Five levels of ignorance

A very interesting book by Philippe Armour explores interesting levels in a process, but interestingly, could be applied to almost anything

The book talks about about laws of software process, it outlines 5 interesting levels of ignorance, that even the most cautious of us fall through at times

1. Zero order ignorance: Lack of ignorance;
   Which means, Knowing the Question, and Knowing the answer. There is no ignorance.
2. First order ignorance: Lack of knowledge;
   Which means, Knowing the Question, but not knowing the answer
3. Second order ignorance: Lack of awareness;
   Which means, Not knowing the Question, nor knowing the answer. But knowing the problem
4. Third order ignorance: Lack of process;
   Which is, Not even knowing the problem, but realising there is something wrong. Or that things are not working right
5. Fourth order ignorance: Lack of ignorance about the orders of ignorance.
   This means not knowing even that there is something wrong and having no idea how to resolve the issue

If we simply generalize this to our lives, turns out. There are many things that could be categorized in these buckets. From the most trivial to the most important

Take for example the issue of child birth. Many couples before knowing they're expecting, fall into the fourth order.

Once the lady knows that she is pregnant, she falls into the third level. She knows something is changing, but doesn't know what to expect. Especially if she's a first time mother.

Then when the baby arrives, and starts crying she would know there is a problem. What to do with it, comes as the knowledge of the elders. With time, she learns to ask the right quest, "The baby is crying what should I do?" and is promoted to the second level of ignorance

Eventually, with time and experience, the mother becomes totally aware of the child needs, and there is no more ignorance. Until something happens (like baby stomachache) Where she falls back to the third order, and a little by little learns to get back to the Zero order.

This is just an example of how we progress in this process. And could easily apply to anything in life

Hope this little article helps you realize how to to deal with personal ignorance