The Power Of Knowing What You Don’t Know

We barely know anything about anything.

In his book Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman introduces his theory of the two modes of thought:

· System 1, which operates instinctively. We use this system when we make split decisions, react automatically, or become emotional.

· System 2, which requires deep effort and analysis. We use this system when trying to solve complex problems and when we use logic to find solutions.

We mostly use System 1 — we often quickly react without taking time to fully assess situations. We make assumptions without challenging our thoughts and overlook small details that we don’t feel like dealing with.

Case in point, the Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT). The CRT was created by Yale marketing professor Shane Frederick to test how well people reflect when solving problems. The test consists of just three questions.

Want to find out how reflective you are? Try the questions below and jot your answers down.

1. A bat and a ball cost $1.10. The bat costs one dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?

2. In a lake, there is a patch of lily pads. Every day, the patch doubles in size. If it takes 48 days for the patch to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half the lake?

3. If it takes 5 machines 5 minutes to make 5 widgets, how long would it take 100 machines to make 100 widgets?

If you’re like most people who take this test, you probably got the following answers:

1. 10 cents

2. 24 days

3. 100 minutes

These are the first answers that spring to mind after reading the questions, and they seem correct. But they’re not.

If the ball costs 10 cents, the total cost of the bat and ball would be $1.20, not $1.10.

If the lake is half-covered on day 24, and the patch doubles in size every day, the lake would be fully covered on day 25, not day 48.

If it took 100 minutes for 100 machines to make 100 widgets, it would also take 5 machines 100 minutes to make 5 widgets (each machine makes 1 widget in the same amount of time as every other machine).

The correct answers are 5 cents, 47 days, and 5 minutes.

If you got them wrong, don’t worry — you’re in good company. In The Knowledge Illusion — Why We Never Think Alone, authors and cognitive scientists Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach explain that only 48 percent of students at MIT and just 26 percent of students at Princeton University got all three answers correct during a study. Like the rest of us, even students at prestigious universities are susceptible to making quick assumptions and not taking time to analyze.

The problem is, making assumptions and skipping over details can cause us to make big mistakes.

Sloman and Fernbach argue that we’re all susceptible to what they call the knowledge illusion — the tendency to assume we know more than we really do.

In their book, they discuss an experiment conducted at Yale University where a group of respondents (who had already taken the CRT) were asked to rate how familiar they are with the functions of a variety of objects (1 = unfamiliar, 7 = expert).

The researchers used everyday items that we’re all familiar with, like zippers, speedometers, pianos, toilets, and locks. A different set of respondents were chosen for each object.

The respondents were asked to do the following:

1. Give an initial rating from 1 to 7 of how well they understand how the item functions.
2. Explain, in detail, exactly how it works.
3. Give an updated rating of how well they understand how the item works, now that they’ve had a chance to try to explain it.

What the study consistently showed is that people will rate their knowledge as very high (closer to 7) initially, then they have trouble explaining how the item works, then they rate their knowledge as very low (closer to 1) after.

Writing out an explanation made them realize that they didn’t know as much as they thought they did.

Try it yourself — we all know how toilets work, right? Can you give a step-by-step explanation of everything that happens when you flush a toilet? Unless you work for a plumbing company, probably not. You’d probably have the same trouble with zippers, speedometers, pianos, and locks.

The same thing happens in other realms — as Sloman and Fernbach say, “as a rule, strong feelings about issues do not emerge from deep understanding. They often emerge in the absence of understanding.” The people who have the strongest opinions about politics, science, and many other topics often don’t understand the topic very well.

People who have a deep understanding of these topics are more aware of the complexities and nuances of situations. They’re more concerned with facts than being right.

Stop to reflect before giving your answer.

In the Yale study, researchers found that people who were more reflective (those who did better on the CRT) rated themselves as lower on the scale of understanding before they were asked to explain how the object works. This indicates that people who are more reflective are more aware of what they don’t know than people who are less reflective.

Reflective people have many advantageous traits. According to Sloman and Fernbach:

People who are more reflective tend to be more careful when given problems that involve reasoning. They make fewer errors and are less likely to fall for tricks than less reflective people fall for. For instance, they are better at detecting when a statement was intended to be profound or whether it’s essentially a random collection of words (like “hidden meaning transforms unparalleled abstract beauty.”) They are also more willing to take risks and are less impulsive. In general, they are more likely to take a chance or to wait longer if it means getting a bigger reward.

Being reflective can protect us from making impulsive decisions, like spending lots of money without reading the fine print. It can keep us from being manipulated by people who use charm and fancy words to draw us in. When we slow down, take a step back and analyze situations, we make less mistakes.

How can we become more reflective and analytical? A good first step, according to Sloman and Fernbach, is to become aware of the gaps in our understanding:

Real understanding requires knowing what you don’t know. Knowing what you don’t know allows you to get help and fill in the gaps when the need arises. It brings you down to earth and prevents you from allowing intellectual arrogance to drive important decisions. Knowing what you don’t know about your credit, new house, potential spouse, and little red sports car can be the trigger to cause you to obtain solid advice from someone who isn’t trying to profit from your bad decisions.

Instead of ignoring that feeling that we don’t quite know what we’re getting into, but doing it anyway, we can pause. Seeking advice from someone who knows more than us about the subject can help us decide whether the decision we’re making is really for the best.

To become aware of the gaps in our understanding, vulnerability is required. We have to humble ourselves and get better at admitting our mistakes and lack of knowledge. It’s not easy to realize that our initial thoughts and assumptions were wrong. It’s hard to accept that we’re not as knowledgeable as we thought, and that we need help from others. But understanding our shortcomings can save us a lot of time, money, energy, and heartache.

And since many people rush their decisions and don’t take time to reflect, don’t slow down, and don’t analyze — those who do stand out as reflective and thoughtful people in work, relationships, and life in general.