We can't all be experts; but we can all be curious

Adding an asterisk to Laura Kennedy's piece on knowledge, and making the case for sitting companionably with our inherent discomfort of not knowing everything

Imagine you’re Pac-Man — or Ms. Pac-Man. And imagine that all of those little dots mazed-out two-dimensionally in front of you are bits of information. To become an expert on any topic — literally any — all that’s required of you is to inhale as many of those dots as you can in the form of TikToks, quick-take headlines, the occasional abstract from a scientific journal you googled, and so on. You may run into some multicolor fact-ghosts along the way who try to harsh the glow of your newly-curated expertise, which is a bummer, but don’t worry! You’ll eventually gorge your way through enough dots to complete the level you’re on and, at that point, you can crown yourself an expert in whatever topic you covered for that round. And tomorrow, or next week, you can start a new level, covering a different topic, and you’ll inhale more little info dots — et voilà — once again, you’ll emerge a fully-fledged expert. It’s truly that simple!

Or at least, that’s what many people on the internet seem to believe is the truest route to becoming an expert.

But my question is, why do so many people skip over being humbly curious, and dive straight into becoming self-anointed overnight experts instead? 

This is a question that’s floated in-and-out of my consciousness for a while now because it’s something we often see in the age of the Internet. But it feels particularly apropos to discuss this week since I’ve rarely seen so many people swiftly elevate themselves to expert status based on the fact that 20+ years ago they vaguely studied something for a few days at university.

The desire to be viewed as an authority on every topic in the news cycle is concerning. Not only because it’s borderline delusional to believe that’s feasible, but also because it applies an unnecessary social pressure on others to mimic this behavior. Nobody wants to be viewed as ignorant, so this loud, faux-expertise has the power to make even the most rational person feel less-than for not making equally-loud-yet-flawed declarations.

This behavior isn’t new, however. Being inclined to consider oneself an expert has been explored in various psychological studies over the decades, and has led to findings such as the Dunning-Kruger effect. In 1999, scientists Dunning and Kruger found that people have a tendency to wrongly overestimate their knowledge or ability in specific areas. Essentially, the more incompetent you are in a specific area, the more likely you are to be unaware of your own incompetence. 

Not even the experts are entirely confident! (source)

And just last month, a similar study was published that found overconfidence tends to grow faster than knowledge. Once someone reaches an intermediate level of knowledge, this phenomenon of overconfidence peaks. My guess is that this overconfidence peaks so quickly because of our human desire to want answers; we find comfort and safety in knowing — or, more accurately, thinking we know.

The human ability to know something is a topic that Laura Kennedy wrote about this week in her newsletter, Peak Notions. She explored the idea of being an expert from the philosophical perspective of epistemology — the theory of knowledge and, broadly, the limits of human knowledge. Laura says:

“There is nothing wrong with conscious not-knowing — with being aware that you don’t know about something… In the absence of sincere research and experience the only respectable position to take is an epistemically humble one, and to say, ‘What the hell do I know?’”

It’s an extremely interesting and thoughtful piece, and I highly recommend reading it. My one caveat with it, however, is that I had to read it very carefully — twice — to be confident that her message was not simply advocating for embracing the not knowing, and moving on without trying to know. Every time I thought her ship was tipping in that direction, she pulled it back with a sentence that made her message clearer. But it felt too subtle for the age of scan-reading.

Ultimately, her message is that we can never truly know anything for absolute certain because so much of what makes up knowledge is based on fallible sources (human memory, second-hand accounts, poor context etc). Therefore, regardless of how confident we may be in our current level of knowledge, the only logical solution is for humans to consistently remain open to learning, adapting, and growing their knowledge further. As she eloquently concludes: “Knowing is an active state, not a passive one. This is no time to be passive.”

I completely agree. I would like to take her message one step further, however. That’s because we can’t humbly acknowledge our lack of knowledge without also acknowledging that this acceptance requires us, as humans, to make peace with being inherently uncomfortable most of the time. There’s undeniable safety and comfort in believing that we know more than we actually do — as the studies I mentioned previously illustrate. That’s what makes the state of not knowing so squirmy, and difficult for humans to be comfortable with.

The effort it takes for us to sit companionably with our discomfort is likely the root of what leads people to become overnight experts. Rather than choosing to remain perpetually curious, and open to learning, it’s easier to pacify the voice inside our heads shouting: “We need answers here! It’s getting a bit uncomfortable not knowing what to believe, so can you hurry up and become an expert so we can go back to relaxing!”

But the more we lean on our curiosity in day-to-day life, the calmer that voice in our head becomes. When you’re regularly curious, you’re giving your brain a steady stream of information and answers to parse and digest. Our brains are no longer starved, left to live solely in a black-or-white state of either knowing or not knowing — we’re allowing it to settle into the calmer, grey middle. That’s a space where our brain doesn’t feel the need to revert to panicky fight-or-flight mode whenever a black-or-white answer isn’t close at hand. 

If we don’t actively practice curiosity, and if we don’t actively remain aware that our brain defaults to this preference for being a (flawed) expert, then we’re no better off than when we blindly avoid something — a topic I wrote about last week. Not engaging with the realities of our lived experience stifles curiosity; just as erroneously believing oneself to be an expert does too. They’re two sides of the same coin. That’s because, when you avoid something, you put up a wall; and when you label yourself an expert, you also put up a wall. Whether that wall was erected to avoid information entering your consciousness, or because you’re blocking new information that may go against your settled-upon truth, you’re still left with a wall. And both scenarios have the same effect of making it nearly impossible for your curiosity to be sparked, and automatically stunt your ability to seek further knowledge on a subject.

This is something that actual experts understand inherently — there is no such thing as knowing everything, or learning all there is to know about a subject. It’s why true experts rarely ever consider themselves to be experts in the first place. Yes, they accept they know a lot about a topic — and certainly more than the average person — but they’re also aware that there’s still a vast amount they don’t know, and will likely never know. This is why, if we really want to be like the experts, then we have to act like the experts, and always maintain at least one percent more curiosity than certainty.

That’s not to say that we can’t also be confident about the knowledge we do possess — we can; especially when faced with someone who clearly has less knowledge, but a louder voice, and a pre-built social media soapbox. And it’s okay to munch those easily-digestible info dots like Pac-Man — there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. The trouble occurs when we allow ourselves to tip into that realm of overconfidence about our knowledge, and forget to trust that being curious will always serve us far better than being an “expert” will.

So as we watch (yet another) distressingly unprecedented event unfold, my challenge to you is to embrace the discomfort you’ve likely been experiencing this week, and keep leaning on your curiosity as a way to build your knowledge. Your uneasiness is nothing to shy away from, and shooing it away unnaturally will only make the unease more intense in the long-run. (Equally, if you haven’t felt any distress, then enlist your curiosity to explore why that may be.)

Also, remind yourself that this discomfort is simply confirmation that you’re not an expert, and that you don’t have all the answers. That’s a good thing! No rational person should expect you to be an expert overnight. (Unless you genuinely are an expert on a given topic, of course, then by all means, please keep sharing your knowledge!) But for the vast majority of us, let’s not turn away from this feeling, and let’s not fall into the trap of believing that reading a few articles can make us the only voice in the room worth listening to. Let’s be content in the knowledge that this disquiet is merely a sign that we’re still curious, and we’re still learning.

If you’re interested in reading more, here’s a link to the piece I mentioned by Laura Kennedy in Peak Notions.