Name: Know Thyself
Rating: 4.5 (322 reviews)
Author: Stephen M. Fleming

What’s in it for me? Start on the path to self-awareness.

In a world where artificial intelligence and neural networks are quickly learning how to think, speak, and act like we do, there’s still one crucial quality that sets humans apart from machines: our capacity for self-awareness. Since the days of the Greek thinker Socrates, philosophers and psychologists alike have been fascinated by our ability not just to think, but to interrogate how and why we think the things we do.

These days, this capacity for self-awareness is a field of neuroscientific study in its own right: the field of metacognition. Understanding metacognitive processes can actually help us think better, make sharper decisions, and avoid critical errors. Luckily, you don’t have to be a trained neuroscientist to apply some of the key principles of metacognition to your own thinking.

In this Blink, you’ll learn

why you should teach the skills you want to learn;
why it’s so difficult to change your mind on big topics; and
how to make better decisions through collaboration.

Your self-awareness is hardwired into your brain. But you can always sharpen it.

Let me ask you a question: What’s Elton John’s real name?

Now, there are three ways you might respond.

One: “I have absolutely no idea.”

Two: “Reginald Dwight, obviously!”

Three: “I know that I know that! It’s on the tip of my tongue, but I can’t seem to remember it.”

This third reaction is a great example of a process that cognitive neuroscientists call metacognition.

What’s metacognition? Well, cognition is thinking. And that prefix, meta-, comes from the Greek for beyond. So metacognition is thinking that goes beyond thinking. It’s having an awareness of how and why we’re thinking something at the same time that we’re thinking it. Someone who thinks metacognitively is self-aware – someone who doesn’t just think things, but interrogates and reflects on what they think.

In the eighteenth century, a Swedish botanist named Carl Linnaeus set himself a pretty big project. He wrote a book, Systema Naturae, where he began to outline a taxonomy of the natural world – in other words, labeling and categorizing every living thing. He wrote exhaustively long entries for all kinds of birds, insects, and plants. But when it came to humans, Linnaeus felt that three Latin words were enough. Nosce te ipsum. Meaning? Those that know themselves.

It’s been over 250 years since Linnaeus wrote that – but ask any cognitive scientist and they’ll tell you, Linnaeus wasn’t wrong. Our capacity for self-awareness is a key part of what makes us human. It drives our actions to a powerful degree – and, harnessed properly, it can help us achieve extraordinary things. Here’s an example:

Free divers are athletes who try to dive as deep underwater as possible without the use of any additional breathing apparatus, like an oxygen tank. During free diving tournaments, divers compete to reach the lowest depths. It’s a pretty dangerous undertaking. Go too deep, and divers risk passing out, sustaining lung injuries, and even drowning.

Successful free divers don’t just need physical stamina and a talent for diving; they rely on an exquisite level of metacognitive awareness of their abilities and limits. If they underestimate their abilities, they’ll stop before they need to, losing valuable inches from their final score. If they overshoot their limitations, the results can be catastrophic. The difference between a good free diver and a great one? Self-awareness.

We’re all self-aware to some degree. Our aptitude for metacognition is hardwired into our brains and many key metacognitive processes are actually performed automatically. If you’ve ever set a drink down on the table, missed the table by an inch or two, and reflexively caught your glass before it shatters on the floor – well, that was your ingrained metacognition at work. We perform a lot of simple tasks, like drinking a glass of water, automatically. At the same time, we’re constantly self-monitoring. If a task doesn’t progress as predicted, we instinctively self-correct.

We can build on the metacognitive instincts hardwired into our brain by cultivating more explicit metacognitive strategies. Research has shown that some people are more naturally prone to metacognition than others; neuropsychologists call these people “metacognitively gifted.” But we’re all capable of developing and refining our metacognitive skills. And, as the next few chapters will show, boosting metacognition can lead to enhanced learning outcomes, better decision-making, and a more flexible style of thinking.

For better learning outcomes, think about how you learn.

These days, we don’t stop learning the moment we graduate high school or college. In fact, we’re far more likely to be “life-long learners,” changing jobs and even careers multiple times in our lives, all while keeping up-to-date with advancing technologies and research.

TL;DR? We need to learn smarter, not harder. That’s where metacognition can give you the edge.

A decision might feel right. That doesn’t mean it is.

In 2012, Mark Lynas was an environmental campaigner passionately opposed to genetically modified foods – he’d even illegally destroyed GM crops with the help of a machete. In 2013, Mark Lynas stood up in front of the Oxford Farming Conference and stated that, having engaged further with the science, he now believed GM farming was crucial for sustainable agriculture. He was no less a committed environmentalist – but, on this issue, he had done a complete 180.

Why is Mark’s story so remarkable?

What can you do when metacognition goes wrong?

In February 1987, the then eighteen-year-old Donte Booker was brought before a court on sexual-assault charges. His victim confidently picked him out of a line-up and her eyewitness testimony was convincing enough for the jury to find Booker guilty. He was sentenced to 25 years in jail.

The problem? As DNA evidence indisputably proved in 2005, Booker was completely innocent. And it’s not like this was an anomaly. The Innocence Project estimates that faulty eyewitness testimony has contributed to 70 percent of proven wrongful convictions in the US.

Key ideas in Know Thyself

What is Know Thyself about?

In Know Thyself (2021) cognitive neuroscientist Stephen M. Fleming lays out the basic principles of metacognition – the way we think about what we think. This revealing book shows by understanding of our metacognitive processes, we can turn them to our advantage, to make accurate, informed judgments.