Achievements in Ignorance: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''"All you need in this world is ignorance and confidence, and then your success is assured."''|'''[[Mark Twain]]'''}}

== Anime &and Manga ==

== ComicsComic Books ==

* In ''[[Seven Psychopaths]]'', this is the in-story rationale for recruiting a [[Ragtag Bunch of Misfits]] to assassinate Hitler—all the sane people in the military have long since dismissed the notion of assassinating Hitler as impossible, so the only ones who stand a chance of succeeding are those who are too crazy to realize it's impossible.

* Done between Mike Teevee and Willie Wonka in ''[[Charlie and the Chocolate Factory]]''.{{context}}

* ''[[Discworld]]'' likes this one.

** Tiffany Aching reading the dictionary cover to cover because nobody ever told her she shouldn't and Susan Sto-Helit successfully teaching seven -year-olds algebra and, when told it's too hard for them, replies that so far they haven't figured that out. It is needed to be said that examples of children learning something before adults would think they're ready to learn it are probably [[Truth in Television]]. A bright child may be reading books meant for adults by the age of eight or ten, though they probably won't understand [[Parental Bonus|everything they read]].

** Bergholt Stuttley "Bloody Stupid" Johnson, of [[Discworld]], is such an incompetent architect and inventor that he ends up creating buildings that are [[Bigger on the Inside]], and circles with the pi equal to exactly 3. Three of the national projects that he undertook can fit in a normal pocket. The full list is [https://web.archive.org/web/20120916232227/http://wiki.lspace.org/wiki/Bergholt_Stuttley_Johnson here].

** In ''[[Discworld/Equal Rites|Equal Rites]]'' Esk teleports something without a counterweight and was able to do it because she didn't know it was impossible, because she hadn't been formally taught.

** Discussed in ''[[Discworld/The Last Hero|The Last Hero]]'', when Leonard asks for journeymen craftsmen, rather than masters, because he has no use for "people who have learned the limits of the possible".

** [[Anthropomorphic Personification|Death]] gives this explanation for how he can move through walls and otherwise tell [[The Order of the Stick|tell the laws of Physics to sit down and shut the hell up]]. His advice to Mort in his stint as his apprentice is not to think about it too hard and forget that you know that you can't move through walls. Mort is able to do this when [[Centipede's Dilemma|he isn't actively thinking about it]] as he escapes a group of thugs by backing through a wall.

** An interesting example is Lord Rust, Ankh Morpork's foremost military leader by dint of heritage,; the man is a total incompetent with absolutely no tactical ability or military knowledge whatever, and does not seem to comprehend the utter futility of attacking a vastly superior force on their home ground with virtually no provisions. Whilst this has the obvious result of killing almost every man under his command, Rust is completely unharmed, even though he leads every suicidal charge from the front. By all laws of probability, he should be dead long ago. However, Rust has the unusual ability of being able to completely and subconsciously ignore anything that contradicts or is outside his extraordinarily unrealistic worldview; assuming that it simply cannot exist; including physical danger. He has been reported as charging directly at enemy lines surrounded by projectiles without being scratched, arrows have apparently changed direction to avoid him (and hitting his men). On the Discworld, sufficiently powerful belief can alter physical reality, and magic has been described as more or less ignoring the laws of physics.

** Cohen and his Silver Horde slaughter the Agatean ninjas in ''[[Interesting Times]]'' because nobody told them that Ninjas were invincible. OfMind you, course[[Conservation of Ninjitsu|there were a lot of ninjas]].

* In ''[[HitchThe HikersHitchhiker's Guide to Thethe Galaxy]]'', the key to flying is "throwing yourself at the ground and missing", being interrupted mid-fall and forgetting to hit, and then—andthen — and this ''is'' vital—notvital — not thinking very hard about how you should be falling. Otherwise [[Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress|gravity will glance sharply in your direction]] and demand to know what the hell you think you're doing.

** This method was also behind the invention of the Infinite Improbability Drive. By way of explanation, the theory behind the ''Finite'' Improbability Drive was well-understood by that point, and largely consisted of ensuring that probability was twisted ''just'' right to ensure an otherwise improbable result. For example, ensuring that, at parties, every particle in the hostess' undergarments simultaneously quantum-leaped two feet to the left. The INFINITE''Infinite'' Improbability Drive was considered something of a [[Holy Grail]] for scientists, but after centuries of trying they gave up and declared that it was next to impossible to create one. An underclassman, cleaning up after one of those previously mentioned parties, realized that if it was ALMOST''almost'' impossible, there must be some real possibility of it, and decided to find out what would happen if he worked out how improbable such a drive was, fed the result into the Finite Improbability Drive, gave it a ''really'' hot cup of tea, and turned it on. Moments later, a fully functional Infinite Improbability Drive was created.

*:* In another series of strips, Ratbert decides to fly simply by flapping his arms. Dilbert insists it can't be done. Bob the Dinosaur gives Ratbert some advice that turns out to work, resulting in him flying near an annoyed Dilbert and remarking "This must be so embarrassing for you."

* Steve Jackson Games' role-playing system ''[[Toon (game)|Toon]]'', which takes place in a cartoon universe, gives appropriately cartoony reasons for being able to do this sort of thing. If a character wants to walk off a cliff and on thin air, or breathe underwater or whatever, he can roll to intentionally try to ''fail'' an intelligence roll. If he fails, it's considered that he's too dumb to realize it's impossible. This is a reference to all the times cartoon characters do just that. It's actually considered a law of [[Toon Physics]] that [[Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress|gravity does not affect a character until they realize it's supposed to]]. This is demonstrated in an episode of ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]''.

** There's also the fact that this is what the [[God Guise|Mechanicum]] ''wants'' the Imperium to be, at least when it comes to raw technology. Anything more sophisticated than turning a door handle or turning on a light switch is considered sacred and "beyond the mien of normal men," and that you must have faith in the Machine Spirits to do the work for you. Yes, that includes the operation of career/mission/SURVIVAL critical equipment.

** ''The Guy Who Cried Grendel'' (/tg/-published ''[[Dark Heresy]]'' game session log) had a [[Blood Knight|Khornate]] heretic posing as a Sister of Battle sent to try and turn the ([[Action Survivor|accidental]]) semi-celebrity to their way of thinking. The humble well-meaning Adept managed to convert her right back while remaining oblivious to this (while her lack of loyalty was quite transparent OOC). ''Radical Inquisition Handbook'' has [[CanonAscended ImmigrantFanon|actually mentioned]] both characters.

** Indeed, one of the defining conflicts of the game is between "normal" Geniuses (who know it isn't possible and do it anyway) and Unmada - Geniuses who truly believe science works according to their paradigm. Around an Unmada, it does...

* And ''[[Mage: The Ascension]]'' has the ignorant and blind Sleepers (all of non-mage humanity) constantly keeping the [[Fantasy Kitchen Sink|terrible demons, gods, monsters, etc.]] at bay (and away from our tasty souls) day in and day out. This is done through the amazing, awe-inspiring power... of ''[[Selective Obliviousness|disbelieving and desperately ignoring]]'' that these things could possibly exist. The PCs being Mages, you realize that this disbelief is a terrible, unacceptable thing.

** Fighter survivedand the group survive a fall at terminal velocity. byHow? [[Not the Fall That Kills You|Fighter ''blockingblocked the ground.'']]. He's clearly a Solar [[Exalted]] who used the Heavenly Guardian Defense.

** This trope was explicitly used by Red Mage when he told Fighter to use 'make [his] swords as things unto chainsaws'; as explained in the page image, the logic beingwas thatto give Fighter isan idea that he's too stupid to realize he doesncan't knowact how to do thaton. It works.

* In ''[[Bob and George]]'', on at least two occasions Mega Man has undergone violence that should have killed him, and survived because he's too dumb to realize he should be dead.

* Dave does this every time he fixes a machine in ''[[Narbonic]]''. This turns out to be because he's {{spoiler|a latent [[Mad Scientist]].}}

* In ''[[Tales of the Questor]]'', Quentyn and his friends put together an absolutely unique magic item using techniques no-one has ever seen before. Subverted in that they're not stupid, but three sheets to the wind (in other words: drunk).

** Not only were they responsible for creating perhaps the most powerful magical sword in existence from what should have been the most magically worthless enchantment training sword (think about recording over a cassette tape hundreds of times), they invented new runes to tie all the latent enchantments together, essentially revolutionizing the field.

* ''[[Collar 6]]'': No one told Laura that {{spoiler|she shouldn't be able to reach subspace at her level without physical stimulation}}.

'''Coop''': Hey, good thing no one ever told me that. }}

* An early episode of ''[[Xiaolin Showdown]]'' has three of the four heroes trapped in an invisible box by [[Enemy Mime|an evil mime]]. Raimundo is able to make noise by sliding the Mantis Flip Coin against the "invisible" bars, while; it was previously established that the walls were solid, and there were no bars. They use this to escape when they realize the box acts like whatever they think it does. This raises the question of how they got trapped in the box in the first place, considering they didnMime'ts believeconstructs thatfunction itsomewhat wason there until they walked into itbelief.

*** Another one hadOne ''[[Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner]]'' short has them both run off thea cliff. - but only Wile E. falls, and he looks downup andruefully holdsat his prey while holding up a sign thatreading says"I roughlywouldn't "Thismind - except that it defies the law of gravity.!" Road Runner, who is ''still'' floating, holds up a response sign that says "True - but I never studied law.!"

** There wasIn a ''[[Tiny Toon Adventures]]'' episode which explained the phenomena., Elmer, teaching the young toons, saidteaches that as long as thea toon didn't look down, itthey wouldn't fall. This in itself is a shout out to an earlier Disney work where Walt himself explained this as the Plausible Impossible effect.

* In the ''[[I Am Weasel]]'' episode "Law of Gravity", I.R. Baboon was actually able to defy gravity up until the point that he actually gets to read the actual Law of Gravity. Later on, Baboon ''destroys'' the Law... and every lawyer on Earth starts floating helplessly in mid-air. Weasel explains it only affects lawyers because they're the only ones who ''understand'' the law.

* Homer Simpson of ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'' achieved an [[Epic Fail]] so massive that he managed to cause an actual nuclear meltdown in a nuclear plant simulation truck with no fissionable materials.:

** Homer managed to [[Epic Fail|cause an actual nuclear meltdown in a nuclear plant simulation truck with no fissionable materials]]. He also managed to light a bowl of cereal on fire by pouring milk on it.

** And Grandpa Simpson once managed to take off his underpants without taking off his pants first. When asked how he did that, he is as confused as everyone else.

* ''[[SpongeBob SquarePants]]'': In "Life of Crime" Spongebob and Patrick [[Beyond the Impossible|set up a bonfire]] while they believe to bethemselves wanted men, and the instant Patrick wonders on how they could possibly light a fire while underwater, it fizzles out.

* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130807224202/http://irrationalgames.com/insider/what-might-have-been/ This interview with Ken Levine] reveals that if he'd ''known'' how difficult and borderline impossible it should have been to create ''[[System Shock 2]]'' with the resources and technology he had at the time, he probably would have failed to deliver what is now a classic.