Underrated skill in 2024: Strategic Ignorance
George Mack
Underrated skill in 2024: Strategic Ignorance
In a world of infinite information, strategic ignorance has never been more valuable.
Every minute, 500 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube
Every day, 500 million tweets are uploaded to X
Every year, 67 million people die
The truth: The 24 hours allotted to you each day isn't even capable of consuming 0.0000001% of the world's events.
Fun hack:
When people mock you for not having an opinion on the new current thing: Start asking them about the current situation in Djibouti, Jezekstan and Eswatini.
You will not only reveal they aren't up to date on the current situation: They didn't even know those countries existed.
Note: Djibouti and Eswatini are real countries. Jezekstan is a country I made up. It's a fun way of testing if they will pretend to know about a made up country.
This test shows they don't actually care about ignorance -- it's just a proxy for shame and control about the new current thing.
When you look at the total world events that day -- we are all ignorant.
The good news is that there's different settings available in the ignorance video game: Low agency ignorance and High agency Ignorance.
1. Low Agency Ignorance
Low agency ignorance passively downloads the loudest voice on the news or For You algorithms.
It's an infinite abyss that never ends. "I don't know" is a sign of weakness.
Low agency ignorance may appear selfless, but in the pursuit of trying to keep on top of everything, it keeps on top of nothing.
2. High Agency Ignorance
High agency ignorance is strategic.
It is aware that attention is the scarcest asset in the age of information abundance.
High agency ignorance proactively seeks information from high value sources. It has firewalls against passive consumption of the world's worst events or social media drama.
"I don't know" is a sign of strength. High agency ignorance may appear selfish, but in the pursuit of strategic focus, it can actually have impact on something.
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Choose your character:
We are all in the ignorance gutter, but some are strategically looking at the stars.
Some are unstrategically getting angry about the worst event that happened today -- which they won't even remember one year from now.
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PS. If you enjoyed this, it's taken from my newsletter. Get all my best ideas in your inbox when you sign up. Link below.
Underrated skill in 2024: Strategic Ignorance
In a world of infinite information, strategic ignorance has never been more valuable.
Every minute, 500 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube
Every day, 500 million tweets are uploaded to X
Every year, 67 million people die
The truth: The 24 hours allotted to you each day isn't even capable of consuming 0.0000001% of the world's events.
Fun hack:
When people mock you for not having an opinion on the new current thing: Start asking them about the current situation in Djibouti, Jezekstan and Eswatini.
You will not only reveal they aren't up to date on the current situation: They didn't even know those countries existed.
Note: Djibouti and Eswatini are real countries. Jezekstan is a country I made up. It's a fun way of testing if they will pretend to know about a made up country.
This test shows they don't actually care about ignorance -- it's just a proxy for shame and control about the new current thing.
When you look at the total world events that day -- we are all ignorant.
The good news is that there's different settings available in the ignorance video game: Low agency ignorance and High agency Ignorance.
1. Low Agency Ignorance
Low agency ignorance passively downloads the loudest voice on the news or For You algorithms.
It's an infinite abyss that never ends. "I don't know" is a sign of weakness.
Low agency ignorance may appear selfless, but in the pursuit of trying to keep on top of everything, it keeps on top of nothing.
2. High Agency Ignorance
High agency ignorance is strategic.
It is aware that attention is the scarcest asset in the age of information abundance.
High agency ignorance proactively seeks information from high value sources. It has firewalls against passive consumption of the world's worst events or social media drama.
"I don't know" is a sign of strength. High agency ignorance may appear selfish, but in the pursuit of strategic focus, it can actually have impact on something.
-----
Choose your character:
We are all in the ignorance gutter, but some are strategically looking at the stars.
Some are unstrategically getting angry about the worst event that happened today -- which they won't even remember one year from now.
-----
PS. If you enjoyed this, it's taken from my newsletter. Get all my best ideas in your inbox when you sign up. Link below.