The power of saying “I don't know” in the age of opinions
Why radical honesty is your greatest strength
🏷️ Categories: Learning, Life lessons.
Not long ago, a friend asked me for advice about relationships…
He started by saying, “you know about psychology…” I laughed when he finished his question and replied, “Look, I haven’t read anything about that and have no idea.”
His face immediately changed.
He looked disappointed and said, “oh, well then.” As if he had expected me to have a ready answer. I replied, “I only know about the topics I research. I haven’t read anything about that, so I can’t really tell you anything.”
That conversation made me think about the power of saying “I don’t know.”
About how necessary it is to admit we don’t know something in a time when everyone seems to have an opinion on everything. In fact, it almost feels like an obligation to take a stance for or against any controversial or trending topic.
Opinions are the most abundant commodity—everyone has millions of them.
Social media, opinion columns, TV talk shows… Everyone competes to sound more confident, more informed, and more convincing just to grab as much of your attention as possible. The more convincing someone seems, the more authority we grant them—even if they have no idea what they’re talking about.
But there’s immense power in honestly admitting that you don’t know something…
And that’s what I want to show you today: why we should say “I don’t know” more often and stop pretending we do know.
The Problem of Fake Authority
It doesn’t matter if someone actually knows about a topic. What matters is sounding confident.
This is what Tim Kreider explains in his brilliant essay The Power of “I Don’t Know.” Nowadays, the voice of authority has become the default tone of columnists, bloggers, pundits, and commentators on any subject you can think of.
The problem may have many causes—here are 3 of them:
The culture of immediacy and social media rewards provocative, shallow information because it’s easier to digest, more appealing, and more likely to go viral.
Today’s information overload is incompatible with reflection and fact-checking. Almost no one takes the time to verify information and draw their own conclusions; most people just absorb mountains of information without any filter.
On top of that, there’s social pressure to display competence and status in public, which leads us to want to appear knowledgeable rather than actually be knowledgeable.
But that confidence from the communicator rarely reflects reality, and here’s why…
What You Should Never Say in the Media
There’s an unspoken rule: never say “I don’t know.”
Admitting ignorance feels like giving up your seat at the table. If you confess that you don’t fully understand climate change, an economic crisis, or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, you automatically make room for someone else who will happily sell you easy answers in exchange for a few minutes of attention.
That dynamic rewards empty confidence and punishes honesty.
The funny thing is that, thanks to the Dunning-Kruger Effect, the more someone knows about a topic, the more doubts and nuances they tend to add to what they say. As John Wheeler once put it: “As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.”
This is usually the reality.
Real experts often speak with caution, filling their explanations with conditions, exceptions, and references to the authors they drew ideas from.
Charlatans, however, speak with absolute certainty about any topic, no matter what you ask them. Yet if you press them, they can’t name any credible sources from which they learned all the things they claim to know so well.
Confidence sells—but it’s dangerous and easy to dismantle.
The Difficulty of Being Honest
Kreider acknowledges something essential that we should all remind ourselves of.
He says he is not, and will never be, someone with definitive authority on anything. His only real value as a person is the honesty with which he speaks. And that honesty is so rare today that it becomes valuable. There are writers, columnists, and TV pundits who are respected and stand out precisely because of this.
Because they are brutally honest and don’t seek to show off or rise above others.
Montaigne, one of the first essayists in history, used to end many of his writings with a simple “but I don’t know” or a “What do I know?” This intellectual humility is what has made him endure for centuries. He admitted his own ignorance. He knew he didn’t have all the answers—and that’s why he was respected.
He wasn’t worth less for not knowing; he was worth more for admitting he was just another learner.
And maybe that’s why his readers felt close to him. Because no one relates to the person who knows (or claims to know) everything, but we all recognize ourselves in the one who doubts, who makes mistakes, who allows themselves to learn and be just another curious human being.
That’s what makes you connect, makes you human, makes you relatable.
The Good Thing About Writing
Kreider admits something that I realized a while ago…
For him, one of the most uncomfortable parts is trying to end with a perfect, wise conclusion. Life isn’t simple, nothing is black or white, but through writing, he notices how much he doesn’t know about a topic—and that pushes him to keep learning.
The more you write, the more you realize what you don’t know, and that’s what allows you to keep learning.
Writing is, essentially, step 2 of the Feynman technique. That’s why it’s so powerful.
Saying “I Don’t Know” Is Liberating
The most honest thing we can do—as writers or as people—is to acknowledge that we don’t have all the answers. That some problems have no solution. That life is extremely complex. And that deep down, we’re just as lost as everyone else.
Next time you feel the pressure to give an opinion, take a breath and admit that you don’t know.
That simple phrase creates space for curiosity, genuine conversation, and the possibility of truly learning. Because in a world saturated with false certainties, saying “I don’t know” doesn’t make you weak.
It makes you real.
Still Curious? Here Are 3 Ideas to Dig Deeper
✍️ Your Turn: Do you think ChatGPT has become the new religion just because it seems to know everything? In reality, it makes mistakes just like humans do, even though millions of people treat it like a demigod.
💭 Quote of the Day: “Nobody ever figures out what life is all about, and it doesn’t matter. Explore the world. Nearly everything is really interesting if you go into it deeply enough.” — Richard Feynman.
See you next time! 👋
References 📚
Kreider, T. (2013). The Power of ‘I Don’t Know’. URL
Thank you, Alvaro. This is an important thing to remember as we bludgeon our ways through life. That meek voice has the power to silent the bold incompetents. An experience: I attended a discussion about domestic violence with several "stakeholders" in town. Suddenly, there was a quiet voice from a Mexican women who was sitting on the floor. She was an aide in the hospital where this discussion was held and also one of the ESL learners in our library program. She said, "Just because it's a problem in your culture doesn't mean it's a problem in ours." You could hear a pin drop.