The Unknown Essay

1046 Words5 Pages
The Unknown "The Unknown", by Donald Rumsfeld (and Hart Seely) simply says that there are things that we are sure that we know, and that there are things that we, without a doubt know we do not know. In intelligence there are things you know you don’t know and therefore endeavor to find out. This makes us question what we know and what we think we know, Such as things that we are not aware that we don’t know. These could very well be things that we should know. So it seems natural to ask, do the unknown unknowns even exist. If we are ignorant to the things that we don’t know. In reality, when we discover things that we never knew, wouldn’t that make them things that we now know we didn’t know; the known unknowns. That is to say if he is talking about the concepts of knowledge (known knowns) uncertainty (known unknowns) and ignorance (unknown unknowns). In Hart Seely’s, “The Poetry of Donald Rumsfeld” he compiles a group of poems by Rumsfeld including “The Unknown”. Why do you think that Heely choose to bring these poems out to a wider public? I believe it was because he felt it was ridiculous for a political official to in such playful language when addressing political issues such as; war and terrorism. This goes to show how higher power can get away saying anything to dismiss the issues. Seely states, “He is trying to sell a story that cant be sold”. Which I believe he means that these issues will never disappear as long as they continue to be avoided by ridiculous riddles. Although what Rumsfeld is saying makes perfect sense to me, could he have said it any better? His statements are very self-contradicting and a bit absurd but in reality it expresses a possible truth which is what I found most interesting. I have researched other poems spoken by Rumsfeld but “The Unknown was the one that I found made the most sense to me that is way I want to

More about The Unknown Essay

Open Document