ASMA KHALID, HOST:
I've got a question for you all. Is ignorance actually bliss? Well, we're going to try to figure that out in the next few minutes. A new book by Columbia University professor Mark Lilla breaks down the constant and very human struggle between wanting to know things while also rejecting truths that might challenge us. The book is called "Ignorance And Bliss: On Wanting Not To Know." Mark, welcome to the show.
MARK LILLA: Good morning.
KHALID: So I've got to ask at the outset here, because I'm in the news business and there feels like there is such a desire these days for people to just tune out the news - you know, people say it stresses them out, they don't have time for it. Are these non-news consumers on to something?
LILLA: They are. There are all sorts of reasons, for example, to limit your flow of information. And so it certainly can be a good thing to sort of decide who's trustworthy and who's not trustworthy and sometimes just to step back and reorder your thoughts and priorities.
KHALID: You write in your book that some people are naturally curious and seek information, and some people have little to no desire to ask questions. Are we all prone to both dispositions?
LILLA: I think we are. We've all met people like this, someone who can't let their curiosity go. And then there are people who, either rightly or wrongly, make the judgment that being curious all the time doesn't help their lives, it just sort of distracts them, and that they'll only pay attention when they think it's important. And so they don't treat curiosity as if it's some overriding human virtue. Then there's a third type of person who has a different disposition, and at times all of us have this temporarily, and that is we just want to shut the windows.
KHALID: So there's the personal aspect of not wanting to know, and then there's society at large. What causes a surge in large groups of people not wanting to engage with information, not wanting to engage with facts?
LILLA: So when there are large social changes, you can understand that people might just want to stay in place while these things come at them until they figure out what is going on. But what's happening now has to do with the huge gap between our educated caste, you might say, and a less educated caste. And there's great distrust now between the two groups, and we know all about that.
KHALID: I have often wondered if you see a role for social media in how we think about information and fact.
LILLA: Everything is accessible all the time, and so the incentive to sort of build walls against all of this or to group yourself among like friends - and I suppose you've seen this on both sides, the willful ignorance of Trump followers who ignore the facts, for instance, that he contradicts himself, but on the other side, you know, the reports that have come out in the past couple days about the way that the Biden administration kept from the press the health status of President Biden. So, you know, we all have - it's always available, that kind of willful ignorance.
KHALID: Mark, I want to know, though, are there certain types of information that most people do not want to know and that they are more susceptible to saying, yeah, I'm fine being ignorant about that?
LILLA: Well, one of those things is our medical condition if we get sick and certainly also mortality. And so we both want to know and don't want to know what our medical condition is. And in fact, many of the things in life are like that, you know. Now, as I try to point out in the book, the will to know and the will not to know is within all of our heads, and there are often situations where both of them are at play, and understandably.
KHALID: Mark Lilla is the author of "Ignorance And Bliss: On Wanting Not To Know." Thank you so much for joining us.
LILLA: Thanks for having me.
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