On Knowledge, Ignorance and Misperception

Many times we, research analysts, think we have completed the puzzle. Actually we NEVER do. What we actually do is think we have completed it. At the end of the day we are just tricking ourselves. If you think twice, our job is like playing the Jigsaw game - do you remember the movie? Things are getting scary, right? So, don't freak out and let me explain it.

Analysts are flood with information from companies, sell-side analysts and stockholders - to name a few. This is just like playing Jigsaw's game. The game is set up, someone controls your attention. You have to figure out  by yourself, just like a CIA agent, what the actual facts are. Distraction is across the corner, but the facts are buried down there. You will have to triangulate information across different sources in order to reach somewhere. Well, "somewhere" is a place where there are a lot more questions to be answered and that's what knowledge means: knowing what you DON'T know. In other words, knowledge is ignorance acknowledgement. And so the game goes on. It's an infinite game. Thus when you get home at night I suggest you to upgrade Munger's lesson "Make sure you learn something new every single day" to "Make sure you end your day with more questions than when you woke up."

Want to dig further?

Ignorance: How it drives science by Stuart Firestein

Finite and Infinite Games by James Carse