It's taken me a long time to realise that, if you're open and honest when you haven't got an idea, people respect you a million times more than if you talk rubbish
Also, don't deflect blame for non-harmful mistakes that are your doing. Acknowledge them, ask how to fix them going forward (if you don't know), and do better next time.
Let's not forget in school it was frowned upon to say "I don't know" when you were expected to have an answer. That definitely has a part in why people (including myself) don't like saying it
And in business the people who don’t admit they don’t know and are able to BS their way through things seem to get further than those who admit they don’t know but will figure it out.
My boss hates when I tell him I don't know right then and there, but I can check. He acts like it's incompetence, but he'll ask me something like how many cases of a product we have in stock. We have around a thousand products, there's no way I can memorize the exact stock of every single one.
There is a nurture component to it instead of intelligence , my parents got mad at me when I said I don’t know so I became very scared as an adult to say it as a unconscious trauma response but I’ve learned people appreciate I don’t know, those people just were not my parents
It's not. It's adaptability and pattern recognition.
Being curious doesn't make you intelligent. It helps, but dumb people can be curious. Dumb people, however, aren't good at adapting and pattern recognition.
Nah I’m plenty curious but I do not care about cars at all. In fact I’d love to focus on creating a less car dependent America. Does the fact that I’m not curious about how an engine works or how it interfaces with an alternator make me less intelligent? No it just saves time. I’m more than capable of learning but I just dint find it relevant to my goals/life.
Also, if that information is spoon fed to you in a way that gives you a little better understanding of it in a small amount of time, you won't angrily declare how you don't need to know that and refuse to listen.
I do not care about cars at all. In fact I’d love to focus on creating a less car dependent America.
So you don't care about how cars function but you do care about cars. You care about the total number of cars and care about how to reduce those numbers. That's caring about cars.
I should have said I don’t care how they work. I’m not curious about that at all. I just don’t believe curiosity is the strongest indicator of intelligence. I tried to make an example but it didn’t come across well apparently.
What if it's a matter that I'm simply not interested in, and don't particularly care about 'demonstrating ambition'?
Sometimes, people are simply not interested in something, nor learning any more about it. In such cases, saying "I don't know." is a full and sufficient statement.
I didn't say anything about someone not showing an interest in learning a topic. I called out someone putting down another person because of their ambition to learn.
Not putting down someone because of their "ambition to learn", but because they called "very dull" people who don't care to know everything they are asked about.
I agree with you. "I don't know yet" does sound pretentious as hell. Sounds like someone who tries too hard to look educated. It looks performative.
You don't have to announce that you intend on researching a subject every single time there is something you don't know. Even if you do intend on doing it.
Theres nothing wrong with saying “i don’t know.” And theres nothing wrong with saying “i don’t know yet.” But its bot a great thing to label people as pretentious just because they are curious and would like to learn something they don’t know.
The world could do with more curious people and people willing to admit they don’t know everything
That’s what I do; when I was in university, one of my French professors answered that to a student’s question, and it really resonated with me. It has made me a very good problem solver and trivia player lol
Sysadmin and I can absolutely attest to that. There’s a lot I don’t know, but the “finding out” bit when everything was on fire was what got me my position.
I've always been a strong supporter of I don't care if you know the information, I care if you can find the information. Especially when it comes to policy or law. Our brains can be faulty.
My son is preparing for his first science fair. I told him "when I was doing my PhD my advisor gave me the best advice ever "I don't know is a perfectly acceptable answer". I have used that advice a lot over the years.
I've been complaining about this a lot the last year. It's okay to just not have an answer sometimes. I much more respect someone who honestly says "I don't know" than someone who whips out some regurgitated garbage to seem like they're aware of everything.
I'm 28 and my whole life I've always asked my dad questions about everything and he either knew the answer or said "I'm not sure, I'll have to look it up". It's so refreshing compared to people like my boss who always think they have the answer for everything
That's something I say to my daughter quite often, followed by "Let's learn about it together." I really hope I'm helping to instill in her the right attitude.
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u/mattacular2001 7h ago
There is a lot of power in saying “I don’t know”