[Opinion] Types of Knowledge

[Anziel_Merkaba]

Early on in my practice I had the opportunity to participate in an informal group call with Lionel Snell (Ramsay Dukes) alongside some other people who were of varying levels of experienced in the esoteric arts. But as I was at that point only about 3 months into my practice, despite being a quick learner and having a few years of meditation experience before I got into the occult, the opportunity to really pick his brain about things was missed. Fortunately, it was still an enlightening experience even if I didn't get as much out of it as other people who were in the group call.

What I would like to propose is that there are three kinds of knowledge; that which you know, that which you know that you don't know, and that what you don't know that you don't know.

The first of these things is rather simple, just being things you have learned through study or experience or simply being told about it. Everyone has things that they know, and everyone knows what things they know. Two plus two equals four, the Capital of the United States is Washington D.C., if you touch a hot stove you'll get burned.

The second of these things is a bit more nuanced in that it's things you are aware of but don't actually have functional knowledge about. For example, if you played Microsoft Flight Simulator for a few hours, or even a few days of time, you might be able to pilot an airplane, but you know that you lack the knowledge to actually fly an airplane. Knowing how to pilot and being able to fly are two very different things that appear the same on the surface; one is knowing how to maneuver and control the airplane, the other is all the ancillary knowledge like squawk codes and how to communicate with the tower and how to navigate a taxiway and all the other things that you need to know to not get in serious legal trouble with the FAA.

The third of these things is that which is so outside of your experience and learning that you cannot fathom it even existing in the first place. 70 years ago the smallest particle known to man was the electron, before 1913 nobody even considered that we could split the atom, when the first steam engine was invented back in the 1600s they couldn't even conceive of what the technology would become with automobiles and the internal combustion engine. This category of knowledge is that which you have no exposure to or concept of; things that functionally never existed to you and are so far outside the realm of what you know that you can't even begin to learn about them.

When delving into new fields, whether those fields are actually new matters not so long as they are new to you, there will naturally be a point where you feel like you know more than you know you don't know, but when you reach that point you must remember that there is probably a lot more that you don't know you don't know. The Dunning-Krueger effect is in there somewhere, but practitioners of the esoteric arts who get too inflated of themselves without having the knowledge and skill to actually back it up learn pretty hard and fast that they aren't the big dog in the kennel. So keep in mind that there is always more to learn and never assume you are an expert. Don't be the guy who practices for 6 months, gets some minor success, and starts strutting with their cock out thinking they're hot shit.

 

[Magpie]

Insightful post. The first and second category really resonate. Reading something is one thing, but to feel it, to make it obvious, like with hot stove burn, is something else and it must be done or else your knowledge is just an intellectual chimera.

The third category is where magic for most people would fall. That was the case for me.

How can you feel like you know more than you don't know in that sort of "business"? Especially, ff you allow things like clairvoyance or remote viewing to be possible, then to claim you know more than you don't seems to be beyond delusional.

 

[Anziel_Merkaba]

How can you feel like you know more than you don't know in that sort of "business"? Especially, ff you allow things like clairvoyance or remote viewing to be possible, then to claim you know more than you don't seems to be beyond delusional.

That's just the Dunning-Krueger effect. People who make a lot of progress quickly in a field that they are new to often get ahead of themselves and overestimate where they actually are in terms of mastery. The trick is to notice when you're getting ahead of yourself and then reminding yourself that there's a lot you still don't know.

The good news is even if you fall face first into the Dunning-Krueger effect you do grow out of it eventually; whether or not you get your shit pushed in by an actual expert first doesn't really matter even if it does help though.

 

[jkeller293]

The third of these things

This one is a interesting point and is the one i am most focused on currently. How i like to approach this (and you will often see me adressing this on this forum) is that i believe focusing on what limits understanding to be the common denominator to be able to understand. To reduce this simply i will say your perspective matters the most. It is what grounds you and what grounds you always limits you. Initiation is what adresses this aspect; however, whatever you are initiated in still limits you to whatever is contained in the initiation process you follow. I strongly believe in having a dynamic perspective that is open to change rather than simply just falling into the trap of believing something is law.

 

[Flandre]

I would also add a distinction for the first kind you mentioned, 'knowing'. The way I see it, I separate it into knowing - as in, having read something in a book or heard someone else talk about it - and understanding, or gnosis. You did say that one can know through experience as well as through being told about something, but I think the distinction between those two is huge, almost as big as between the first kind and the third kind that you mentioned.

The more I'm learning, the more I'm reading, the more I realize how little I actually understand (which fits the Dunning-Krueger phenomenon you mentioned very well) - because when I read, it's others' experiences. You can read about certain things or forces, but experiencing them is a whole another thing.

That's the thing about qualia - can Mary, who cannot see colour, understand the colour blue? She can describe what it is, but she's never seen it herself.

Of course theoretical knowledge is still very useful, crucial even. It helps with safety, and with it you don't have to rediscover the wheel if you want to build a cart. Although understanding gained through intuition tends to line up with established tradition or what is at the centre of it. Even if it's not seen immediately, at least in my case. I love the feeling of realizing something and then reading about it in a book later.

Understanding gained via intuition is the "eureka" moment when one finally "gets it" in a single moment. It could be enlightening in regards to meditation on a certain subject, or something you haven't even thought of before. I noticed it tends to happen way more often during scrying, at least for me.

 

[jkeller293]

I would also add a distinction for the first kind you mentioned, 'knowing'. The way I see it, I separate it into knowing - as in, having read something in a book or heard someone else talk about it - and understanding, or gnosis. You did say that one can know through experience as well as through being told about something, but I think the distinction between those two is huge, almost as big as between the first kind and the third kind that you mentioned.

The more I'm learning, the more I'm reading, the more I realize how little I actually understand (which fits the Dunning-Krueger phenomenon you mentioned very well) - because when I read, it's others' experiences. You can read about certain things or forces, but experiencing them is a whole another thing.

That's the thing about qualia - can Mary, who cannot see colour, understand the colour blue? She can describe what it is, but she's never seen it herself.

Of course theoretical knowledge is still very useful, crucial even. It helps with safety, and with it you don't have to rediscover the wheel if you want to build a cart. Although understanding gained through intuition tends to line up with established tradition or what is at the centre of it. Even if it's not seen immediately, at least in my case. I love the feeling of realizing something and then reading about it in a book later.

Understanding gained via intuition is the "eureka" moment when one finally "gets it" in a single moment. It could be enlightening in regards to meditation on a certain subject, or something you haven't even thought of before. I noticed it tends to happen way more often during scrying, at least for me.

Speaking of intuition i had a bit of that come to me after reading what you wrote. I asked the questions in my mind "what is the tuition for intuition?" "Must i pay attention without tension?"

As simple as this is it may just be the main idea of accessing the ability to understand something which you previously didn't. And are you really questioning when you quiet your mind and just pay attention without forming any judgement at all to what you sense?

For example, if im looking at a pipeing system i may first ask the question "where does the water come in at?" — but from there am i really asking questions after that? No, im just using my eyes to follow the direction stated by the first question. After this then i understand the piping system after just paying attention to the piping system.

So i wonder if this mental faculty which i used after making the question can be trained to the point were you would never have to ask a question to figure out anything.

 

[Shade]

Reminds me of a story as it relates to Buddhism, I think it was told by Ram Das but perhaps Alan Watts, it is a reflection of Li Bo and Zizang if I’m not mistaken.
This is heavily paraphrased but goes like this…

Li Bo goes and says that a seed cannot contain a mountain, he has read a thousand books and has never heard such a thing, when he is met with the question “where are these Books?”. Li Bo replies, “well they are in the monastery, but I have also traveled the mountains and have never seen such a seed”. The other man looks at him knowingly and replies, “ahh so you have the knowledge of all these books and you’ve experienced the mountain but still your head remains as empty as a coconut”.

There are different types of knowledge and philosophy tries to help bridge the gap between book learned knowledge, experience and the abstract truth that lay in the middle. What is for certain is one thing, the physical nature of humans is not all knowing, but neither is it all learning of you close off your mind.
This was a very insightful and thought provoking thread @Anziel_Merkaba

A teacher can learn from a child and a child can learn from a teacher, all it takes is an open mind to know that you do not have all the answers.
I get where you are coming from, or at least I think I know, but then again.. what do I know?

This world according to the Hindu’s is Maya or the illusion. We are but a dream of brahma. So in the end, what good does knowledge do if it does not help raise the spirit? (Genuine question) There is a similar thought in some writings where the idea is to raise the spirit enough to break from the mortal coil, on the side of the same coin according to “On the Origin of the World” found in the Nag Hammadi we are an “Angelic” Spirit inside the body of a “Demonic” Archon body.
We in life test our spirit against these physical forces.
Your thoughts on how this applies to the 3 schools of knowledge you referred to? (Whether you buy into it or not, it’s a -thought- experiment I’m curious to get your take on.

 

[Anziel_Merkaba]

Your thoughts on how this applies to the 3 schools of knowledge you referred to?

My thoughts on how the idea of the world being an illusion are pretty simple, in that while the world isn't entirely real we as beings still within it follow the rule and order of said world.

Of the three types of knowledge, what you know is the simplest, as it's what you are aware of and believe to be true. What you know you don't know is more involved, in that it is what you can conjecture based on what you know and your understanding of the rules that govern the world irregardless of the illusory nature of said world. What you don't know you don't know is simpler than the latter but more complex than the former, as it lies somewhere between what others know that you don't know and things nobody has observed or imagined.

A while ago I had an idea of how to reconcile the ever expanding world and the illusory nature of reality and came up with this: new knowledge and discoveries retroactively come into existence when a being searches for it. For example, before the idea of subatomic particles ever was thought, they didn't exist, but when the first person asked "what if?", they suddenly have always existed. The more we explore of this illusory reality, the more we find, and the more concrete the rules of the world become; this also supports the idea that magic today is lesser than it was in the past.

Personally I'm not sure if I fully believe that idea, but I feel that it is more right than wrong if it's not completely correct.