Unknown known: Difference between revisions

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{{a|devil|[[File:Rumsfeld.png|450px|thumb|center|I ''knew'' you were going to say that.]]{{unknowns}}}}{{d|Unknown known|/ʌnˈnəʊn nəʊn/|n|}}{{santayana}}
{{a|devil|[[File:Rumsfeld.png|450px|thumb|center|I ''knew'' you were going to say that.]]{{unknowns}}}}{{d|Unknown known|/ʌnˈnəʊn nəʊn/|n|}}{{santayana}}


The one type of [[unknowns|unknown]] that doesn’t appear in [[Rumsfeld’s taxonomy - Risk Article|Donald Rumsfeld’s taxonomy]], but which ''should'', since it is probably the source of ''more'' catastrophic events of our time than any of the others: [[unknown known]]s are the things you ''do'' know, but you don’t ''know'' you know. Things that, courtesy of that tremendous fiction the [[corporate veil]], an institution may be [[deemed]] to know, but about which none of its present representatives has the faintest clue; things which one might have once known but ''forgotten''; things which one is in total ''denial'' about, and the unpleasant realities of our modern, [[complex]] world to which one is not, presently, facing up.
One type of [[unknowns|unknown]] that doesn’t appear in [[Rumsfeld’s taxonomy - Risk Article|Donald Rumsfeld’s taxonomy]], but which ''should'', since it is probably the source of ''more'' catastrophic events of our time than any of the others is the [[unknown known]].
 
Unknown knowns are the things you ''do'' know, but you don’t ''know'' you know or, at least, conveniently ''forget'' you know at just the point it would have been most prescient to remember them. Things that, courtesy of that tremendous fiction, the [[corporate veil]], an institution may be [[deemed]] to know, but about which none of its present representatives has the faintest clue; things which one might have once known but ''forgotten''; things which one is in total ''denial'' about, and the unpleasant realities of our modern, [[complex]] world to which one is not, presently, facing up.


As Slovenian philosopher [[Slavoj Žižek]] eloquently puts it: “the disavowed beliefs, suppositions and obscene practices we ''pretend'' not to know about, even though they form the background of our public values”.  
As Slovenian philosopher [[Slavoj Žižek]] eloquently puts it: “the disavowed beliefs, suppositions and obscene practices we ''pretend'' not to know about, even though they form the background of our public values”.