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I can think of one alternative interpretation: maybe some folks are better at finding the truth in a statement. E.g. with the statement 'Hidden meaning transfo

I can think of one alternative interpretation: maybe some folks are better at finding the truth in a statement. E.g. with the statement 'Hidden meaning transforms unparalleled abstract beauty,' which is a machine-generated statement. Bullshit, according to the authors. Certainly, though, the statement 'hidden meaning transforms [the unhidden] beauty [of the object being beheld]' is both true and somewhat profound (imagine, say, a piece of art which is itself beautiful but which contains references to something a beholder finds distasteful — say, a beautiful state of a Confederate general on a horse: a beholder might love the statue until he's told what it represents). The only real garbage word in the original statement is 'unparalleled' — but that is basically a flavouring particle in speech, meaning not much at all. An unintelligent person might make nothing of the 'bullshit' statement; and intelligent person might find a meaning for it which makes sense, and thus finds it profound.

emacsgifs 9y ago
As opposed to the unintelligent / intelligent criteria. I think it's more likely closer to being (at time of reading) positioned intellectually to (a) value a particular expression as having some level of profundity, vs (b) seeing the same expression as some level of complete and utter horse plop. I think there is often a meta level too, where the intellectual state is positioned at a crossroads of moving from the perception of profundity as bullshit, and subsequently, beginning to see certain (previously seen as) bullshit as profound. I think it's worth making the (obvious) case that intellectual life is not a fixed constant, and is infact a continuous organic, individual process. Generalising is as useless as it always is.