Confucius: To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.
Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense, aka “Rumsfucious:” As we know, there are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say: We know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns, the ones we don’t know we don’t know. — Feb. 12, 2002, Department of Defense news briefing
Thoreau cites Confucius during a discussion of self-knowledge in Walden, and it reminded me of Ol Rummy. Looks like he was on to something deeper after all. I thought he was talking about intelligence, but he was really getting at “true knowledge.” Perhaps the US government should create a Central True Knowledge Agency? Speaking of true knowledge, the entirety of Walden is online.
Tags: confucius, donald rumsfeld, knowledge, known, thinker, unknown, walden
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Rumsfeld has a few idiosyncratic gems from what I’ve seen. As a foreign onlooker with only mild exposure to his (mis?)deeds, he kinda seems to me like a character out of a dystopian graphic novel.
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