Linus Pauling was one of the world’s greatest chemists. He won two Nobel Prizes and was a pioneer in both quantum chemistry and molecular biology. But in later years, Pauling started to talk about medicine. In his advocacy of “mega-vitamin” therapies, Pauling argued that mega-doses of vitamin C could treat diseases such as cancer and cure ailments like the common cold. There is no reputable evidence to support this. The medical establishment did and does dismiss these claims as utterly unfounded, unproven, and dangerous.

Pauling is an example of what the philosopher Nathan Ballantyne calls an “epistemic trespasser.” And it’s probably why the smartest, best-educated person you know can sometimes say or do the most idiotic of things.

Epistemic trespassing

Epistemic trespassing is when an expert in one field thinks that they are an expert in another. As Ballantyne put it: “Epistemic trespassers judge matters outside their field of expertise. They have competence or expertise to make good judgments in one field, but move to another field where they lack competence—and pass judgment nevertheless. We should doubt that trespassers are reliable judges in fields where they are outsiders.”

So, a trespasser is someone who might be good at coding, astrophysics, or medicine, and then imagines that they must be good at politics, sociology, or anthropology.

Epistemic trespassing is when a tech billionaire thinks that, because he is successful in one industry, he can solve a complex geopolitical crisis. Or it’s when a brilliant physicist believes that their mastery of math makes them an authority on public health.

Ballantyne argues that those who are well qualified and who have decades of earned experience often have a kind of intellectual pride that blinds them to their own boundaries. Because they have been the “master” of one domain for so long, they start to believe that their brilliance is a portable light they can carry into any dark room. They forget that while they may be a lion in the savannah of their own expertise, they are just another confused tourist when they wander into someone else’s jungle.

Transferable skills

Of course, some subjects overlap. If you are good at biology, it’s not unreasonable to assume you might find medicine a bit easier. If you are good at philosophy, you might find sociology or politics a natural extension. Likewise, there are clearly “transferable skills.” A transferable skill is a metacognitive heuristic — a strategy for “thinking about thinking” — that you can carry across to almost anything you do.

So, the ability to read and write is a basic, early-years transferable skill. Theologians, mathematicians, and film directors all know how to read. But how to interpret data, how to cross-reference a fact, and how to write a convincing essay are higher-level transferable skills.

Ballantyne argues that trespassing is almost always defined by a kind of intellectual arrogance where competence — and recognition — in one field means someone thinks they can easily tackle problems in another. As he put it, “Out of their league but highly confident nonetheless, trespassers appear to be immodest, dogmatic, or arrogant.”

Epistemic trespassing can be dangerous — as in the case of Pauling — and it can be desperately unhelpful, as in the case of someone saying, “I don’t know, but I can guess” or “I’ll give it a go.” But for most of us and in our daily lives, epistemic trespassing is simply irritating. There are few things so fist-clenchingly, eye-rollingly frustrating as someone wading into your area of expertise or knowledge, thinking they know better because they do know better in another field.

How to avoid epistemic trespassing

So, don’t be Linus Pauling. Don’t trespass. According to Ballantyne’s work, there are two easy ways we can make sure we don’t.

First, always recalibrate your knowledge when you approach other fields. We have to be honest about where our competence ends. As Ballantyne put it, we should aim for “greater intellectual modesty, in the sense that we will have good reason to be far less confident we have the right answers to many important questions.”

Second, be more willing to bow to others who know better. With achievement and competence often comes a false sense of independence. If you spend years or decades being asked by others what the answer is or what to do, it’s hard to then go back to asking others what to do instead. The professor of many years finds it difficult to go back to being a first-year undergraduate.

As Plato’s Socrates put it, “The beginning of wisdom is knowing how limited your knowledge is,” and in a world of loud opinions, we need to recognize that just because somebody is a genius in one area, that doesn’t make them an authority in another.