Real Knowledge vs. Chauffeur Knowledege

Real Knowledge is when someone has truly understood the topic and knows more about what they do not know as compared to what they know.

On the other hand, Chauffeur Knowledge is when people know the words in a topic instead of the topic itself.

A wicked story which Charlie used to talk about Max Planck, who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1918 and his Chauffeur. While on tour for giving the same talk across Germany, Planck's chauffeur memorized his speech and in one of the events proposed that he deliver the speech on quantum mechanics and Max to be seated in the audience for a change. Planck liked the idea, and his chauffeur gave the speech in that event.

When one of the professors asked a complex question, chauffeur digressed it by saying that even my chauffeur (in this case Max) can answer it, and his chauffeur did. You see one such topic these days is Artificial Intelligence (AI). People who know about AI are quietly sitting in the audience and everyone else has learnt a story around AI. They add their own elements such that its narration looks original when in fact it is just a story.

People prefer reading a story around topic instead of the actual topic. So, the next time you read anything on social media, question yourself: Is this just a false sense of understanding or factual elements about a topic? Spoiler Alert: I see some using numbers as facts which is just another form of chauffeur knowledge.

(Notice how I created a story of a story to explain that we are just accumulating chauffeur knowledge instead of real knowledge.)

Excerpt in my own words from a book I am reading currently - Art of Thinking Clearly by Rolf Dobelli

If you want to get a flavor of what Real Knowledge is, do follow Arpit Bhayani and his blogs. I have been binging his videos on YouTube lately and the way he explains a topic is awesome.