• kersploosh@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    3
    ·
    edit-2
    5 days ago

    No information is the best option. How bad the misinformation is depends on intent. Is the misinformation a lie intentionally told to conceal a truth? Or is it bullshit, information intended to persuade regardless of truth?

    Someone who lies and someone who tells the truth are playing on opposite sides, so to speak, in the same game. Each responds to the facts as he understands them, although the response of the one is guided by the authority of the truth, while the response of the other defies that authority and refuses to meet its demands. The bullshitter ignores these demands altogether. He does not reject the authority of the truth, as the liar does, and oppose himself to it. He pays no attention to it at all. By virtue of this, bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are.

    From Harry Frankfurt’s essay On Bullshit