Calling Bullshit: The Art of Scepticism in a Data-Driven World

by Carl T. Bergstrom

Bullshit is not a modern invention. In one of his Socratic dialogues, Euthydemus, Plato complains that the philosophers known as the Sophists are indifferent to what is actually true and are interested only in winning arguments.

Brandolini’s principle. Coined by Italian software engineer Alberto Brandolini in 2014, it states: “The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than [that needed] to produce it.”

Satirist Jonathan Swift wrote in 1710 that “falsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it.”

the most successful headlines don’t convey facts, they promise you an emotional experience

Journalists are trained to ask the following simple questions about any piece of information they encounter: Who is telling me this? How does he or she know it? What is this person trying to sell me?

Lies are designed to lead away from the truth; bullshit is produced with a gross indifference to the truth.

Walter Lippmann noted a century ago, “There can be no liberty for a community which lacks the means by which to detect lies.”