# Is understanding even necessary?

**URL:** <https://forum.podcaster.community/t/is-understanding-even-necessary/4794>\
**Category:** Workbench\
**Created:** [March 4, 2025, 3:09pm UTC](https://forum.podcaster.community/t/is-understanding-even-necessary/4794 "2025-03-04T15:09:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![craigconstantine](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/user_avatar/forum.podcaster.community/craigconstantine/32/2322_2.png) [@craigconstantine](https://forum.podcaster.community/u/craigconstantine)\
**Post date:** [March 4, 2025, 3:09pm UTC](https://forum.podcaster.community/t/is-understanding-even-necessary/4794/1 "2025-03-04T15:09:41Z")

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[![Is understanding even necessary?](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex030/uploads/podcaster1/original/2X/b/b4c1ec29b7e65b59f81d507f1360b4d5e9af1f9d.png)](https://openandcurious.org/2025/03/04/is-understanding-even-necessary/)

> When it comes, this will be the fourth message received from Alsafi in my lifetime. Few have timed their career so fortuitously. The first came when I was a child. The second came just weeks after I joined the Intercivilizational Observatory’s San Francisco office, and I wormed my way onto the analysis team. The third came the year I met Cassio, and I was doubly lovestruck. Still, I was reading responses to questions another generation had asked. But now, a full 39-year round-trip after I began, I’ll finally get answers to my questions. Ones from my youth, maybe, but they’ll be mine. After all this time, I’ll finally be In Conversation.
> 
> ~ [Andrew Dana Hudson](https://openandcurious.org/tag/andrew-dana-hudson/), from [The Weather Out There – Long Now](https://longnow.org/ideas/the-weather-out-there/)

I find tremendous value in deep, considered conversation. Usually, a conversation about the weather isn’t such a valuable opportunity. But that conversation about the “weather” is really about the limits of what can be considered a conversation.

It’s clear that one is not having a conversation if there is zero understanding. At zero-level you don’t even realize the other is trying to communicate. At the other extreme lie those deep, considered conversations. But just how much understanding is&nbsp;_necessary_&nbsp;for us to say we’re in a conversation? Might the understanding requirement be low, perhaps _extremely_ low?

If you know only that the other is trying to communicate, isn’t that enough to say a conversation is happening? Those conversations, where I am aware that I am not understanding the other, turn out to be really valuable. Perhaps it’s the [Pareto principle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle#Analysis) at work: With someone I understand not at all, a tiny bit of understanding gives me a huge benefit. Perhaps it’s about unknown-unknowns: The more I make the _`*hunh*`_ sound, the better.

ɕ

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This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at [https://openandcurious.org/2025/03/04/is-understanding-even-necessary/](https://openandcurious.org/2025/03/04/is-understanding-even-necessary/)