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The Fine Art of Bullshit, Killed by Google

283 points by JacobAldridge 12y ago

ummonkwatz 12y ago
The bullshit didn't even have to be believable: "Marilyn Manson was the kid that played Paul from the Wonder Years. Also, he had a rib removed so he could perform autofellatio." Kids everywhere believed that. Hilarious.
- spiritplumber 12y ago
  We heard that about Gabriele D'Annunzio...
- cbd1984 12y ago
  Right, like "Vaccines cause autism" and "Homeopathy is something you should say without laughing". Also hilarious. There's a dark side to bullshit. There's a side which creates endless pain for no good reason, because things 'sound good' or are 'too good to check' and nobody likes a party-pooper, do they? Especially when the party-pooper is pointing out how this little piece of bullshit could kill someone. No. Go along to get along. Don't be so serious all the time. Don't imagine you know better. It's rude.
  - HCIdivision17 12y ago
    As stolio notes elsewhere in the thread, there is a blunt difference. On the one side there's bullshit that matters, and on the other side is "no seriously, they both have Tyler in their name!" It is absolutely necessary to be able to tell the difference, since it's a basic way to avoid being conversationally tone deaf. Alternatively, I invoke Poe's Law in case I'm being That Guy. (Tone's hard on the Internet - it's much better to play in person!)
  - xorcist 12y ago
    Yet "vaccines cause autism" has spread like a virus over the Internet. I had never heard about it before the recent (ten years) memification. It's not like the recipients google it and go "no it doesn't" because it you really do you might as well go mad about the insane "facts" put forth. Google and the web in general probably spread as much bullshit as it kills. It's complicated.
    - lione 12y ago
      On those kind of issues, the google results are a bit muddled. You'll get the results saying "No, of course vaccines don't cause autism", alongside a bunch of BS articles saying "It totally does, because I had my kid vaccinated once, and he's autistic!". Unless you actually search through the sources and figure out which is more credible, it's hard to get a straight yes or no answer.
- igrekel 12y ago
  Yep, my nieces and nephew, all six of them from 12 to 20 all believed that the guy who did the song "Don't worry be happy" had committed suicide. I had to show them recent videos of Bobby McFerrin, his webpage, and then prove he had done that song.
noonespecial 12y ago
Its actually become a fun game around here. Someone makes an outrageous claim and it starts a race to be the first to call them on it. Phones get drawn like six-guns and its on! We call this little victory of fact finding the "fonesnope". (Or "getting fonesnoped" if you happen to be the claimant). Its a fun party game. Try it.
increment_i 12y ago
As a kid I remember family discussions surrounding the legitimacy of certain pieces of trivia, often reaching the point where people began trying to shout over each other. Eventually, my uncle would pick up the phone, dial a random number and say, "Hi there, you wouldn't happen to know who directed Casablanca would you?"
crazygringo 12y ago
I have a rule I always follow, and have convinced many friends of too -- no Googling/Wikipedia-ing in social settings. If nobody knows something (trivia-like), it's almost always a lot more fun to continue not knowing. Sure, look it up when you get home. But a little group self-discipline goes far in keeping the fine art of bullshitting alive. (And it's not just the answer that kills the conversation, but also the fact that someone is right and someone is wrong, game over. Much better to keep the game going!)
- jonathanwallace 12y ago
  Oh wow. Preferred ignorance as entertainment. In hindsight, it is so obvious that this would be a preference in our information overloaded lives. I agree with you. That sounds like much more fun.
- joshvm 12y ago
  At least with the people I know, most trivia is the sort of thing they already found on the internet. If you browse Reddit and none of your friends do, you're pretty much guaranteed to know some bizarre fact. Similarly with programs like QI, it's often quite easy to know where people get their facts from (the conversation usually ends with "You got that from QI didn't you?" "Yes. I did.") On the other hand I find it incredibly difficult to shut up when someone says something wrong about computing (or usually about some current affairs topic in computing). Don't be that guy.
  - JoshTriplett 12y ago
    > On the other hand I find it incredibly difficult to shut up when someone says something wrong about computing (or usually about some current affairs topic in computing). Don't be that guy. I look it as an opportunity to see how many people outside the computing field see it. It's sometimes horrifying, but on the other hand, my most common reaction is "that explains so much".
- cbd1984 12y ago
  I disagree. The conversation is so much more interesting when there are more connections, more tangents to explore than one mind can contain. Facts build on facts, and you can chase down endless rabbit holes when you're not limited to what one wrinkly lump of cholesterol can scrape out of its interconnected canyons.
pervycreeper 12y ago
Good riddance? I believe I'm missing some profound point that the TFA is apparently making.
- harshreality 12y ago
  The point is that uncertainty about some things creates social engagement.
  - pervycreeper 12y ago
    Well, there are still things to be uncertain about that aren't useless trivia, factoids, or urban legends. Hopefully the new BS free era will trickle down to the lower classes, gradually eroding their ignorance and prejudices, at least about one-liner facts.
    - Gatsky 12y ago
      Hopefully this new era will also gradually mitigate lazy generalizations and atavistic class distinctions.
      - pervycreeper 12y ago
        Point taken, but please read for the kernel of truth that remains after all the nits have been picked off.
    - eropple 12y ago
      It has indeed been entire minutes since I saw somebody rationalize their well-actuallying into social good. Well done.
  - coldtea 12y ago
    Not to mention that you can come up with some interesting ideas, art and even inventions when facing such uncertainty -- stuff that is lost otherwise.
uniclaude 12y ago
For those looking for never ending talks and debates about what is true or not, we still have philosophy, religion, and of course politics. Moreover, there's a lot of room the "The Fine Art of Bullshit" there.
- stolio 12y ago
  Those are divisive topics, those are debates that matter. For increased social cohesion play-fighting over bullshit is better, there's a subtext that the only reason it's worth it is you actually enjoy the company of those around you.
yzzxy 12y ago
_why wrote about this phenomenon in CLOSURE: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5764687/CLOSURE.pdf https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5764687/CLOSURE.pdf The segment in question runs from about page 29 through 34. I unfolded my napkin and got the silverware out. "I don't remember." She got out her phone. "No, don't go there." "I. M. D. B." Her fingers. "Oh, Cristian Douglas," I said. "It was Cristian Douglas." Still typing, head leaned back, under the spell of her phone.
stana 12y ago
Not only bullshit. I remember in one of the Beatles interviews how early on they found out that some guy in town knew the B7 guitar chord. They would get on a bus to meet this guy to learn the chord. This journey would not exist today :(
- juliangregorian 12y ago
  Smells fishy to me. I could figure out B7 in like, a minute, and I'm not a good guitarist at all.
JoshTriplett 12y ago
The story posted in the article provides a romanticized illustration of how finding knowledge in a world without easy access to it can produce an adventure. (I like that it doesn't directly say which of the 1994 or 2014 versions was better, though there's sure an implication from how they're painted.) On the other hand, access to information can produce an adventure, as well; so can many other things. In the end, the right group of friends can end up on wild adventures for any number of reasons. That's leaving aside the implications of having easy access to information to answer more important questions. Questions for which there's a known right answer should get resolved as quickly as possible. That leaves more time for the questions that the Internet and all the other resources we have available can help answer, but which still require work. (Whether those questions are useful or just amusingly absurd is up to you.) Just look at XKCD's What If (https://what-if.xkcd.com/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/), which references online information but nonetheless puts it together in novel ways (density of seawater and approximate volume of a bowling ball gives the minimum weight required for a bowling ball to sink). In the future, that post (https://what-if.xkcd.com/125/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/125/) will show up on the other end of a very strange set of search terms, but there will always be many more questions where that came from, and there are myriad examples online of detailed reasoning from fictional premises. For instance, see http://www.intuitor.com/moviephysics/ http://www.intuitor.com/moviephysics/ , http://physicswithportals.com/ http://physicswithportals.com/ , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize , or https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uG3_RgX9JA0/TboU21S9gNI/AAAAAAAAD5w/zkR3VV91S8Y/s1600/6733226c0117931aa6df7c8d3a8e7127.jpg https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uG3_RgX9JA0/TboU21S9gNI/AAAAAAAAD... .
- lloeki 12y ago
  > On the other hand, access to information can produce an adventure, as well How many of us, solo or in a group, ended up reaching for the asked piece of information basically instantly on Wikipedia, yet, serendipitously hooked on by another piece of information, ended up bouncing around page upon page like a pachinko ball until one says "wait, how did we get up to this already?".
  - mosselman 12y ago
IvyMike 12y ago
Comedian Pete Holmes' take on this from a few years ago: http://youtu.be/PQ4o1N4ksyQ http://youtu.be/PQ4o1N4ksyQ
- jcr 12y ago
  "It's like having a drunk know-it-all in your pocket." Hilarious. We're not quite there yet, but soon though. Just wait until we go from predictive search to preemptive search.
gsam 12y ago
Now known as the finer art of bullshit.
hayksaakian 12y ago
All that's changed is the bar for creativity. There are claims which have no proof or disproof on the web. You have to be more creative in 2015.
hayksaakian 12y ago
All that's changed is the bar for creativity. There are claims which have no proof or disproof on the web. You have to be more creative in 2015.
ciupicri 12y ago
If he wants to engage people he should switch to trolling.
- cbd1984 12y ago
  Yes, because attacking people and bullying them is a wonderful way to make friends and influence people.
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    I think s/he means the type of trolling where you pretend to be monumentally stupid to see whether other people catch on, eg 'what do you mean the world isn't flat, I've been up in a plane so don't think you're fooling me with that round nonsense.' I don't go in for this but I do find it entertaining to read sometimes.
- Evolved 12y ago
  Trolls are what folks in my day used to call assholes. Trolling isn't just joking with your buddies about something innocuous. It has become an excuse for just being a jerk to people and hoping they don't pop you in the nose. On the other hand there are genuine good pranksters whose craft is finely honed and deserving of appreciation.
  - ciupicri 12y ago
    Of course that in this context it's the latter just as anigbrowl's comment proves.
user02 12y ago
This is stupid, you're all stupid.
coldtea 12y ago
Actually Google (and Wikipedia et al) enabled an even more evolved form of bullshit. The kind were people with shallow (or none) knowledge of a topic check some reference source they half understand and try to pass of as experts in the subject matter... At least with reference books you had to own them in the first place and get into the trouble to locate a reference in their index etc. Now any bozo can check an obscure lemma in a matter of seconds and pretend he knows what he's talking about in an online discussion (and often offline), going back to check more details in the process any time his bluff is close to be discovered.
- mreiland 12y ago
  While looking at wiki isn't going to make you an expert, basing your opinion on a wiki article isn't exactly the worst thing in the world to do.
rey12rey 12y ago
This art is well and truly alive in football(soccer) pubs today, at least in the 10+ ones I frequent on occasion. No one there respects stats or facts or whatever. Everyone is always right.
drawkbox 12y ago
There was a comedian that talked about this a couple years ago. The old 'Swear to God' that would prove any piece of fine BS to your friends, is no longer valid. Swear to Google is the new 'believe me'. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoVxOLew_cU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoVxOLew_cU (towards the end).
bussiere 12y ago
Except if you find a conspiracy website that say that they are, and your friend will tell you that's a conspiracy and THEY are sibling. That's juste what they want you to believe. Here in france we have a lot of people that believe theses websites
polarix 12y ago
I'm struggling to identify what it is about this nostalgia that infuriates me so deeply. Perhaps it's just fascinating to me that so many people find it fun to be in stupid situations. I find it barbaric and twisted. More productively, I wonder how people would respond to this after having grown up with the boundary of their 30s knowledge horizon roughly equivalent to that of humanity's experts 10yr prior. Anyone born since ~2000 perhaps is in this situation. Will they have eliminated this kind of "fun" "bullshit" from their behavior completely?
- bung 12y ago
  1. Provide instant answers to everyone on the planet 2. No one ever lies again 3. ??? 4. Star Trek becomes real
  - chris_wot 12y ago
    You'll get a Riker.
- swatow 12y ago
  For me it's the assumption that if since a particular circumstance triggered an interesting social interaction, that the lack of that circumstance would mean that no interesting social interaction would occur. At the base, it's the same hollow critique of millennials: because they do things differently (e.g. interact socially online as well as in person) they must be missing out on all the great things that the Boomers experienced.
  - Klinky 12y ago
    This looks to be a Gen X story. I am not sure what the Boomers have to do with this?
- barsonme 12y ago
  I honestly believe we live our lives for the moments that aren't spent learning. Facts are facts, and that's just about it. This behavior is "fun" because their bullshitting about Steven Tyler led to them meeting up with some girls, going to some bars, and having a good night out. It's weird how all these advancements in technology that were supposed to free up our time have just taken up more of our time. It's sad, really. Learning used to be an adventure, and sometimes you were wrong. It was a game, even if you knew the answer beforehand. Now it's a chore, and I really don't see all these bullshit facts being removed from our society today, even though almost everything is a few taps of your iPhone away.
KaiserPro 12y ago
Sadly google hasn't killed "the bullshit". The rise of personal/social media means that we can live in our own bubble of whatever view we choose. This was exposed quite starkly with this story: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/cancer-is-best-death-so-dont-try-to-cure-it-says-doctor-9952361.html http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/... If you exclude the pro/cons comments (and the abuse) you're left with loads of "charities have the cure, they are holding them back" they defy sense, yet are reassured by the people about them.
LargeCompanies 12y ago
Holy moly, the Internet thrives on bullshit. You best not believe much you see on the Internet! So much crap is made up and goes viral for surprise the almighty dollar.
robobro 12y ago
Funnily enough, the Guinness Book of World Records started for a similar reason, settling barroom trivia bets
k__ 12y ago
I'm happy that it's over. My step-dad always posed with his fact-knowledge as if it was the holy grail of wisdom. It even led to this bullshitting in the link. If he didn't know something, he made it up. Or he would tell us about some (anecdotical!) evidence for this and that. Today, I just flip out my smartphone and look it up and after that, everyone learned something. Sometimes the facts are so ridiculous or shocking that knowing the truth can be funny or exciting too :)
anigbrowl 12y ago
Read any newspaper article on global warming - the comments section is guaranteed to contain humongous amounts of bullshit. Actually, the comments section on just about any news article is guaranteed to contain humongous amounts of bullshit. OK, it's not really the fun entertaining sort of bullshit, but you've got to take what you can get.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
Alex_Jiang 12y ago
If anything google made all types of bullshit more accessible. Just search for articles about: Non-stick pans, chem-trails, hollow-earth theory, etc. etc.
- puredemo 12y ago
  What is the bullshit associated with non-stick pans? The off-gassing when they heat up to much?
swang 12y ago
"Oh great, now we don't have a reason to go out"... SAID NO ONE EVER.
chris_wot 12y ago
I once tried to find out on Wikipedia whether goldfish really have ten second attention spans. I learned that in Nix vs. Heddon the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a tomato is a vegetable, not a fruit.
- olalonde 12y ago
  Couldn't resist Googling that and there is indeed a Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nix_v._Hedden http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nix_v._Hedden
- minikites 12y ago
  Also, X-men toys are "toys" not "dolls" because they're non-human. X-men fans got mad, heh. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz,_Inc._v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz,_Inc._v._United_States
  - bryanrasmussen 12y ago
    The X-Men are the next step in doll evolution.
- mikecb 12y ago
  Under a specific tax statute.
- chernevik 12y ago
  Would you please go back and find out about the goldfish? I'm curious, but fear I'd never come back if I went to look for myself.
  - pgy 12y ago
    Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfish#Intelligence http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfish#Intelligence
    - chernevik 12y ago
mrweasel 12y ago
Bullshit hasn't gone anywhere, sadly. Politicians, the media, companies and people in general spew out more bullshit than ever before, despite the fact that we have easier access to facts than ever before. No one care to check: "it's in the news, so it must be true". Or the alternative, we assume it's all bullshit, even when it's not. It often seems that we don't care if somethings is bullshit. If it appeals to us we don't want to run the risk of being proven wrong. If we don't like the bullshit that's coming our way there's no point in proving it wrong, because "everyone knows that it's bullshit".
everyone 12y ago
You can still bullshit. You just cant do it by inventing random easily unverified factoids. You need to be a bit more inventive and creative these days.
- pistle 12y ago
  9/11 was an inside job.
xianshou 12y ago
The world, pre-Google, abounded in serendipitous quests to find one piece of information offline. The world, post-Google, abounds in serendipitous quests to find many pieces of information online, such as starting at a given book on Amazon and moving down the chain of Amazon's "Customers Also Bought", or embarking on a semi-infinite dive through Wikipedia. Any of these can turn into a game given the right mindset. Who can connect Klein bottles to the Gettysburg address in the fewest links? Of course, that's not to disparage the fun of lacking access to proper information. Just look at these bodybuilders arguing over the number of days in a week: http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/233107/two-body-builders-argue-on-the-internet-about-how-many-days-are-in-the-week/ http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/233107/two-body-builders-arg...
- asifjamil 12y ago
  That bodybuilding.com thread is gold
mark_l_watson 12y ago
I find it difficult to relate to negative comments (for easy access to information) in this thread. A story that might be interesting: We live in Arizona. Last year two old guys (really old, about my age :-) got out of their pickup truck and walked over to me while I was gassing up our car and asked for directions to some obscure little town. After asking why they were travelling (they were on the way to some distant relative's house for a party) I pulled out my droid phone and used the voice interface to Google Now to ask for driving directions; we also got a warning about a road closure. Neither of these guys had ever owned a computer so they asked the obvious questions of how much would a similar phone cost and where to get one. I would bet that they had a smart phone within days. +1 for easy access to information.
nl 12y ago
Drop bears are a carnivorous, highly aggressive cousin of the Koala. 1) Koalas are from Australia, and in Australia every animal tries to kill you. 2) The AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM[1] has an entire page on them[2]. 3) Australian Geographic (the Australian cousin of National Geographic) has a long post about how they tend to target non-native homo-sapiens[3] 4) This study[4] shows how they are best tracked by indirect means. PDF available at [5] [1] http://australianmuseum.net.au/ http://australianmuseum.net.au/ [2] http://australianmuseum.net.au/Drop-Bear http://australianmuseum.net.au/Drop-Bear [3] http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/03/drop-bears-target-tourists,-study-says/ http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/03/drop-bea... [4] http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00049182.2012.731307#.VLp3DIqUfCI http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00049182.2012.731... [5] http://eprints.utas.edu.au/16293/1/2013_Janssen_APAS2013_proceedings_version.pdf http://eprints.utas.edu.au/16293/1/2013_Janssen_APAS2013_pro...
lotsofmangos 12y ago
Given the plethora of competing bullshit-castles being constructed online, a google search could easily end with them believing that Steven Tyler and Mary Tyler Moore are not only brother and sister, but are also secret agents of the Illuminated Seers of Bavaria.
Jugurtha 12y ago
Cool narrative :)
teddyh 12y ago
“What did we do before Google?” “We wondered about stupid stuff all day until we forgot about it.” http://www.absurdnotions.org/an20031223.gif http://www.absurdnotions.org/an20031223.gif (From http://www.absurdnotions.org/page112.html http://www.absurdnotions.org/page112.html)
jdietrich 12y ago
"Where can I find a women's shelter?" "Is it normal to be attracted to other boys?" "Can I claim food stamps?" "Is my employer allowed to deduct breakages from my pay?" "How much is cassava selling for in Lagos?" Knowledge changes lives. As technologists, we are at the forefront of a revolution that has the potential to banish ignorance forever, for everyone. We have a basic moral duty to honour that responsibility, to recognise the real risks of what we are doing, and to work for the benefit of humanity. The fun of bullshitting is something I am happy to accept as a casualty of war. Frankly, I think it's rather bourgeois to gripe about it. I'm far more concerned about personalised search results inadvertently working to intellectually ghettoise us and reinforce prejudices. I'm concerned about the effect that paywalled academic journals might be having on the spread of pseudoscience. I'm concerned that IT systems are being designed predominantly by middle-class Americans in liberal cities, who are often ignorant of how their design decisions might affect people who are living in more repressive environments. Bullshit should die unmourned, because we've got more important things to worry about.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- jljljl 12y ago
  It's possible to both lament the loss of bullshitting, and the interaction it generates, while also appreciating the significant improvements technology has brought.
- copenja 12y ago
  I don't think the thesis of the article was that instant access to information is bad for society. I think the article was more a reflection on how radically things have changed, and that, even if things are generally much better now, there still were unexpected positives to simpler times.
meesterdude 12y ago
I found myself thinking "the fine art of bullshit, as told by a bullshitter" while reading this article. I was annoyed because there is no subheading or useful intro that tells me what this is about so i can decide if I want to read it or not. Just a vague title and a vague picture. The writer might think this is clever -- I think its misplaced.
moultano 12y ago
I mostly see upsides. Instead of uncertainty about random trivia, the conversation can be based on certainty about amazing trivia. Did you know that early South-Americans used the shells of giant turtle-like mammals as houses? Isn't that crazy? Here, check out a picture of one. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Glyptodon_asper_front.JPG http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Glyptodon... Or as xkcd put it, you are one of the lucky 10,000! http://xkcd.com/1053/ http://xkcd.com/1053/

283 points by JacobAldridge 12y ago

The bullshit didn't even have to be believable: "Marilyn Manson was the kid that played Paul from the Wonder Years. Also, he had a rib removed so he could perform autofellatio." Kids everywhere believed that. Hilarious.

spiritplumber 12y ago
We heard that about Gabriele D'Annunzio...
cbd1984 12y ago
Right, like "Vaccines cause autism" and "Homeopathy is something you should say without laughing". Also hilarious. There's a dark side to bullshit. There's a side which creates endless pain for no good reason, because things 'sound good' or are 'too good to check' and nobody likes a party-pooper, do they? Especially when the party-pooper is pointing out how this little piece of bullshit could kill someone. No. Go along to get along. Don't be so serious all the time. Don't imagine you know better. It's rude.
- HCIdivision17 12y ago
  As stolio notes elsewhere in the thread, there is a blunt difference. On the one side there's bullshit that matters, and on the other side is "no seriously, they both have Tyler in their name!" It is absolutely necessary to be able to tell the difference, since it's a basic way to avoid being conversationally tone deaf. Alternatively, I invoke Poe's Law in case I'm being That Guy. (Tone's hard on the Internet - it's much better to play in person!)
- xorcist 12y ago
  Yet "vaccines cause autism" has spread like a virus over the Internet. I had never heard about it before the recent (ten years) memification. It's not like the recipients google it and go "no it doesn't" because it you really do you might as well go mad about the insane "facts" put forth. Google and the web in general probably spread as much bullshit as it kills. It's complicated.
  - lione 12y ago
    On those kind of issues, the google results are a bit muddled. You'll get the results saying "No, of course vaccines don't cause autism", alongside a bunch of BS articles saying "It totally does, because I had my kid vaccinated once, and he's autistic!". Unless you actually search through the sources and figure out which is more credible, it's hard to get a straight yes or no answer.
igrekel 12y ago
Yep, my nieces and nephew, all six of them from 12 to 20 all believed that the guy who did the song "Don't worry be happy" had committed suicide. I had to show them recent videos of Bobby McFerrin, his webpage, and then prove he had done that song.

noonespecial 12y ago

Its actually become a fun game around here. Someone makes an outrageous claim and it starts a race to be the first to call them on it. Phones get drawn like six-guns and its on! We call this little victory of fact finding the "fonesnope". (Or "getting fonesnoped" if you happen to be the claimant). Its a fun party game. Try it.

increment_i 12y ago

As a kid I remember family discussions surrounding the legitimacy of certain pieces of trivia, often reaching the point where people began trying to shout over each other. Eventually, my uncle would pick up the phone, dial a random number and say, "Hi there, you wouldn't happen to know who directed Casablanca would you?"

crazygringo 12y ago

I have a rule I always follow, and have convinced many friends of too -- no Googling/Wikipedia-ing in social settings. If nobody knows something (trivia-like), it's almost always a lot more fun to continue not knowing. Sure, look it up when you get home. But a little group self-discipline goes far in keeping the fine art of bullshitting alive. (And it's not just the answer that kills the conversation, but also the fact that someone is right and someone is wrong, game over. Much better to keep the game going!)

jonathanwallace 12y ago
Oh wow. Preferred ignorance as entertainment. In hindsight, it is so obvious that this would be a preference in our information overloaded lives. I agree with you. That sounds like much more fun.
joshvm 12y ago
At least with the people I know, most trivia is the sort of thing they already found on the internet. If you browse Reddit and none of your friends do, you're pretty much guaranteed to know some bizarre fact. Similarly with programs like QI, it's often quite easy to know where people get their facts from (the conversation usually ends with "You got that from QI didn't you?" "Yes. I did.") On the other hand I find it incredibly difficult to shut up when someone says something wrong about computing (or usually about some current affairs topic in computing). Don't be that guy.
- JoshTriplett 12y ago
  > On the other hand I find it incredibly difficult to shut up when someone says something wrong about computing (or usually about some current affairs topic in computing). Don't be that guy. I look it as an opportunity to see how many people outside the computing field see it. It's sometimes horrifying, but on the other hand, my most common reaction is "that explains so much".
cbd1984 12y ago
I disagree. The conversation is so much more interesting when there are more connections, more tangents to explore than one mind can contain. Facts build on facts, and you can chase down endless rabbit holes when you're not limited to what one wrinkly lump of cholesterol can scrape out of its interconnected canyons.

pervycreeper 12y ago

Good riddance? I believe I'm missing some profound point that the TFA is apparently making.

harshreality 12y ago
The point is that uncertainty about some things creates social engagement.
- pervycreeper 12y ago
  Well, there are still things to be uncertain about that aren't useless trivia, factoids, or urban legends. Hopefully the new BS free era will trickle down to the lower classes, gradually eroding their ignorance and prejudices, at least about one-liner facts.
  - Gatsky 12y ago
    Hopefully this new era will also gradually mitigate lazy generalizations and atavistic class distinctions.
    - pervycreeper 12y ago
      Point taken, but please read for the kernel of truth that remains after all the nits have been picked off.
  - eropple 12y ago
    It has indeed been entire minutes since I saw somebody rationalize their well-actuallying into social good. Well done.
- coldtea 12y ago
  Not to mention that you can come up with some interesting ideas, art and even inventions when facing such uncertainty -- stuff that is lost otherwise.

uniclaude 12y ago

For those looking for never ending talks and debates about what is true or not, we still have philosophy, religion, and of course politics. Moreover, there's a lot of room the "The Fine Art of Bullshit" there.

stolio 12y ago
Those are divisive topics, those are debates that matter. For increased social cohesion play-fighting over bullshit is better, there's a subtext that the only reason it's worth it is you actually enjoy the company of those around you.

yzzxy 12y ago

_why wrote about this phenomenon in CLOSURE: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5764687/CLOSURE.pdf https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/5764687/CLOSURE.pdf The segment in question runs from about page 29 through 34. I unfolded my napkin and got the silverware out. "I don't remember." She got out her phone. "No, don't go there." "I. M. D. B." Her fingers. "Oh, Cristian Douglas," I said. "It was Cristian Douglas." Still typing, head leaned back, under the spell of her phone.

stana 12y ago

Not only bullshit. I remember in one of the Beatles interviews how early on they found out that some guy in town knew the B7 guitar chord. They would get on a bus to meet this guy to learn the chord. This journey would not exist today :(

juliangregorian 12y ago
Smells fishy to me. I could figure out B7 in like, a minute, and I'm not a good guitarist at all.

JoshTriplett 12y ago

The story posted in the article provides a romanticized illustration of how finding knowledge in a world without easy access to it can produce an adventure. (I like that it doesn't directly say which of the 1994 or 2014 versions was better, though there's sure an implication from how they're painted.) On the other hand, access to information can produce an adventure, as well; so can many other things. In the end, the right group of friends can end up on wild adventures for any number of reasons. That's leaving aside the implications of having easy access to information to answer more important questions. Questions for which there's a known right answer should get resolved as quickly as possible. That leaves more time for the questions that the Internet and all the other resources we have available can help answer, but which still require work. (Whether those questions are useful or just amusingly absurd is up to you.) Just look at XKCD's What If (https://what-if.xkcd.com/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/), which references online information but nonetheless puts it together in novel ways (density of seawater and approximate volume of a bowling ball gives the minimum weight required for a bowling ball to sink). In the future, that post (https://what-if.xkcd.com/125/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/125/) will show up on the other end of a very strange set of search terms, but there will always be many more questions where that came from, and there are myriad examples online of detailed reasoning from fictional premises. For instance, see http://www.intuitor.com/moviephysics/ http://www.intuitor.com/moviephysics/ , http://physicswithportals.com/ http://physicswithportals.com/ , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize , or https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uG3_RgX9JA0/TboU21S9gNI/AAAAAAAAD5w/zkR3VV91S8Y/s1600/6733226c0117931aa6df7c8d3a8e7127.jpg https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uG3_RgX9JA0/TboU21S9gNI/AAAAAAAAD... .

lloeki 12y ago
> On the other hand, access to information can produce an adventure, as well How many of us, solo or in a group, ended up reaching for the asked piece of information basically instantly on Wikipedia, yet, serendipitously hooked on by another piece of information, ended up bouncing around page upon page like a pachinko ball until one says "wait, how did we get up to this already?".
- mosselman 12y ago

IvyMike 12y ago

Comedian Pete Holmes' take on this from a few years ago: http://youtu.be/PQ4o1N4ksyQ http://youtu.be/PQ4o1N4ksyQ

jcr 12y ago
"It's like having a drunk know-it-all in your pocket." Hilarious. We're not quite there yet, but soon though. Just wait until we go from predictive search to preemptive search.

gsam 12y ago

Now known as the finer art of bullshit.

hayksaakian 12y ago

All that's changed is the bar for creativity. There are claims which have no proof or disproof on the web. You have to be more creative in 2015.

hayksaakian 12y ago

All that's changed is the bar for creativity. There are claims which have no proof or disproof on the web. You have to be more creative in 2015.

ciupicri 12y ago

If he wants to engage people he should switch to trolling.

cbd1984 12y ago
Yes, because attacking people and bullying them is a wonderful way to make friends and influence people.
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  I think s/he means the type of trolling where you pretend to be monumentally stupid to see whether other people catch on, eg 'what do you mean the world isn't flat, I've been up in a plane so don't think you're fooling me with that round nonsense.' I don't go in for this but I do find it entertaining to read sometimes.
Evolved 12y ago
Trolls are what folks in my day used to call assholes. Trolling isn't just joking with your buddies about something innocuous. It has become an excuse for just being a jerk to people and hoping they don't pop you in the nose. On the other hand there are genuine good pranksters whose craft is finely honed and deserving of appreciation.
- ciupicri 12y ago
  Of course that in this context it's the latter just as anigbrowl's comment proves.

user02 12y ago

This is stupid, you're all stupid.

coldtea 12y ago

Actually Google (and Wikipedia et al) enabled an even more evolved form of bullshit. The kind were people with shallow (or none) knowledge of a topic check some reference source they half understand and try to pass of as experts in the subject matter... At least with reference books you had to own them in the first place and get into the trouble to locate a reference in their index etc. Now any bozo can check an obscure lemma in a matter of seconds and pretend he knows what he's talking about in an online discussion (and often offline), going back to check more details in the process any time his bluff is close to be discovered.

mreiland 12y ago
While looking at wiki isn't going to make you an expert, basing your opinion on a wiki article isn't exactly the worst thing in the world to do.

rey12rey 12y ago

This art is well and truly alive in football(soccer) pubs today, at least in the 10+ ones I frequent on occasion. No one there respects stats or facts or whatever. Everyone is always right.

drawkbox 12y ago

There was a comedian that talked about this a couple years ago. The old 'Swear to God' that would prove any piece of fine BS to your friends, is no longer valid. Swear to Google is the new 'believe me'. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoVxOLew_cU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoVxOLew_cU (towards the end).

bussiere 12y ago

Except if you find a conspiracy website that say that they are, and your friend will tell you that's a conspiracy and THEY are sibling. That's juste what they want you to believe. Here in france we have a lot of people that believe theses websites

polarix 12y ago

I'm struggling to identify what it is about this nostalgia that infuriates me so deeply. Perhaps it's just fascinating to me that so many people find it fun to be in stupid situations. I find it barbaric and twisted. More productively, I wonder how people would respond to this after having grown up with the boundary of their 30s knowledge horizon roughly equivalent to that of humanity's experts 10yr prior. Anyone born since ~2000 perhaps is in this situation. Will they have eliminated this kind of "fun" "bullshit" from their behavior completely?

bung 12y ago
1. Provide instant answers to everyone on the planet 2. No one ever lies again 3. ??? 4. Star Trek becomes real
- chris_wot 12y ago
  You'll get a Riker.
swatow 12y ago
For me it's the assumption that if since a particular circumstance triggered an interesting social interaction, that the lack of that circumstance would mean that no interesting social interaction would occur. At the base, it's the same hollow critique of millennials: because they do things differently (e.g. interact socially online as well as in person) they must be missing out on all the great things that the Boomers experienced.
- Klinky 12y ago
  This looks to be a Gen X story. I am not sure what the Boomers have to do with this?
barsonme 12y ago
I honestly believe we live our lives for the moments that aren't spent learning. Facts are facts, and that's just about it. This behavior is "fun" because their bullshitting about Steven Tyler led to them meeting up with some girls, going to some bars, and having a good night out. It's weird how all these advancements in technology that were supposed to free up our time have just taken up more of our time. It's sad, really. Learning used to be an adventure, and sometimes you were wrong. It was a game, even if you knew the answer beforehand. Now it's a chore, and I really don't see all these bullshit facts being removed from our society today, even though almost everything is a few taps of your iPhone away.

KaiserPro 12y ago

Sadly google hasn't killed "the bullshit". The rise of personal/social media means that we can live in our own bubble of whatever view we choose. This was exposed quite starkly with this story: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/cancer-is-best-death-so-dont-try-to-cure-it-says-doctor-9952361.html http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/... If you exclude the pro/cons comments (and the abuse) you're left with loads of "charities have the cure, they are holding them back" they defy sense, yet are reassured by the people about them.

LargeCompanies 12y ago

Holy moly, the Internet thrives on bullshit. You best not believe much you see on the Internet! So much crap is made up and goes viral for surprise the almighty dollar.

robobro 12y ago

Funnily enough, the Guinness Book of World Records started for a similar reason, settling barroom trivia bets

k__ 12y ago

I'm happy that it's over. My step-dad always posed with his fact-knowledge as if it was the holy grail of wisdom. It even led to this bullshitting in the link. If he didn't know something, he made it up. Or he would tell us about some (anecdotical!) evidence for this and that. Today, I just flip out my smartphone and look it up and after that, everyone learned something. Sometimes the facts are so ridiculous or shocking that knowing the truth can be funny or exciting too :)

anigbrowl 12y ago

Read any newspaper article on global warming - the comments section is guaranteed to contain humongous amounts of bullshit. Actually, the comments section on just about any news article is guaranteed to contain humongous amounts of bullshit. OK, it's not really the fun entertaining sort of bullshit, but you've got to take what you can get.

deleted 12y ago
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Alex_Jiang 12y ago

If anything google made all types of bullshit more accessible. Just search for articles about: Non-stick pans, chem-trails, hollow-earth theory, etc. etc.

puredemo 12y ago
What is the bullshit associated with non-stick pans? The off-gassing when they heat up to much?

swang 12y ago

"Oh great, now we don't have a reason to go out"... SAID NO ONE EVER.

chris_wot 12y ago

I once tried to find out on Wikipedia whether goldfish really have ten second attention spans. I learned that in Nix vs. Heddon the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a tomato is a vegetable, not a fruit.

olalonde 12y ago
Couldn't resist Googling that and there is indeed a Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nix_v._Hedden http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nix_v._Hedden
minikites 12y ago
Also, X-men toys are "toys" not "dolls" because they're non-human. X-men fans got mad, heh. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz,_Inc._v._United_States http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_Biz,_Inc._v._United_States
- bryanrasmussen 12y ago
  The X-Men are the next step in doll evolution.
mikecb 12y ago
Under a specific tax statute.
chernevik 12y ago
Would you please go back and find out about the goldfish? I'm curious, but fear I'd never come back if I went to look for myself.
- pgy 12y ago
  Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfish#Intelligence http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldfish#Intelligence
  - chernevik 12y ago

mrweasel 12y ago

Bullshit hasn't gone anywhere, sadly. Politicians, the media, companies and people in general spew out more bullshit than ever before, despite the fact that we have easier access to facts than ever before. No one care to check: "it's in the news, so it must be true". Or the alternative, we assume it's all bullshit, even when it's not. It often seems that we don't care if somethings is bullshit. If it appeals to us we don't want to run the risk of being proven wrong. If we don't like the bullshit that's coming our way there's no point in proving it wrong, because "everyone knows that it's bullshit".

everyone 12y ago

You can still bullshit. You just cant do it by inventing random easily unverified factoids. You need to be a bit more inventive and creative these days.

pistle 12y ago
9/11 was an inside job.

xianshou 12y ago

The world, pre-Google, abounded in serendipitous quests to find one piece of information offline. The world, post-Google, abounds in serendipitous quests to find many pieces of information online, such as starting at a given book on Amazon and moving down the chain of Amazon's "Customers Also Bought", or embarking on a semi-infinite dive through Wikipedia. Any of these can turn into a game given the right mindset. Who can connect Klein bottles to the Gettysburg address in the fewest links? Of course, that's not to disparage the fun of lacking access to proper information. Just look at these bodybuilders arguing over the number of days in a week: http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/233107/two-body-builders-argue-on-the-internet-about-how-many-days-are-in-the-week/ http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/233107/two-body-builders-arg...

asifjamil 12y ago
That bodybuilding.com thread is gold

mark_l_watson 12y ago

I find it difficult to relate to negative comments (for easy access to information) in this thread. A story that might be interesting: We live in Arizona. Last year two old guys (really old, about my age :-) got out of their pickup truck and walked over to me while I was gassing up our car and asked for directions to some obscure little town. After asking why they were travelling (they were on the way to some distant relative's house for a party) I pulled out my droid phone and used the voice interface to Google Now to ask for driving directions; we also got a warning about a road closure. Neither of these guys had ever owned a computer so they asked the obvious questions of how much would a similar phone cost and where to get one. I would bet that they had a smart phone within days. +1 for easy access to information.

nl 12y ago

Drop bears are a carnivorous, highly aggressive cousin of the Koala. 1) Koalas are from Australia, and in Australia every animal tries to kill you. 2) The AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM[1] has an entire page on them[2]. 3) Australian Geographic (the Australian cousin of National Geographic) has a long post about how they tend to target non-native homo-sapiens[3] 4) This study[4] shows how they are best tracked by indirect means. PDF available at [5] [1] http://australianmuseum.net.au/ http://australianmuseum.net.au/ [2] http://australianmuseum.net.au/Drop-Bear http://australianmuseum.net.au/Drop-Bear [3] http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/03/drop-bears-target-tourists,-study-says/ http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/news/2013/03/drop-bea... [4] http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00049182.2012.731307#.VLp3DIqUfCI http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00049182.2012.731... [5] http://eprints.utas.edu.au/16293/1/2013_Janssen_APAS2013_proceedings_version.pdf http://eprints.utas.edu.au/16293/1/2013_Janssen_APAS2013_pro...

lotsofmangos 12y ago

Given the plethora of competing bullshit-castles being constructed online, a google search could easily end with them believing that Steven Tyler and Mary Tyler Moore are not only brother and sister, but are also secret agents of the Illuminated Seers of Bavaria.

Jugurtha 12y ago

Cool narrative :)

teddyh 12y ago

“What did we do before Google?” “We wondered about stupid stuff all day until we forgot about it.” http://www.absurdnotions.org/an20031223.gif http://www.absurdnotions.org/an20031223.gif (From http://www.absurdnotions.org/page112.html http://www.absurdnotions.org/page112.html)

jdietrich 12y ago

"Where can I find a women's shelter?" "Is it normal to be attracted to other boys?" "Can I claim food stamps?" "Is my employer allowed to deduct breakages from my pay?" "How much is cassava selling for in Lagos?" Knowledge changes lives. As technologists, we are at the forefront of a revolution that has the potential to banish ignorance forever, for everyone. We have a basic moral duty to honour that responsibility, to recognise the real risks of what we are doing, and to work for the benefit of humanity. The fun of bullshitting is something I am happy to accept as a casualty of war. Frankly, I think it's rather bourgeois to gripe about it. I'm far more concerned about personalised search results inadvertently working to intellectually ghettoise us and reinforce prejudices. I'm concerned about the effect that paywalled academic journals might be having on the spread of pseudoscience. I'm concerned that IT systems are being designed predominantly by middle-class Americans in liberal cities, who are often ignorant of how their design decisions might affect people who are living in more repressive environments. Bullshit should die unmourned, because we've got more important things to worry about.

deleted 12y ago
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jljljl 12y ago
It's possible to both lament the loss of bullshitting, and the interaction it generates, while also appreciating the significant improvements technology has brought.
copenja 12y ago
I don't think the thesis of the article was that instant access to information is bad for society. I think the article was more a reflection on how radically things have changed, and that, even if things are generally much better now, there still were unexpected positives to simpler times.

meesterdude 12y ago

I found myself thinking "the fine art of bullshit, as told by a bullshitter" while reading this article. I was annoyed because there is no subheading or useful intro that tells me what this is about so i can decide if I want to read it or not. Just a vague title and a vague picture. The writer might think this is clever -- I think its misplaced.

moultano 12y ago

I mostly see upsides. Instead of uncertainty about random trivia, the conversation can be based on certainty about amazing trivia. Did you know that early South-Americans used the shells of giant turtle-like mammals as houses? Isn't that crazy? Here, check out a picture of one. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Glyptodon_asper_front.JPG http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Glyptodon... Or as xkcd put it, you are one of the lucky 10,000! http://xkcd.com/1053/ http://xkcd.com/1053/