Letter: Will Dunning-Kruger become The Nightmare on K Street?

Published: 01-11-2025 7:00 AM

As a young engineer and pilot trainee in the 1980s, I had much to learn. We learned about checklists for avoiding future problems and ensuring everything was considered and accomplished. We used the checklists because we lacked the experience required for reliable success. Another memory from the 1980s was Freddy Krueger, a fictitious character who could harm you in your sleep. He was The Nightmare on Elm Street. Years later, a more frightening name was coined.

The Dunning-Kruger effect is when people overestimate their abilities or knowledge in a particular area. They don’t know what they don’t know. Checklists continue to be used so we can consider and learn from others’ past mistakes. One of my memories is asking my fellow newbies if they even knew what the items on the checklist meant, which many didn’t.

We are now in a period where some entering our government don’t know what they don’t know. These are the guys who cut taxes with an ax and not a scalpel. Sure, turn off the power to a whole apartment building to save money on electricity, but realize you just caused everyone’s food to spoil and turned off your neighbor’s oxygen generator, resulting in their death. If you then say that you didn’t think of that, you just became a victim of Dunning-Kruger. Perhaps Dunning-Kruger will become The Nightmare on K Street, where thoughtless and naive decisions cause our nation’s economy to crash and burn.

Don Cavallaro

Rye

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