When it comes to the universe, I can confidently say I know what I don’t know. That might seem to be trivial, but knowing what one doesn’t know is an ology I’m happy to have studied. I don’t have a name for it, but I find ignoranceology acceptable.
First what I know about the cosmos I learned from some pretty sharp people with access to instruments too expensive for me to buy, big telescopes and such. Anyway, the people who have looked outward into the vast reaches of the universe, have indicated we know very little about the composition of Everything, except to give ourselves two terms: Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Turns out that, give or take a few percentage points, those two “whatevers” make up 95% of the cosmos. Ordinary matter and energy, the stuff of our daily lives and the terms of E = mc^2 (or m = E/c^2), make up a startling low 5% of All That Is. But, here’s where my ignoranceology comes into play: At least I know what I don’t know, since no one has yet definitively given us the composition, the makeup, of Dark Matter, and no one has definitively explained why Dark Energy is part of the universe.
Now, in contrast, no other creatures on the planet—just humble us—know that they don’t know. That makes the breadth of our mental reach greater than all other life-forms combined. All those other brains amount to operating on what they know. I—all of us—can operate on knowing more: That we know less. We realize that the 5% isn’t Everything. Every other being operates as though the 5% is Everything.
And now the analogy you’ve been waiting for: With regard to everyone around me, I probably know less than 5%. My ignoranceology should be the heart of my efforts to understand my “human universe.” Instead, I usually spend my efforts on what I already know. Maybe you do, also.
With our ability to know what we don’t know, don’t you think we might consider making an effort to study our ignorance. I can envision high school and college courses on the subject. I can see self-help books, too. Heck, throw in a non-credit continuing education cruise to some little-known destination, where passengers might disembark to spend time contemplating the unknown—as well as the unknowable.
We have all been somewhat blessed with knowledge, but we have also been blessed with ignorance. I’m simply recommending our spending a little time realizing that our knowledge has a larger context, that 5% should be viewed against a background of 95%, the former defined and the latter undefined. Sure, the knowledge of our ignorance is humbling, but at least we’re not wandering over the planet or even traveling in outer space thinking we know all there is to know. In fact, that would be the course objective of Ignoranceology 101: At the end of the course, the student will understand the limit to his or her understanding and identify what he or she doesn’t know.
First what I know about the cosmos I learned from some pretty sharp people with access to instruments too expensive for me to buy, big telescopes and such. Anyway, the people who have looked outward into the vast reaches of the universe, have indicated we know very little about the composition of Everything, except to give ourselves two terms: Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Turns out that, give or take a few percentage points, those two “whatevers” make up 95% of the cosmos. Ordinary matter and energy, the stuff of our daily lives and the terms of E = mc^2 (or m = E/c^2), make up a startling low 5% of All That Is. But, here’s where my ignoranceology comes into play: At least I know what I don’t know, since no one has yet definitively given us the composition, the makeup, of Dark Matter, and no one has definitively explained why Dark Energy is part of the universe.
Now, in contrast, no other creatures on the planet—just humble us—know that they don’t know. That makes the breadth of our mental reach greater than all other life-forms combined. All those other brains amount to operating on what they know. I—all of us—can operate on knowing more: That we know less. We realize that the 5% isn’t Everything. Every other being operates as though the 5% is Everything.
And now the analogy you’ve been waiting for: With regard to everyone around me, I probably know less than 5%. My ignoranceology should be the heart of my efforts to understand my “human universe.” Instead, I usually spend my efforts on what I already know. Maybe you do, also.
With our ability to know what we don’t know, don’t you think we might consider making an effort to study our ignorance. I can envision high school and college courses on the subject. I can see self-help books, too. Heck, throw in a non-credit continuing education cruise to some little-known destination, where passengers might disembark to spend time contemplating the unknown—as well as the unknowable.
We have all been somewhat blessed with knowledge, but we have also been blessed with ignorance. I’m simply recommending our spending a little time realizing that our knowledge has a larger context, that 5% should be viewed against a background of 95%, the former defined and the latter undefined. Sure, the knowledge of our ignorance is humbling, but at least we’re not wandering over the planet or even traveling in outer space thinking we know all there is to know. In fact, that would be the course objective of Ignoranceology 101: At the end of the course, the student will understand the limit to his or her understanding and identify what he or she doesn’t know.
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