Saturday 2/13/2021 - 10% Broad Knowledge vs 90% Narrow Knowledge

My mind wandered back to “would you rather have 10% knowledge of all subjects, or 90% of one subject?”. I would be curious what the stats look like across all the different populations. This assumes everyone is interested in knowledge, but I suspect even if someone thinks they don’t care, subconsciously it is still a driving factor.

Is the knowledge hopper less productive than the one track seeker? Maybe a fresh look at a problem from the basics only could solve part of that last 10%. Society needs these contrasting roles. One to constantly start explorations, create links across multiple fields, and can be “outside the box” helpful across any subject. Lots of discoveries, but likely get hypotheses wrong more often. Huge boost to critical thinking and problem solving skills, but don’t always have a history of case study to work from (more inherent risk?)

All that contrasts to the organized, analytical mind process of a life devoted to one subject. Less questions to answer, and the patience to test until we can use the word “Theory”. These people provide real world advancements in practical knowledge use. Organize all the data to create what everyone uses. Potential risk to unintended consequences when there is no knowledge of other fields of impact.

Which group is more likely to be ignorant if we should  be doing something in the first place? One group lacks basic understanding of other forces, and the other doesn’t know enough about the subject at hand. Like all of life, I’m sure there is a lot of nuance and variations between these two poles. Maybe AI takes over more and more for the granular deep dives, and humans are forced to a larger portion of inputting that foundational 10%.