Feeling That We Know

The study of knowledge — epistemology — has intrigued and tormented philosophers since antiquity, although the term is only a couple of centuries old.

Modern psychology has added the dimension of how we know or, more accurately, how we think we know.

Types of Knowing

Scientific knowing is probabilistic — what is likely true. The knowledge base of the physical sciences, though constantly evolving, features high degrees of probability. The knowledge base of the social sciences suffers from lesser degrees of probability, due to the complexity, dynamics, and volume of the variables involved.

Colloquial knowing — what most people mean when they used the term — is characterized by an absence of doubt about facts (I know the date of our first kiss), internal states (I know that I love you), impressions (I know she’s a good person), hope (I know that I’ll always love you), or faith (I know that God loves us).

Psychological knowing is the suppression of doubt, and feeling that we know. This, by far, is the most common form of knowing, certainly in the minefields of love and politics.

Both are fraught with emotion, which evolved to motivate action, not to make reasonable judgments about facts, impressions, or truth. We don’t get emotional because we’re certain; we feel certain because we’re emotional.

The emotions that make us feel we know emerge from tacit judgments, based on past experiences and habits. These are fraught with bias and prejudice. Our conscious judgments tend to reaffirm the autopilot judgments, to cherry-pick facts and evidence under the yoke of confirmation bias.

Knowing Ourselves

We know certain facts about ourselves on autopilot. You don’t need to make a conscious decision not to dive off the boat when you can’t swim. Autopilot judgments about the self are another matter.

These we infer from conscious feelings or from sophisticated reflection on patterns of behavior.

For example, if I feel bad, I may infer that I’m making an autopilot judgment about myself as (something like) inadequate, unintelligent, or unattractive. I may reflect in therapy on the tacit self-judgments inferred from patterns of behavior that harm my long-term best interests.

As a rule, we don’t infer from or reflect on our tacit judgments. They seem to be like temperament, a part of our emotional tone — what it feels like to be us.

Knowing Others

It’s impossible to distinguish feeling that we know from projecting — attributing our own emotions, thoughts, biases, or behavioral expectations to others.

Yet projection is probably the most common form of social interaction. We don’t notice how often we do it because it doesn’t produce sufficient discomfort to bring it to consciousness. When it does come to consciousness, it’s usually due to someone’s behavior contradicting our projections. Examples:

• A rejecting partner in a loving relationship
• A compassionate partner in a resentful relationship
• A conservative politician or social advocate espousing structural justice reforms
• A liberal politician or social advocate emphasizes personal effort and responsibility.
• The Epidemic of Certainty

Have you noticed that the more complex and nuanced social issues become, the more certain some people are of their categorical assertions?

Certainty is an emotional state, not an intellectual one. To create a feeling of certainty, the brain must filter out more information than it processes, which, of course, increases its already high error rate during emotional arousal. In other words, the more certain we feel, the more likely we’re oversimplifying, if not downright wrong.

As Voltaire put it in the 18th century, “Doubt is an uncomfortable condition, but certainty is a ridiculous one.”

The Lost Virtue of Humility

Throughout most recorded history, humility was considered a virtue, while hubris sowed the seeds of destruction. That changed in the latter part of the last century, with the emergence of what Christopher Lasch — writing before the age of selfies — called, The Culture of Narcissism. More recently, Jean Twenge and Keith Campbell described the narcissism epidemic. The title of this blog asserted in 2008 that anger and resentment are inevitable components of — and reactions to — entitlement. Sadly, this seems truer today.

Psychological studies of humility have surged in the last two decades, for example, the work of Worthington, Davis, and Hook. Humility links to curiosity, learning, and success in business and relationships.

We can think of humility as:

• An absence of arrogance
• A reduction of thinking that we know
• Recognition that feelings of certainty are part illusion, and that objective judgment is elusive and rare
• Realization that truth is polygonal.

One of the best things we can do for health, well-being, love, and politics is to reclaim the lost virtue of humility.