Support my work and keep it sustainable: ko-fi.com/evolio

In this episode I explain bullshit to my friend, comedian Zach Jobe. Yes, bullshit. It turns out it is a legit hard nosed topic of philosophical debate with decades of work and thousands of academic publications behind it. We talk about what it is, why people do it, who is vulnerable to it and how to recognize it in your everyday life. Building a robust detector it turns out is one of the best ways to to steel yourself against it.

---

Created by: Ryan Pevey at evolio.org and Zach Jobe @zhjobe

Concept: A science and comedy conversation about what philosophical bullshit is and how to detect it.

Tools: DaVinci Resolve, GIMP

Intro music by Maksym Malko from Pixabay (pixabay.com/music/upbeat-podcast-interview-music-254186/)

Podcast streams:

redcircle.com/shows/04ecc7a3-3383-4ca0-bff3-c55d04100ed5

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hidden-science-stories/id1874450380

open.spotify.com/show/50xaIb6jjmSJv7georpfVt?si=16e6c0e030414593

music.amazon.com/podcasts/b0415a99-f209-4c66-80c5-d8eb2b490811/hidden-science-stories

---

Citations:

Frankfurt, Harry G. On Bullshit. Princeton University Press, 2005 [original essay 1986]. The foundational philosophical treatment. Essential starting point. 67 pages; highly readable.

Frankfurt, Harry G. On Truth. Princeton University Press, 2006. Frankfurt’s follow-up, addressing why truth matters as a value. Reads as a companion to On Bullshit.

Pennycook, G., Cheyne, J.A., Barr, N., Koehler, D.J., & Fugelsang, J.A. "On the reception and detection of pseudo-profound bullshit." Judgment and Decision Making, 10, 549–563, 2015. The paper that launched empirical bullshit research. Open access.

Pennycook, G. & Rand, D.G. "Who falls for fake news? The roles of bullshit receptivity, overclaiming, familiarity, and analytic thinking." Journal of Personality, 88(2), 185–200, 2020. Key empirical link between bullshit receptivity and misinformation susceptibility.

Bergstrom, Carl T. & West, Jevin D. Calling Bullshit: The Art of Skepticism in a Data-Driven World. Random House/Allen Lane, 2020. The best practical guide to bullshit detection for a general audience; particularly strong on data-driven and scientific bullshit. Course materials also freely available at callingbullshit.org.

Cassam, Qassim. Vices of the Mind: From the Intellectual to the Political. Oxford University Press, 2018. Develops the concept of epistemic vices, including insouciance and malevolence, with political applications. Theoretical but accessible.

Hicks, M.T., Humphries, J. & Slater, J. "ChatGPT Is Bullshit." Ethics and Information Technology, 26:38, 2024. The most cited academic paper applying Frankfurt’s framework to LLMs. Open access. Directly relevant to the AI segment.

Szanto, Thomas. "Epistemically exploitative bullshit: A Sartrean account." European Journal of Philosophy, 31(3), 711–730, 2023. Extends Frankfurt to cover politically weaponized bullshit. Relevant to intersections of bullshit and power.

Serena Iacobucci, Roberta De Cicco. "A literature review of bullshit receptivity: Perspectives for an informed policy making against misinformation." Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, 6(S1), 23–40, 2022 Comprehensive review of empirical research on bullshit receptivity from 2015–2021. Good for overview of the field.

Vaidya, Anand Jayprakash. "Are LLMs Natural Born Bullshitters?" The Philosophers’ Magazine, 2024. Accessible philosophical analysis of the AI-bullshit question for a general audience. A good bridge between the technical Hicks et al. paper and lay readers.

0:00 On Bullshit

11:44 Two types of Bullshit

18:14 The Bullshit Asymmetry Principle

21:43 Psychology of Bullshit

27:51 LLMs and the rise of Botshit

44:31 Propaganda is political Bullshit

49:22 The Bullshit of Pseudoscience

56:03 Bullshit detector 101

62:57 Point of Optimism

66:51 2026 Predictions Update