Randerolf

You know what's bullshit?

This.

This bullshit. It's a pack of lies and veiled half truths masquerading as bullshit.

Note: I've never posted in nonsense. Is how you do it? Or is this thread some bullshit.

uncle phil

if you think you see it, and you think you smell it, just raise the bullshit flag and make your feelings known...

__________________
"We were wrong, terribly wrong. (We) should not have tried to fight a guerrilla war with conventional military tactics against a foe willing to absorb enormous casualties...in a country lacking the fundamental political stability necessary to conduct effective military and pacification operations. It could not be done and it was not done."
- Robert S. McNamara
-----------------------------------------
"We will take our napalm and flame throwers out of the land that scarcely knows the use of matches...
We will leave you your small joys and smaller troubles."
- Eugene McCarthy in "Vietnam Message"
-----------------------------------------
never wrestle with a pig.
you both get dirty;
the pig likes it.

ring

"Bullshit (also bullcrap, bullplop, horseshit, bullbutter) is a common EnglishEnglish language
English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
expletiveExpletive
The word expletive is currently used in three senses: syntactic expletives, expletive attributives, and "bad language".The word expletive comes from the Latin verb explere, meaning "to fill", via expletivus, "filling out"....
. It may be shortened to "bull" or the euphemismEuphemism
A euphemism is a substitution of an agreeable or less offensive expression in place of one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant to the listener, or in the case of #Doublespeak, to make it less troublesome for the speaker....
B.S. The term is common in American EnglishAmerican English
PhonologyIn many ways, compared to English language in England, North American English is conservative in its phonology. Some distinctive accents can be found on the East Coast of the United States , partly because these areas were in contact with England, and imitated prestigious varieties of English English at a time when those varieties we...
. In British EnglishBritish English
British English or UK English is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere....
, bollocksBollocks
"Bollocks" is a word of Old English origin, meaning "testicles". The word is often used figuratively in British English, as a noun to mean "nonsense", an expletive following a minor accident or misfortune, or an adjective to mean "poor quality" or "useless"....
is a comparable expletive, although bullshit is now a commonly used expletive in British English as well.

As with many expletives, it can be used as an interjectionInterjection
An interjection is a part of speech that usually has no grammatical connection with the rest of the Sentence and simply expresses emotion on the part of the speaker, although most interjections have clear definitions....
(or in many other parts of speech) and can carry a wide variety of meanings. Most commonly, it is used in connection with incorrect, misleading, or false language and statements. While the word is generally used in a deprecating sense, it may imply a measure of respect for language skills, or frivolity, among various other benign usages.

In popular philosophyPhilosophy
Philosophy is the study of general problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, truth, beauty, justice, validity, mind, and language....
, Harry FrankfurtHarry Frankfurt
Harry Gordon Frankfurt is a professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University. He previously taught at Yale University and Rockefeller University....
among others described the word bullshit as related to but distinct from lying.


Etymology
"Bull", meaning nonsense, dates from the 17th century (Concise Oxford Dictionary), whereas the term "bullshit" is popularly considered to have been first used in 1915, in AmericanUnited States
The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
slang, and to have come into popular usage only during World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
. The word "bull" itself may have derived from the Old FrenchOld French
Old French was the Romance languages dialect continuum spoken in territories which span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from around 1000 to 1300....
boul meaning "fraud, deceit" (Oxford English Dictionary). The term "horseshit" is a near synonym.

The earliest attestation mentioned by the Concise Oxford Dictionary is in fact T. S. EliotT. S. Eliot
'Thomas Stearns Eliot', Order of Merit , was a poet, dramatist, and literary critic. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948. Among his most famous writings are the poems The Love Song of J....
, who between 1910 and 1916 wrote an early poem to which he gave the title The Triumph of Bullshit, written in the form of a balladeBallade
The ballade is a Verse form typically consisting of three eight-line stanzas, each with a consistent metre and a particular rhyme scheme. The last line in the stanza is a refrain, and the stanzas are followed by a four-line concluding stanza usually addressed to a prince....
. The first stanzaStanza
In poetry, a stanza is a unit within a larger poem. In modern poetry, the term is often equivalent with strophe; in popular vocal music, a stanza is typically referred to as a "Verse " ....
goes:


Ladies, on whom my attentions have waited
If you consider my merits are small
Etiolated, alembicated,
Orotund, tasteless, fantastical,
Monotonous, crotchety, constipated,
Impotent galamatias
Affected, possibly imitated,
For Christ's sake stick it up your ass.



The word bullshit does not appear in the text of the poem, though in keeping with the ballade form, the refrainRefrain
A refrain is the line or lines that are repeated in music or in Poetry; the "chorus" of a song. Poetry fixed forms that feature refrains include the villanelle, the virelay, and the sestina....
"For Christ's sake stick it up your ass" appears in each following verse and concludes the envoi. Eliot did not publish this poem during his lifetime.

As to earlier etymology the OEDOxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press , is a comprehensive dictionary of the English language. Two fully-bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989; as of December 2008 the dictionary's current editors have completed a quarter of the third edition....
cites bull with the meaning "trivial, insincere, untruthful talk or writing, nonsense". It describes this usage as being of unknown origin, but notes the following: "OFOld French
Old French was the Romance languages dialect continuum spoken in territories which span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from around 1000 to 1300....
boul, boule, bole fraud, deceit, trickery; mod. IcelIcelandic language
Icelandic is a North Germanic languages, the language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese language and Norwegian dialects such as Telemark dialect and Sognam?l....
bull ‘nonsense’; also MEMiddle English
Middle English is the name given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman conquest of England of 1066 and about 1470, when the #Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the introduction of the printing press into England by William...
bull BUL ‘falsehood’, and BULL verb, to befool, mock, cheat." Worthy of note is the South African English equivalent "bull dust".

Although as the above makes clear there is no confirmed etymological connection it might be noted that these older meanings are synonymous with the modern expression "Bull" otherwise generally considered (and intentionally used as) a contraction of "Bullshit".


Uses of "bullshit"


Assertions of fact
Bullshit is commonly used to describe statements made by people more concerned with the response of the audience than in truth and accuracy, such as goal-oriented statements made in the field of politics or advertising.


Distinguished from lying
"Bullshit" does not necessarily have to be a complete fabrication; with only basic knowledge about a topic, bullshit is often used to make the audience believe that one knows far more about the topic by feigning total certainty or making probable predictions. It may also merely be "filler" or nonsense that, by virtue of its style or wording, gives the impression that it actually means something.

In his essay on the subject William G. Perry called bull[shit] "relevancies, however relevant, without data" and gave a definition of the verb "to bull[shit]" as follows:

The "bullshitter" generally either knows the statements are likely false, exaggerated, and in other ways misleading or has no interest in their factual accuracy one way or the other. "Talking bullshit" is thus a lesser form of lyingLie
A lie , is a type of deception in the form of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others, often with the further intention to maintain a secret or reputation, protect someone's feelings or to avoid a punishment....
, and is likely to elicit a correspondingly weaker emotionEmotion
An emotion is a mental and physiological state associated with a wide variety of feelings, thoughts, and behavior.Emotions are subjective experiences, or experienced from an individual point of view....
al response: whereas an obvious liarLie
A lie , is a type of deception in the form of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others, often with the further intention to maintain a secret or reputation, protect someone's feelings or to avoid a punishment....
may be greeted with derision, outrage, or angerAnger
Anger is an emotional state that may range from minor irritation to intense rage. The physical effects of anger include increased heart rate, blood pressure,and levels of adrenaline and noradrenaline....
, an exponent of bullshit tends to be dismissed with an indifferent sneer.


As an act


Carrying out a deception
"Bullshitting" is the act of asserting bullshit as in, for example, an employment interview.

Whimsical hoax
People are also said to "bullshit" friends or acquaintances should they spin an elaborate and possibly whimsical tall taleTall tale
A tall tale is a story with unbelievable elements, related as if it was true and factual. Some such stories are exaggerations of actual events, such as, "that fish was so big, why I tell ya', it nearly sank the boat when I pulled it in!" Other tall tales are completely fictional tales in a familiar setting, such as the American Old West or t...
, so as to make the listener appear foolish by dint of their gullibility in accepting the untruths as fact. Another informal and slightly archaic term for this is "jiving".

Informal conversation
Sometimes called "shooting the shit" or "shooting the bull", bullshit can also be the act of having a casual conversation of little value or about an unimportant subject.


As a skill
People may attribute their performance in an examinationExamination
To examine somebody or something is to inspect it closely; hence, an examination is a detailed inspection or analysis of an object or person....
to their ability to "bullshit". In this sense, "bullshitting" walks the line between extemporaneous speaking and lying outright.


As nonsense
Bullshit can also refer to excessively complex, unreasonable, burdensome, offensive, or otherwise unwanted instructions, demands, rules, accounts, explanations, or other verbiage. For example, a contractor wishing to bid on a government job may refer to the paperwork required to do so as "government bullshit."


Interjection
The exclamation "bullshit!" can also be used to express surprise, shock, indignation and/or humour at another person's statement. It may be an accusation that the material is deliberately deceptive, or else a humorous invitation to confirm or elaborate a surprising claim. People may say "that's bullshit" when something bad or unexpected happens, as in "No way!" or "You're kidding".


Alternate terms
'"Horseshit"' is a less common synonym for "bullshit". "Horseshit" is more often used as a reactive exclamation or profoundly distrustful assessment. "Horseshit" carries a connotation of the speaker's indignation and tends to lack the benign implications of "bullshit"; stating that something is a "load of horseshit" usually implies that the speaker feels wronged or upset by the current situation, whereas calling something "bullshit" can imply anything from indignation to a joking and good-natured intent.

Words such as "baloney" or "poppycock" are less vulgar alternatives. There are also many Irish slang equivalents, including blarney, malarkey, balderdash, and tommyrot.)


"Bullshit" in philosophy

In his essay On BullshitOn Bullshit
On Bullshit is an essay by philosophy Harry Frankfurt. Originally published in the journal Raritan Quarterly Review in 1986, the essay was republished as a separate volume in 2005 and became a nonfiction bestseller, spending twenty-seven weeks on the New York Times New York Times Best Seller list....
(originally written in 1986, and published as a monograph in 2005), philosopher Harry FrankfurtHarry Frankfurt
Harry Gordon Frankfurt is a professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University. He previously taught at Yale University and Rockefeller University....
of Princeton UniversityPrinceton University
Princeton University is a private university university located in Princeton, New Jersey, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League and has the largest per-student Financial endowment in the world....
characterizes bullshit as a form of falsehood distinct from lying. The liar, Frankfurt holds, knows and cares about the truth, but deliberately sets out to mislead instead of telling the truth. The "bullshitter", on the other hand, does not care about the truth and is only seeking to impress: (*) (*)

Frankfurt connects this analysis of bullshit with Ludwig WittgensteinLudwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein was an Austrian-United Kingdom philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language....
's disdain of "non-sense" talk, and with the popular concept of a "bull sessionBull Session
Bull Session is a business news talk show aired weekdays from 6 to 6:30 PM ET on CNBC from circa 1997 to 1998. Hosted by David Faber .Bull Session takes a spirited look at the day's top news stories from a business perspective -- going far beyond events in the financial markets....
" in which speakers may try out unusual views without commitment. He fixes the blame for the prevalence of "bullshit" in modern society upon anti-realismAnti-realism
In philosophy, the term anti-realism is used to describe anyposition involving either the denial of an Objectivity reality of entities of a certain type or the denial that verification-transcendent statements about a type of entity are either true or false....
and upon the growing frequency of situations in which people are expected to speak or have opinions without appropriate knowledge of the subject matter.

Gerald CohenGerald Cohen
Gerald Allan "Jerry" Cohen is a marxist political philosopher, presently the Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory, All Souls College, Oxford....
, in "Deeper into Bullshit", contrasted the kind of "bullshit" Frankfurt describes with a different sort: nonsense discourse presented as sense. Cohen points out that this sort of bullshit can be produced either accidentally or deliberately. While some writers do deliberately produce bullshit, a person can also aim at sense and produce nonsense by mistake; or a person deceived by a piece of bullshit can repeat it innocently, without intent to deceive others.

Cohen gives the example of Alan SokalAlan Sokal
Alan David Sokal is a professor of mathematics at University College London and professor of physics at New York University. He works in statistical mechanics and combinatorics....
's "Transgressing the Boundaries"Sokal Affair
The Sokal affair was a hoax by physics Alan Sokal perpetrated on the editorial staff and readership of the postmodern cultural studies journal Social Text ....
as a piece of deliberate bullshit. Sokal's aim in creating it, however, was to point out that the "postmodernist" editors who accepted his paper for publication could not distinguish nonsense from sense, and thereby by implication that their field was "bullshit".


Euphemisms
"Bullshit" has a number of euphemismEuphemism
A euphemism is a substitution of an agreeable or less offensive expression in place of one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant to the listener, or in the case of #Doublespeak, to make it less troublesome for the speaker....
s:


BS
bullshark
bullshnikes
bovine stercus
bovine scat
baloneyNonsense
Nonsense is a Linguistics or Writing which resembles a human language or other symbolic system, but in fact does not carry any identifiable meaning....
bull
bull butter (alluding to something that would be as absurd as a bull producing milk/butter)
bull con
bull feathers
bullcrap
bullroar (especially when intimidation is involved)
bullpucky or bullpuckey
bullhonkery
dittmar
horsefeathers
horsepucky or horsepuckey
horse hockey (referring to the hockey-like motion of shoveling manure from horse stalls into a
poppycock (a transliterationTransliteration
Transliteration is the practice of transcribing a word or text written in one writing system into another writing system or system of rules for such practice....
of pappe kak, the Dutch phrase for "bird guano")
Horseshit



Further reading

— Halifax academic Laura Penny's study of the phenomenon of bullshit and its impact on modern society. — Harry Frankfurt's detailed analysis of the concept of bullshit."

short version:

Ourcrazymodern?

YOU have got to be BULLSHITTING.

__________________
BE JUST AND FEAR NOT

uncle phil

ring, i am eternally enlightened...

lemme guess, you've got a B. S., and we all know what that is, an M. S., which is just More of the Same, and a PhD, which is just Piled higher and Deeper...

__________________
"We were wrong, terribly wrong. (We) should not have tried to fight a guerrilla war with conventional military tactics against a foe willing to absorb enormous casualties...in a country lacking the fundamental political stability necessary to conduct effective military and pacification operations. It could not be done and it was not done."
- Robert S. McNamara
-----------------------------------------
"We will take our napalm and flame throwers out of the land that scarcely knows the use of matches...
We will leave you your small joys and smaller troubles."
- Eugene McCarthy in "Vietnam Message"
-----------------------------------------
never wrestle with a pig.
you both get dirty;
the pig likes it.

ring

....a year and a half o' highschool, spread out over 3 years, 4 different States...
(states indeed), and 5 different public institutions...

But you already know this,
cuz you pays attention.

Baraka_Guru

Out of bullshit springs forth the blossom.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

BadNick

some people just talk about it, or talk it...some people collect it. Which are you?

ring

gotta keep the convexities in check....

Ourcrazymodern?

Check:

It won't talk to you
'til you're willing to listen.
It can't hear, either.

__________________
BE JUST AND FEAR NOT

ring

yep...you know these things,
wise one.

uncle phil

__________________
"We were wrong, terribly wrong. (We) should not have tried to fight a guerrilla war with conventional military tactics against a foe willing to absorb enormous casualties...in a country lacking the fundamental political stability necessary to conduct effective military and pacification operations. It could not be done and it was not done."
- Robert S. McNamara
-----------------------------------------
"We will take our napalm and flame throwers out of the land that scarcely knows the use of matches...
We will leave you your small joys and smaller troubles."
- Eugene McCarthy in "Vietnam Message"
-----------------------------------------
never wrestle with a pig.
you both get dirty;
the pig likes it.

Shell

Bullshit...never underestimate the power of carefully worded nonsense.

__________________
..."Say what you think. Those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind" ~ Dr. Seuss

Bill O'Rights

Personally, I prefer horseshit. It makes my roses bloom better.

__________________
"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

uncle phil

__________________
"We were wrong, terribly wrong. (We) should not have tried to fight a guerrilla war with conventional military tactics against a foe willing to absorb enormous casualties...in a country lacking the fundamental political stability necessary to conduct effective military and pacification operations. It could not be done and it was not done."
- Robert S. McNamara
-----------------------------------------
"We will take our napalm and flame throwers out of the land that scarcely knows the use of matches...
We will leave you your small joys and smaller troubles."
- Eugene McCarthy in "Vietnam Message"
-----------------------------------------
never wrestle with a pig.
you both get dirty;
the pig likes it.

wooÐs

pee pee.

Redlemon

"This is bullshit! Nobody cares! These guys are from England, and who gives a shit! It's a lot of wasted names that don't mean diddly shit!!!"

--Casey Kasem, on U2

__________________
I can't read your signature. Sorry.

uncle phil

__________________
"We were wrong, terribly wrong. (We) should not have tried to fight a guerrilla war with conventional military tactics against a foe willing to absorb enormous casualties...in a country lacking the fundamental political stability necessary to conduct effective military and pacification operations. It could not be done and it was not done."
- Robert S. McNamara
-----------------------------------------
"We will take our napalm and flame throwers out of the land that scarcely knows the use of matches...
We will leave you your small joys and smaller troubles."
- Eugene McCarthy in "Vietnam Message"
-----------------------------------------
never wrestle with a pig.
you both get dirty;
the pig likes it.