There seems to be a distinction, which is sometimes missed, between people who ‘know the name of something’ and people who ‘know something,’ an observation from physicist Richard Feynman.
The first, ‘knowing the name of something,’ is surface knowledge, something we have borrowed and not integrated into our own being. The second, ‘knowing something,’ is from those who’ve done the work, paid the dues and integrated it into their own work.
Reading, listening and learning is a form of borrowing. Until the time is spent and work done integrating it into what is already known, it remains borrowed.
‘Knowing something’ then becomes part of who we are, part of our opinion of things, as long as we have done the work required to hold such opinions. If we haven’t done the work required to hold certain opinions, we only ‘know the name of something,’ which is worth very little if anything.
One of the challenges coming from this, as Charlie Munger explained, is getting the responsibility of issues into the hands of the people who ‘know something’ and away from those who just ‘know the name of something.’
William Kerr And associates 