The Curse of Knowledge

In Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip and Dan Heath, the authors discuss the curse of knowledge. The curse is essentially this: the more you know about a subject, the less able you are to easily pass on that information. One place to find a real world example of this is in fiber crafts videos- knitting, crochet, etc. I ran up against the curse trying to learn needle tatting. (Tatting is the term for making lace.) In the video I watched, the tatter slowly set up the basics of making the first loop, which is already a lot tiny stitches (except they probably aren't called stitches, but you get the idea). Then when the first loop was finished she said "You just keep going until you're done." My friend and I had to advance the video frame by frame to figure out how to start the next loop or chain. The tatter's hands moved quickly with muscle memory. She likely didn't even realize she was leaving out steps- of course you have to flip the pattern before starting the next loop; that's how it lays flat. But she suffered from the curse of knowledge. 

In my experience, the curse of knowledge functions the same way that memory works: we remember a little of the beginning of a process, because the basic ideas get reinforced as we go. Then we remember the high points and the end- the most exciting parts. The middle bits, the connective tissue, don't stick in our minds. Players remember games this way. Professors who are talented practitioners but not good teachers teach this way. 

There is another way the curse can manifest. I'm experiencing it by writing this blog. This form the curse of knowledge takes is the inability to answer a broad question because the answer is 5k words long. When someone asks in a forum "what is a good theme?" I no longer know where to start. I can point to my posts on resonance or the anatomy of a theme. I could start talking about fluff or gimmicks. I could talk about the importance of thematic integration. I could start at the beginning and run through the principles of design, an important foundation that doesn't even address the question. Or I could scroll past the question. 

Becoming good at a craft is about learning all the nuance of the connective tissue that is so difficult to teach. Teaching a craft is about being able to pass on that information in a clear, concise way. Both beginners and experts have to have patience in the face of the curse of knowledge. 

I struggled through each step but eventually learned to make a lace doily. I didn't have a community of experienced tatters to reach out to. The board game design community is an amazing support structure. While it can be frustrating to answer the same beginner questions over and over (no one will steal your idea, we promise), the goal should be getting people to the middle steps and clearly teaching those steps. That is where the craft lies.