Abstract
In 2002, referring to Iraq and its relationship to terrorism, Donald Rumsfeld declared “that there are known knowns, there are things we know we know. We also know that there are known-unknowns, that is to say we know there are some things that we do not know, but there are also unknown-unknowns—the ones that we don’t know we don’t know.”
There was nothing new in what Rumsfeld said, and some thought he was uttering evasive gibberish, but Rumsfeld’s classifications are quite useful. Exploring known unknowns is, for example, much of the work of science. Donald Rumsfeld turned out to be a better epistemologist than a defense secretary.
I shall begin briefly with some known knowns about the House Blueprint’s proposal then turn to known unknowns.