If Nietzsche Were a Narwhal: What Animal Intelligence Reveals About Human Stupidity

by Justin Gregg

“the ability to produce satisfying bullshit may serve to assist individuals in navigating social systems, both as an energetically efficient strategy for impressing others and as an honest signal of one’s intelligence.”33 In other words, the bullshitter has an extra advantage over a non-bullshitter: They don’t waste time worrying about the truth; they can focus all of their energy on being believed instead of being accurate. The psychologist Klaus Templer wanted to know why it is that toxic, dishonest people (that is, bullshitters) seem to be better at navigating the corporate and political landscape than honest, good-hearted people. One would think that bullshitters would be punished or ostracized by society. But that’s the opposite of what seems to happen. Templer asked 110 employees at several large companies how they would rate themselves in terms of their political skills, such as the ability to network with and influence others.34 The same was asked of these employees’ bosses. Templer also gave the employees a personality test to measure their levels of honesty and humility. Perhaps unsurprisingly, those employees who had lower levels of honesty and humility (i.e., those more likely to be shameless liars and bullshit artists) also rated themselves as politically skilled. Others agreed with them. The bosses rated their less honest employees as the most politically skilled. But, importantly, also rated them as more competent than their honest and humble workmates. This...

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