My kid is constantly irritated w my husband and me for not knowing how things work. “You use xyz every day of your life and you never thought to ASK??!!!”
Hmmm, is the tapping example an “unknown known?” I would think of an unknown known as something more like:
1) A person thinks they won’t know how to do something, but then once they start doing it they realize they actually *do* know how.
2) You think you don’t know some factual statement, but then a couple seconds later you remember and realize you actually do know.
The tapping example is different. The noun “known” refers to one person, but the adjective “unknown” is a *different* person. Contrast this with the other three in the set: the adjective and the noun refer to the same group (collective society.)
Fair point that it isn't the best example of an unknown known, it's using knowledge without knowing you're using it rather than not knowing you know it.
I want to push back one the "expert makes bad math teacher" narrative, because I think it has become an excuse for math teachers to not study deeper math, which contributes to the bad state math education is in. What I see is that teachers do not have the depth of knowledge to teach in a nuanced way, instead they waste time repeating the same points, and mistake window dressing with pedagogy. I would argue that they suffer from a different blind spot: they have an illusion of mastery and don't even know what they don't know.
No doubt there are cases where a lack of expertise is a hindrance! Most likely the best teachers are those who have the combination of expertise in the subject matter and expertise in teaching. I think subject matter expertise helps you see the deeper connections that can help in many teaching situations, but expertise in teaching the subject matter means knowing what concepts are needed to scaffold each stage of learning.
The research I cited seems to indicate expertise can make you further out of step with knowing what concepts are needed at specific stages in learning--that's much easier to remedy than a lack of deep expertise in the subject matter, I would think
I would like to link to another post, that is to the side of this post, but which adds to how our brains operate. I am far from an expert on these matters but find the latest theories extremely interesting. Hope you don't mind.
This is the first time I have faced an article which talks about unknown knowns—those which became, for me, undoubtedly part of my being, such as from others.
I approach this from Heidegger's ontological approach—though I have a hunch you're more prone to the analytical side...
But for me, there's an epistemological movement that's very clear, which is based on
All the knowledge in the world is already veiled in the being-of-presence (Dasein).
(The presence is me, you, or anyone else...)
But it is undifferentiated, without a defined form, and lacking its qualities.
When we become aware of the universal character of "individual" existence, which is always universal at a naturalistic perspective, we can understand that if we are in everything, knowledge is too.
Being in everything, the one who wants to develop the shape of a particular fragmentation of knowledge (let's say, geometry) must do the following:
1 - Grasp the unknown object and gather informations from this object from external sources, since existence is being considered, in its final moment, universal, that is shared, as well as our interior knowledge, with every human being and extract from intuition and past-data (memorized) that makes possible to create singular creative associations and finally comprehend the object
Subjectively interpret—never actually knowing what the object is, but knowing enough to make use of it.
Understand the interpretation of the object, which, as I said, is always only an approximation of the reality of the object.
Thus, knowledge is unveiled to presence.
This is not the only way; it seems to me that we can unconsciously jump these steps and reach an unreasonable conclusion that ends up being correct—strange....
It was very interesting to read your article. I love the idea of "not knowing what you know", especially when that hidden knowledge comes out unexpectedly. For example, those moments of social gathering when you say something awesome, leaving everyone in awe. And then you think, "Where the hell did this come from?" Precious.
Who has the more profound knowledge of a penny? Someone who knows what he can buy for a 1000 pennies but couldn’t draw a penny or someone who can draw a perfect penny but has no clue of its use?
The answer to the question of what something truly is can never bypass the question of what knowledge is.
As a consequense our knowledge of what knowledge truly is, will always be incomplete.
Nevertheless our knowledge of what knowledge truly is will be per definition closer to completion than any other knowledge.
My kid is constantly irritated w my husband and me for not knowing how things work. “You use xyz every day of your life and you never thought to ASK??!!!”
Yeah, the constant kid "why" questions can be really humbling!
Hmmm, is the tapping example an “unknown known?” I would think of an unknown known as something more like:
1) A person thinks they won’t know how to do something, but then once they start doing it they realize they actually *do* know how.
2) You think you don’t know some factual statement, but then a couple seconds later you remember and realize you actually do know.
The tapping example is different. The noun “known” refers to one person, but the adjective “unknown” is a *different* person. Contrast this with the other three in the set: the adjective and the noun refer to the same group (collective society.)
Fair point that it isn't the best example of an unknown known, it's using knowledge without knowing you're using it rather than not knowing you know it.
I want to push back one the "expert makes bad math teacher" narrative, because I think it has become an excuse for math teachers to not study deeper math, which contributes to the bad state math education is in. What I see is that teachers do not have the depth of knowledge to teach in a nuanced way, instead they waste time repeating the same points, and mistake window dressing with pedagogy. I would argue that they suffer from a different blind spot: they have an illusion of mastery and don't even know what they don't know.
No doubt there are cases where a lack of expertise is a hindrance! Most likely the best teachers are those who have the combination of expertise in the subject matter and expertise in teaching. I think subject matter expertise helps you see the deeper connections that can help in many teaching situations, but expertise in teaching the subject matter means knowing what concepts are needed to scaffold each stage of learning.
The research I cited seems to indicate expertise can make you further out of step with knowing what concepts are needed at specific stages in learning--that's much easier to remedy than a lack of deep expertise in the subject matter, I would think
I would like to link to another post, that is to the side of this post, but which adds to how our brains operate. I am far from an expert on these matters but find the latest theories extremely interesting. Hope you don't mind.
https://www.brett-p-andersen.com/p/psychological-entropy-and-the-hierarchical
When someone talks about unknown unknown’s, run away because they are smart people about to do something very stupid 😆🤨
Me, after writing a post talking about unknown unknowns: 🤔
"Young man, in mathematics you don't understand things. You just get used to them."
- John von Neumann
The curse of knowledge is worth multiple posts, IMO. It is worth reminding ourselves about, over and over and over.
This is the first time I have faced an article which talks about unknown knowns—those which became, for me, undoubtedly part of my being, such as from others.
I approach this from Heidegger's ontological approach—though I have a hunch you're more prone to the analytical side...
But for me, there's an epistemological movement that's very clear, which is based on
All the knowledge in the world is already veiled in the being-of-presence (Dasein).
(The presence is me, you, or anyone else...)
But it is undifferentiated, without a defined form, and lacking its qualities.
When we become aware of the universal character of "individual" existence, which is always universal at a naturalistic perspective, we can understand that if we are in everything, knowledge is too.
Being in everything, the one who wants to develop the shape of a particular fragmentation of knowledge (let's say, geometry) must do the following:
1 - Grasp the unknown object and gather informations from this object from external sources, since existence is being considered, in its final moment, universal, that is shared, as well as our interior knowledge, with every human being and extract from intuition and past-data (memorized) that makes possible to create singular creative associations and finally comprehend the object
Subjectively interpret—never actually knowing what the object is, but knowing enough to make use of it.
Understand the interpretation of the object, which, as I said, is always only an approximation of the reality of the object.
Thus, knowledge is unveiled to presence.
This is not the only way; it seems to me that we can unconsciously jump these steps and reach an unreasonable conclusion that ends up being correct—strange....
It was very interesting to read your article. I love the idea of "not knowing what you know", especially when that hidden knowledge comes out unexpectedly. For example, those moments of social gathering when you say something awesome, leaving everyone in awe. And then you think, "Where the hell did this come from?" Precious.
Wouldn't this example in the rumsfeld quote be an "unknown known"?
Who has the more profound knowledge of a penny? Someone who knows what he can buy for a 1000 pennies but couldn’t draw a penny or someone who can draw a perfect penny but has no clue of its use?
The answer to the question of what something truly is can never bypass the question of what knowledge is.
As a consequense our knowledge of what knowledge truly is, will always be incomplete.
Nevertheless our knowledge of what knowledge truly is will be per definition closer to completion than any other knowledge.