frequently abused concept #7: explain it to me like I'm a 5-year old
Jun. 26th, 2025 04:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
malyj_gorganHeard that phrase a number of times. Everyone who was every saying it looked so smug that it gave me a toothache. Basking in own self-righteousness and and projecting that implication that "if you _really_ understand this shit, you should be able to explain it well, and if you can't it only speaks ill of you."
No, don't take it wrong. Ever since my graduate advisor's co-author once told me that "every good idea should be explainable by hand-waving", I took this idea to my heart and ran with it. But there is one very big issue with it -- it's too easy to abuse and it's being abused. The problem is obvious: if I explain it to you like you are a five-year old, then you would know if like a five-year old, right? There is a reason that we are trying to teach our kids stuff when they are older than five -- a five-year-old's understanding is primitive. There are only two reasons you would want to know something only at the very basic level: (a) Either you don't really care about it and want to know just enough to pick the right dog reflex about it (whether you should eat it, fuck it, piss on it, or bark at it) (b) Or you want to get a starting point about learning more about that something.
But in a modern corporation a "decision-maker" manager never has enough bandwidth yet cannot ever say "I don't know". So they make others explain to them every little thing that would happen under their amazing management... only explain to them like they are five. And they, based on this five-year-old-like level of understanding they are trying to make actual decisions.
That's why the world is in such as sinkhole and accelerating downward. People who make decisions think that they know their shit, because they think that they know what the world around them is about, but they know it at the level of a five year old. And very few of them have tried to read Janusz Korczak's classic, and even if they did, yet fewer would see the parallels. So, we are all doomed.
In case you wonder what is the right solution? Should each manager know everything they manage to the last detail? Should everyone become a rocket scientist? What is the way? Well, I have some answers for you:
1. I don't think there is a general answer, if it exists, I don't know it.
2. In the very narrow scope of human activities, where I do think my knowledge may be relevant the answer is three-prong (a) know the limits to your knowledge; (b) outside of those limits do not be afraid to admit your ignorance and do not pretend that your ideas matter; (c) if you don't want to admit that you don't know something and can't manage something, delegate
Thank you for your attention :)
I think it's the same in politics, but I can only project as I am not in politics. This is outside of my limits.
No, don't take it wrong. Ever since my graduate advisor's co-author once told me that "every good idea should be explainable by hand-waving", I took this idea to my heart and ran with it. But there is one very big issue with it -- it's too easy to abuse and it's being abused. The problem is obvious: if I explain it to you like you are a five-year old, then you would know if like a five-year old, right? There is a reason that we are trying to teach our kids stuff when they are older than five -- a five-year-old's understanding is primitive. There are only two reasons you would want to know something only at the very basic level: (a) Either you don't really care about it and want to know just enough to pick the right dog reflex about it (whether you should eat it, fuck it, piss on it, or bark at it) (b) Or you want to get a starting point about learning more about that something.
But in a modern corporation a "decision-maker" manager never has enough bandwidth yet cannot ever say "I don't know". So they make others explain to them every little thing that would happen under their amazing management... only explain to them like they are five. And they, based on this five-year-old-like level of understanding they are trying to make actual decisions.
That's why the world is in such as sinkhole and accelerating downward. People who make decisions think that they know their shit, because they think that they know what the world around them is about, but they know it at the level of a five year old. And very few of them have tried to read Janusz Korczak's classic, and even if they did, yet fewer would see the parallels. So, we are all doomed.
In case you wonder what is the right solution? Should each manager know everything they manage to the last detail? Should everyone become a rocket scientist? What is the way? Well, I have some answers for you:
1. I don't think there is a general answer, if it exists, I don't know it.
2. In the very narrow scope of human activities, where I do think my knowledge may be relevant the answer is three-prong (a) know the limits to your knowledge; (b) outside of those limits do not be afraid to admit your ignorance and do not pretend that your ideas matter; (c) if you don't want to admit that you don't know something and can't manage something, delegate
Thank you for your attention :)
I think it's the same in politics, but I can only project as I am not in politics. This is outside of my limits.
