Harry Frankfurt Quotes

As A Philosopher, I'm Not Obliged To Explore Every Unknown Wilderness.

I Used To Teach At Yale, Which Was At One Time A Center Of Postmodernist Literary Theory. Derrida Was There. Paul De Man Was There.

I Was Raised In Brooklyn And In Baltimore. My Father Was A Bookkeeper. When I Was 36 Years Old, My Mother Told Me I Was Adopted.

It Is Impossible For Someone To Lie Unless He Thinks He Knows The Truth. A Person Who Lies Is Thereby Responding To The Truth, And He Is To That Extent Respectful Of It.

It Is Only Because A Person Has Volitions Of The Second Order That He Is Capable Both Of Enjoying And Of Lacking Freedom Of The Will.

Bullshit Is Unavoidable Whenever Circumstance Require Someone To Talk Without Knowing What He Is Talking About.

There Are Significant Relationships, Of Course, Between Wanting Things And Caring About Them..the Notion Of Caring Is In Large Part Constructed Out Of The Notion Of Desire. Caring About Something May Be, In The End, Nothing More Than A Certain Complex Mode Of Wanting It. However, Simply Attributing Desire To A Person Does Not In Itself Convey That The Person Cares About The Object He Desires.

One Of The Most Salient Features Of Our Culture Is That There Is So Much Bullshit.

One Of The Most Salient Features Of Our Culture Is That There Is So Much Bullshit. Everyone Knows This. Each Of Us Contributes His Share. But We Tend To Take The Situation For Granted. Most People Are Rather Confident Of Their Ability To Recognize Bullshit And To Avoid Being Taken In By It. So The Phenomenon Has Not Aroused Much Deliberate Concern, Or Attracted Much Sustained Inquiry. In Consequence, We Have No Clear Understanding Of What Bullshit Is, Why There Is So Much Of It, Or What Functions It Serves.

The Fact About Himself That The Liar Hides Is That He Is Attempting To Lead Us Away From A Correct Apprehension Of Reality; We Are Not To Know That He Wants Us To Believe Something He Supposes To Be False. The Fact About Himself That The Bullshitter Hides, On The Other Hand, Is That The Truth-values Of His Statements Are Of No Central Interest To Him . . . He Does Not Care Whether The Things He Says Describe Reality Correctly. He Just Picks Them Out, Or Makes Them Up, To Suit His Purpose.

Bullshit Is A Greater Enemy Of The Truth Than Lies Are.

It Is Impossible For Someone To Lie Unless He Thinks He Knows The Truth. Producing Bullshit Requires No Such Conviction.