Things I don't know I know

It started as a sketch on a white board years ago. I was trying to explain to people on my team the difference between what they thought I knew and what I really knew. It was a messy Venn diagram but it got the point across. After the meeting, I snapped a picture of the board on my phone and forgot about it.

A few months later, I don't remember how we got there, but we were talking in my office with a few co-workers about cognitive bias in people. We hypothesized about how having a larger frame of reference reduces cognitive bias. We all agreed that the more you realize there are other possible outcomes to a problem, the more you can stop reinforcing one (possible bad) outcome. It's the old "to a hammer, everything looks like a nail" expression. That afternoon, I remembered the old diagram on my phone and set out to upgrade it to a full map of all possible knowledge. Don't get too excited, this isn't a new Wikipedia. It's more of a categorization than actual knowledge. I ended up with a chart I was quite happy with.

Here's the breakdown (in order of interest):

• Stuff I know - Self explanatory. I know how to tie my shoes. Enough said.
• Stuff other people think I know - "Come on Eric, you're good at math and coding. You should be able to write a bubble sort!" This is a sort of implied knowledge because they know you have two sets of knowledge and assume they overlap. So if you are a good cook and you like to fish, one assumes you know how to cook fish. It's a plausible jump to a conclusion, but it's not always true.
• Stuff I don't know I know - Every now and then, it turns out you can do something you never learned. How? Problem solving and your existing frame of references. So even if you don't know how to rebuild a carburetor, being handy with tools and that dreaded college class on fluid dynamics might be all you need to disassemble it and fix a problem. You didn't learn the skill but you learned others you can use. It's cross training for your brain!
• Stuff I know I don't know - I know I don't know how to smoke a brisket to make smoked meat.
• Stuff I know I don't know ... enough to be dangerous - I know I don't know how to smoke a brisket to make smoked meat. ... but I'm going to try anyway. What could go possible wrong? This is where things start to get interesting. Some of the greatest discoveries happen in this zone. Along with the highest number of singed eyebrows band-aid applications, and crushed hopes and dreams. This is the space program of all your projects. This is the area where you push past your comfort zone and try new things. Without this zone, you will never progress past what you are capable of doing right now. Things will go badly. But it's worth it for that one in a hundred case which yields results you never expected. Embrace it and learn from it. Speaking from experience. eyebrows grow back.
• Stuff I don't know I don't know - There's reason this is the biggest area on the map. You can't even begin to understand the subject areas you don't know about, much less the actual knowledge in those areas. Here's a little exercise you can use to reduce this slice of the pie. Every day, set aside 15 minutes. Start on a web page of your choice and click on a link you would never have clicked on (being sure to avoid obvious click bait like "How to reduce belly fat"). Look at whatever page that sends you to and again, click on the next least likely link. I can guarantee that within a few clicks down the rabbit hole you will be in uncharted territory feeling like an explorer. Some of those will be throw-away days. You might learn there are 9 species of geese in the goose family and that's good enough. Other times, you'll discover whole new areas that you might spend days investigating. Who knows, Bolivian archeology might become your next hobby.

I invite you to draw that map to scale for yourself. Who knows, maybe if the big slice at the bottom is small enough, you might be a possible Trivial Pursuit contender or destined for Jeopardy fame.