I routinely tell my mentees, “I don’t know” is a perfectly acceptable answer
People can have an opinion, but recognise the edges of their knowledge limiting that opinion.
You’re also going to want to keep some version of “and I don’t trust that your explanation will be unbiased” in your back pocket.
We need to vote in elected representatives who are willing to admit this.
To paraphrase Paul Krugman, politicians are often more easily swayed by well-dressed lobbyists than nerdy economists.
George W. Bush was infamous for this. He believed he was smart about everything, but then was swayed by particularly emphatic advisors. And soon he was surrounded by emphatic lobbyists.
Today we’re watching as Dunning–Kruger effect takes hold, since Trump believes he’s the smartest man in the room, and is remarkably easy to manipulate by foreign assets. In fact, it’s such an issue it should be regarded as a national security crisis.
I guess this all to say, don’t be like Bush or Trump.
any number of people way smarter then I
It’s only because of their stupidity that they’re able to be so sure of themselves. - Franz Kafka
The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are removedsure while the intelligent are full of doubt. - Bertrand Russell
the older I get i realise the less I know, which is the wisdom age should bring
You forgot Josh Billings, “It ain’t what you don’t know that’s the problem. It’s what you know that isn’t so.”
also “this is my opinion, but I really don’t know much about the matter”
People will still say that isn’t enough and that you need to have a strong stance regardless of your knowledge
General problem. The same thing in science, negative results (tried this, didn’t work) are extremely valuable but not publishable in general, relegated to lab lore. So people constantly re-invent the wheel. Sucks.
“I don’t know enough to have an opinion… so I’m just not going to vote”
And you wonder how we ended up with Trump in 24. I’m sorry, but that phrase works for a lot of things except politics where it’s your civic duty to educate yourself.
Theres plenty of things going on in the world for 11 months a year that im not up to date on to have a political opinion on. That doesnt mean that i dont vote.
These two things are not mutually inclusive
How about “… so I’ll read up on it and let you know what I find out.”
Phrase works fine if it’s a starting point, not if it’s an end state.
I mean if the trump voters could admit that we’d be ok
It was Nate Hagens (The Great simplification podcast) who said this when he worked at Lehman Brothers about confidence. Don’t worry, he learned quickly that he was the bad guy and changed his ways completely.
Anyway, when all the new recruits came in they gave them a pop quiz. It starts off simply “What is a derivative?” “How to bonds work?”, and with everyone being young an confident they all answer enthusiastically. Eventually they drop in a question that is really difficult and oddball that nobody would know, naturally everyone starts trying to formulate and answer only to have the teacher stop them. Teacher just says, “Don’t try to fake it, that helps no one. What you say is. I don’t know, I will find out, and I will get back to you.”
You don’t have to have an answer to everything.
Problem is the people who need to follow this advise the most won’t listen. They don’t even use the word opinion anymore but instead call it their “own truth” to give their hunches and gut feelings some sort of untouchable authority they don’t deserve.
What is this? A nuanced take? Why I oughta….
Listen here! This is lemmy! I’m now going to complain to the mods that your post and comments be removed because I either don’t like or don’t understand them!
this is literally an unnuanced take
It literally isn’t. It’s a suggestion that admitting ignorance should be normalized.
you consider the response of “I don’t know” …to have nuance to it?
My go to is: I don’t really know enough about that to speak on it.
And don’t waste your time on people that refuse to take that as an answer
The people who won’t take that as an answer are usually people who want to benefit from you having the opinion they want you to have. Even if it’s not an opinion that they, themselves, espouse.
People literally say this about an ongoing genocide.
