With this podcast,[1] Dr. Weingart is preaching to the choir in many ways.
Insanity is looking at the world and seeing something different from what normal people see.
Normal people don’t want to know about that, but curious people do.
Curiosity is the basis of science and learning.[2]
Curiosity is the antithesis of dogma.
Curiosity will lead us to think about what others call insane.
I do have a couple of points to criticize, but these are slips of the tongue by Dr. Weingart. They are not errors of judgment, nor are they errors of fact.
He refers to Malcolm Gladwell as Gladstone. His brain is probably well ahead of what he is saying and he did not realize that what came out of his mouth was not what he intended.
The other is more likely to be confusing.
This homophony has the possibility of confusing the listener, because it is difficult to tell if he is using the word confidence or competence. Just a few sentences before, he was discussing competence, but now he is discussing confidence, specifically unjustified confidence. For the Australian listener, it may have been more difficult to understand with Dr. Weingart’s American accent. Written, it should be clear which word Dr. Weingart intends.
At 19:30 –
“To become competent you must feel bad” – Hubert Dreyfus[1]
Unless we push ourselves beyond our current comfort zone abilities, we are only treading water, or we are sinking. This is the way we learn.
If we do not understand how our students feel, maybe it is because we have stopped learning. Maybe we have stopped putting ourselves in positions where we are novices.
If we are comfortable at everything we do, we are not trying anything truly new to us. If we do not try anything new to us, how do we understand the experiences of our students, who are often overwhelmed by the amount of new information they are expected to learn?
At 19:50 –
Charles Darwin put it even better – ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.[1]
At 20:15 –
Unconscious incompetence – You don’t know and you don’t know that you know.[1]
It should be obvious that Dr. Weingart did not misunderstand the Dunning-Kruger effect.[3] He makes it clear through the rest of this excellent presentation that he understands what Dunning and Kruger demonstrated. However, he does appear to have had a slip of the tongue.
The Dunning-Kruger effect can be summed up by adding back the dropped don’t.
Unconscious incompetence – You don’t know and you don’t know that you don’t know.[1]
The title of the paper by Dunning and Kruger is –
Unskilled and unaware of it: how difficulties in recognizing one’s own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments.[4]
Later, Dr. Weingart states –
Never assume your own excellence.[1]
We should always consider that we may be wrong. This is the way to not fall victim to dogma.
How much less likely will we be to automatically give a medication, because it is the customary thing to do, if we consider that we may be wrong?
How much less likely will we be to automatically perform a procedure, because it is the customary thing to do, if we consider that we may be wrong?
How much less likely will we be to automatically follow custom, if we consider that we may be wrong?
though I am native here
And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honor’d in the breach than the observance,Hamlet Act 1, scene 4,
explanatory notes from eNotes.com
Also look at the excellent references provided by Dr. Weingart in the show notes.
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Footnotes:
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[1] Podcast 105 – The Path to Insanity
EMCrit
Dr. Scott Weingart
Podcast/Videocast page.
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[2] Curiosity
NASA
Name the Rover Contest
Winning entry by Clara Ma.
Curiosity is an everlasting flame that burns in everyone’s mind. It makes me get out of bed in the morning and wonder what surprises life will throw at me that day. Curiosity is such a powerful force. Without it, we wouldn’t be who we are today. When I was younger, I wondered, ‘Why is the sky blue?’, ‘Why do the stars twinkle?’, ‘Why am I me?’, and I still do. I had so many questions, and America is the place where I want to find my answers. Curiosity is the passion that drives us through our everyday lives. We have become explorers and scientists with our need to ask questions and to wonder. Sure, there are many risks and dangers, but despite that, we still continue to wonder and dream and create and hope. We have discovered so much about the world, but still so little. We will never know everything there is to know, but with our burning curiosity, we have learned so much.
If we do not question everything, we must be satisfied with ignorance.
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[3] Dunning-Kruger effect
Wikipedia
Article
Science denialism is excellently described by the Dunning-Kruger effect. A comedian claims to know more about vaccines than scientists – and people believe the misinformation. Some politicians claim to know more about climate than scientists – and people believe the misinformation. Some preachers claim to know more about biology, geology, paleontology, . . . than scientists – and people believe the misinformation.
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[4] Unskilled and unaware of it: how difficulties in recognizing one’s own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments.
Kruger J, Dunning D.
J Pers Soc Psychol. 1999 Dec;77(6):1121-34.
PMID: 10626367 [PubMed – indexed for MEDLINE]
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