Shankar Vedantam

Is it possible that the knowledge illusion in some ways is tied to our own self-concept, that there are things we care about, and those are the places precisely where the knowledge illusion rears its head most dramatically?

Yeah.

You mentioned that sparking curiosity is a way of fighting the illusion of knowledge.

We got an email from a listener named Zach.

He writes that he and a colleague are avid cyclists.

They go on bicycle tours around the country.

And Zach finds that when they roll into a random town, the locals there are often quite curious about them.

And Zach and his colleague, likewise, are curious about the new place they're in.

And it opens up a dialogue between them and the people around them

So Zach's question is, are there environmental conditions or circumstances that are more likely to prompt people toward curiosity?

I mean, I've noticed that when I'm a tourist, Phil, I'm traveling somewhere, I also don't feel any pressure to know everything about the people around me or the situation around me.

I'm open to asking questions because, of course, I've just been there for two and a half minutes.

I can't be expected to know anything.

So in some ways, being in novel environments lifts the pressure off our shoulders to, in some ways, appear smart or to know a lot because, of course, by definition, we don't.

Phil Fernback is a cognitive scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder.

With Stephen Sloman, he's author of The Knowledge Illusion, Why We Never Think Alone.

Phil, thank you so much for joining me today on Hidden Brain.

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