Difficulty: What the hell
I used to be fit–not just in decent shape, but genuinely fit. I ran half-marathons, spent hours in the boxing gym, lifted weights, cranked more than a thousand pushups, and did multiple sets of 30 pull-ups on the same day. Now, I am nearly twenty kilograms overweight and struggling with nicotine addiction.
I take medication to help suppress my appetite, but yesterday I said “fuck it” and ate fried tofu and fried chicken in the same evening. Weeks ago, I also switched from cigarettes to a combination of heat sticks and a nicotine spray. I’d smoke a heat stick, say “fuck it” yet again, and spray nicotine on the inside of my cheeks right after having a smoke. “I’m losing weight and quitting smoking,” I tell others. “Science shows that rapid weight loss is not sustainable, and neither is quitting cold turkey.”
I know that this is not just weakness of will. It is also, I think, a form of bullshit. More specifically, it is what I want to call akratic bullshit.
Akrasia, or incontinence, is a Greek term that has no easy English translation. It is similar to weakness of will or hypocrisy, but more closely refers to intentionally performing some action despite believing that another course of action would be better.
So when I know I should reduce my caloric intake but eat fried tofu and fried chicken on the same day, that’s akrasia. When I smoke but believe that quitting is better, that’s akrasia.
Not all akrasia is bullshit. I can sincerely try to do what I take to be best and still fail. What makes some cases of akrasia bullshit is not the failure itself, but the performance of commitment. I simulate serious adherence to the relevant norms while not being genuinely guided by them. In that sense, akratic bullshit is not mere weakness; it is weakness masked, misdescribed, or performed as something more disciplined than it really is.
In short, we can define akratic bullshit as follows:
Akratic bullshit is the simulation of the commitment to a goal while not being genuinely guided by the norms, evidence, and practical discipline that the commitment would require.
Note that akratic bullshitters need not be insincere. They need not intentionally mask or misdescribe their failure. Indeed, I sincerely believe that I’m trying to lose weight and quit smoking, but because my concern to adhere to the relevant norms or standards is not genuine (not properly guided by the norms or standards I must respect, given the practice I am engaged in), what I do is still bullshit. So the issue is not whether I want to quit. The issue is whether my conduct is genuinely guided by that goal, or whether I am merely performing commitment to it while continuing to organize my behavior around competing desires.
Sometimes, akratic bullshit overlaps with classic representational bullshit, whose definition can also cleanly capture this species in cases like this. Revisit my definition of classic representational bullshit:
Bullshit is (a) speech or deed that simulates adherence to standards of reasoning or truth without a genuine concern to get things right, or (b) speech or deed that displays indifference to any relevant standards of representational correctness.
This case of akratic bullshit fits this definition. When I say, “I’m gradually quitting or losing weight because that’s what the science supports,” I am:
- simulating evidence-guided reasoning
- invoking research and rationality
- performing honesty and realism without being genuinely guided by a concern to get the situation right
This overlap between akratic bullshit and classic representational bullshit matters because it points to a family resemblance in our taxonomy of bullshit. We can create new definitions to capture different species of bullshit, but we don’t want to have one definition for every species that pops up. That would be ad hoc and theoretically unhelpful.
The point, then, is not that every failed diet or failed attempt to quit smoking is bullshit. It is that some failures are accompanied by a performance of commitment that masks what is really going on. Akratic bullshit names that performance. And once we see it, we can also see how it connects self-deception, rationalization, and classic representational bullshit within a single broader framework.
Philosophy without Bullshit 