eve both died. They simply did not die instantly, rather death was now apart of their lives since they sinned.

  • Reply
  • Colin - December 8, 2008 at 2:45 pm #

  • Well done post. But I take a couple of small exceptions.

    1. Much of the BS you hear is not about projects, but about the person themselves. BS is a quick way for people to inflate their own background and is rarely disprovable without evidence.

    2. This goes back to my first point: sometimes the best use of a BS detector is to simply know who is full of it for future reference. If you can’t disprove their self-claims, but know they are usually full of it, you can use this to avoid or separate from them.

    3. Almost all of these scenarios are written from the POV of a boss, or at least equal colleague. Knowing how to detect BS in superiors is just as important, but they can’t be as openly challenged.

    4. Sometimes it can be to your advantage to let someone else’s BS slide if it does not damage your project and it wins you an ally for future use. You just have to know that they are full of it for future reference.

    Thanks a ton for the post!

  • Reply
  • zpablo - October 23, 2008 at 11:15 am #

  • Very good article indeed. Opened my eyes.
    One question, isn’t it just called a fruit? Why do you call it an apple? The forbidden
    fruit is a fruit – not an apple.

  • Reply
Scott's Bestselling Books
  • Confessions of a
    Public Speaker
  • Provocative and funny secrets from a veteran speaker, you'll laugh as you learn.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
  • The Myths of Innovation
  • The classic bestseller, now in paperback with 4 new chapters.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
  • Making Things Happen
  • The classic and bestselling handbook for any project leader, packed with tactics and stories.
  • Buy now at Amazon Book Details
Photos from Recent Events (view flickr stream)

You're reading Scott Berkun, All rights reserved unless noted. You can subscribe here Blog RSS Comments (RSS)