Lies, ‘hallucinations’ and bullshit
Frankfurtian bullshit and lying
Many popular discussions of ChatGPT call its false statements ‘hallucinations’. One also might think of these untruths as lies. However, we argue that this isn’t the right way to think about it. We will argue that these falsehoods aren’t hallucinations later — in Sect 3.2.3. For now, we’ll discuss why these untruths aren’t lies but instead are bullshit.
The topic of lying has a rich philosophical literature. In ‘Lying’, Saint Augustine distinguished seven types of lies, and his view altered throughout his life. At one point, he defended the position that any instance of knowingly uttering a false utterance counts as a lie, so that even jokes containing false propositions, like –
I entered a pun competition and because I really wanted to win, I submitted ten entries. I was sure one of them would win, but no pun in ten did.
– would be regarded as a lie, as I have never entered such a competition (Proops & Sorensen, 2023: 3). Later, this view is refined such that the speaker only lies if they intend the hearer to believe the utterance. The suggestion that the speaker must intend to deceive is a common stipulation in literature on lies. According to the “traditional account” of lying:
To lie = df. to make a believed-false statement to another person with the intention that the other person believe that statement to be true (Mahon, 2015).
For our purposes this definition will suffice. Lies are generally frowned upon. But there are acts of misleading testimony which are criticisable, which do not fall under the umbrella of lying.[1] These include spreading untrue gossip, which one mistakenly, but culpably, believes to be true. Another class of misleading testimony that has received particular attention from philosophers is that of bullshit. This everyday notion was analysed and introduced into the philosophical lexicon by Harry Frankfurt.[2]
Frankfurt understands bullshit to be characterized not by an intent to deceive but instead by a reckless disregard for the truth. A student trying to sound knowledgeable without having done the reading, a political candidate saying things because they sound good to potential voters, and a dilettante trying to spin an interesting story: none of these people are trying to deceive, but they are also not trying to convey facts. To Frankfurt, they are bullshitting.
Like “lie”, “bullshit” is both a noun and a verb: an utterance produced can be a lie or an instance of bullshit, as can the act of producing these utterances. For an utterance to be classed as bullshit, it must not be accompanied by the explicit intentions that one has when lying, i.e., to cause a false belief in the hearer. Of course, it must also not be accompanied by the intentions characterised by an honest utterance. So far this story is entirely negative. Must any positive intentions be manifested in the utterer?
Throughout most of Frankfurt’s discussion, his characterisation of bullshit is negative. He notes that bullshit requires “no conviction” from the speaker about what the truth is (2005: 55), that the bullshitter “pays no attention” to the truth (2005: 61) and that they “may not deceive us, or even intend to do so, either about the facts or what he takes the facts to be” (2005: 54). Later, he describes the “defining feature” of bullshit as “a lack of concern with truth, or an indifference to how things really are [our emphasis]” (2002: 340). These suggest a negative picture; that for an output to be classed as bullshit, it only needs to lack a certain relationship to the truth.
However, in places, a positive intention is presented. Frankfurt says what a bullshitter ….
“…does necessarily attempt to deceive us about is his enterprise. His only indispensably distinctive characteristic is that in a certain way he misrepresents what he is up to” (2005: 54).
This is somewhat surprising. It restricts what counts as bullshit to utterances accompanied by a higher-order deception. However, some of Frankfurt’s examples seem to lack this feature. When Fania Pascal describes her unwell state as “feeling like a dog that has just been run over” to her friend Wittgenstein, it stretches credulity to suggest that she was intending to deceive him about how much she knew about how run-over dogs felt. And given how the conditions for bullshit are typically described as negative, we might wonder whether the positive condition is really necessary.
Bullshit distinctions
Should utterances without an intention to deceive count as bullshit? One reason in favour of expanding the definition, or embracing a plurality of bullshit, is indicated by Frankfurt’s comments on the dangers of bullshit.
“In contrast [to merely unintelligible discourse], indifference to the truth is extremely dangerous. The conduct of civilized life, and the vitality of the institutions that are
- ↑ A particularly surprising position is espoused by Fichte, who regards as lying not only lies of omission, but knowingly not correcting someone who is operating under a falsehood. For instance, if I was to wear a wig, and someone believed this to be my real hair, Fichte regards this as a lie, for which I am culpable. Bacin (2021) for further discussion of Fichte’s position.
- ↑ Originally published in Raritan, VI(2) in 1986. References to that work here are from the 2005 book version.
