The talk page does not exist, and I have no rights to create it, so I will ask here: If I say “I am thinking of a number—what is it?”—would “I don’t know” be not only a valid answer, but the only answer, for anyone other than myself?
The assertion the page makes is that “I don’t Know” is “Something that can’t be entirely true if you can even formulate a question.”—but this seems a counterexample.
I understand the point that is trying to be made—that “I don’t know” is often said even when you actually could narrow down your guess a great deal—but the assertion given is only partially correct, and if you base arguments on a string of mostly correct things, you can still end up wildly off-course in the end.
Am I perhaps applying rigor where it is inappropriate? Perhaps this is taken out of context?
If you, as a human, are thinking of a number, I can narrow it down a great deal from a uniform improper prior. I don’t really like that wiki entry, though—if you ask me to guess a number and I say “I don’t know,” it’s sure as heck not because either of us believes or is attempting to imply that I have literally no information about the problem.
I think the way in which that wiki entry is important is that “I don’t know” cannot be your only possible answer to a question. If there was a gun to my head, I could give guessing your number a pretty good try. But as triplets of words go, “I don’t know” serves a noble and practical purpose.
It hits a nerve with me. I do computer tech stuff, and one of the hardest things for people to learn, seemingly, is to admit they don’t actually know something (and that they should therefore consider, oh, doing research, or experiment, or perhaps seek someone with experience). The concept of “Well—you certainly can narrrow it down in some way” is lovely—but you still don’t actually know. The incorrect statement would be “I know nothing (about your number)”—but nobody actually says that.
I kinda flip it—we know nothing for sure (you could be hallucinating or mistaken) - but we are pretty confident about a great many things, and can become more confident. So long as we follow up “I don’t know” with ”… but I can think of some ways to try to find out”, it strikes me as simple humility.
Amusingly—“I am thinking of a number”—was a lie. So—there’s a good chance that however you narrowed it down, you were wrong. Fair’s fair—you were given false information you based that on, but still thought you might know more than you actually did. Just something to ponder.
While reading up on Jargon in the wiki (it is difficult to follow some threads without it), I came across:
http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/I_don%27t_know
The talk page does not exist, and I have no rights to create it, so I will ask here: If I say “I am thinking of a number—what is it?”—would “I don’t know” be not only a valid answer, but the only answer, for anyone other than myself?
The assertion the page makes is that “I don’t Know” is “Something that can’t be entirely true if you can even formulate a question.”—but this seems a counterexample.
I understand the point that is trying to be made—that “I don’t know” is often said even when you actually could narrow down your guess a great deal—but the assertion given is only partially correct, and if you base arguments on a string of mostly correct things, you can still end up wildly off-course in the end.
Am I perhaps applying rigor where it is inappropriate? Perhaps this is taken out of context?
If you, as a human, are thinking of a number, I can narrow it down a great deal from a uniform improper prior. I don’t really like that wiki entry, though—if you ask me to guess a number and I say “I don’t know,” it’s sure as heck not because either of us believes or is attempting to imply that I have literally no information about the problem.
I think the way in which that wiki entry is important is that “I don’t know” cannot be your only possible answer to a question. If there was a gun to my head, I could give guessing your number a pretty good try. But as triplets of words go, “I don’t know” serves a noble and practical purpose.
It hits a nerve with me. I do computer tech stuff, and one of the hardest things for people to learn, seemingly, is to admit they don’t actually know something (and that they should therefore consider, oh, doing research, or experiment, or perhaps seek someone with experience). The concept of “Well—you certainly can narrrow it down in some way” is lovely—but you still don’t actually know. The incorrect statement would be “I know nothing (about your number)”—but nobody actually says that.
I kinda flip it—we know nothing for sure (you could be hallucinating or mistaken) - but we are pretty confident about a great many things, and can become more confident. So long as we follow up “I don’t know” with ”… but I can think of some ways to try to find out”, it strikes me as simple humility.
Amusingly—“I am thinking of a number”—was a lie. So—there’s a good chance that however you narrowed it down, you were wrong. Fair’s fair—you were given false information you based that on, but still thought you might know more than you actually did. Just something to ponder.