Editing There are unknown unknowns (section)

==Reaction==

Canadian columnist [[Mark Steyn]] called it "in fact a brilliant distillation of quite a complex matter".<ref name="telegraph">{{cite news |author=Steyn, Mark |author-link=Mark Steyn |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/3599959/Rummy-speaks-the-truth-not-gobbledygook.html |title=Rummy speaks the truth, not gobbledygook |publisher=Daily Telegraph |date=December 9, 2003 |access-date=October 30, 2008}}</ref> Australian economist and blogger [[John Quiggin]] wrote: "Although the language may be tortured, the basic point is both valid and important."<ref>{{cite web |last=Quiggin |first=John |author-link=John Quiggin |url=https://johnquiggin.com/2004/02/10/in-defense-of-rumsfeld/ |title=In Defense of Rumsfeld |work=johnquiggin.com |access-date=5 January 2024 |date=February 10, 2004}}</ref>

Psychoanalytic philosopher [[Slavoj Žižek]] says that beyond these three categories there is a fourth, the unknown known, that which one intentionally refuses to acknowledge that one knows: "If Rumsfeld thinks that the main dangers in the confrontation with Iraq were the 'unknown unknowns', that is, the threats from Saddam whose nature we cannot even suspect, then the [[Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse|Abu Ghraib scandal]] shows that the main dangers lie in the "unknown knowns"—the disavowed beliefs, suppositions and obscene practices we pretend not to know about, even though they form the background of our public values."<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.lacan.com/zizekrumsfeld.htm |date=May 21, 2004 |work=In These Times |via=lacan.com |first=Slavoj |last=Žižek |author-link=Slavoj Žižek |title=What Rumsfeld Doesn't Know That He Knows About Abu Ghraib |access-date=February 23, 2009}}</ref>

German sociologists Christopher Daase and Oliver Kessler agreed that the [[framing (sociology)|cognitive frame]] for political practice may be determined by the relationship between "what we know, what we do not know, what we cannot know", but stated that Rumsfeld left out "what we do not like to know".<ref name=kauk>{{Cite journal |last1=Daase |first1=Christopher |last2=Kessler |first2=Oliver |date=December 2007 |title=Knowns and Unknowns in the 'War on Terror': Uncertainty and the Political Construction of Danger |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0967010607084994 |journal=Security Dialogue |language=en |volume=38 |issue=4 |pages=411–434 |doi=10.1177/0967010607084994 |s2cid=145253344 |issn=0967-0106|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

The event has been used in multiple books to discuss [[risk assessment]].<ref name="GirardGirard2009"/><ref name="NeveLuetchford2008">{{cite book|last1=Neve|first1=Geert de|last2=Luetchford|first2=Peter|title=Hidden Hands in the Market: Ethnographies of Fair Trade, Ethical Consumption, and Corporate Social Responsibility |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M1iYFfhhm8cC&pg=PA252|access-date=February 10, 2014 |year=2008 |publisher=Emerald Group Publishing |isbn=9781848550582|pages=252–}}</ref>

Rumsfeld named his 2011 autobiography ''[[Known and Unknown: A Memoir]]''. In the author's note at the start of the book, he expressly acknowledges the source of his memoir's title and mentions a few examples of his statement's prominence.<ref name="Rumsfeld2">{{cite book|last1=Rumsfeld |first1=Donald |title=Known and Unknown: A Memoir|date=2011|publisher=Penguin Group|location=New York|isbn=9781101502495|page=xiii|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_wIcpxMOjD4C&pg=PR14}}</ref> ''[[The Unknown Known]]'' is the title of [[Errol Morris]]'s 2013 biographical documentary film about Rumsfeld.<ref>{{cite news |author=Scott|title=Not Giving an Inch in a Battle of Wits and Words; Deciphering Donald H. Rumsfeld in 'The Unknown Known'|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/02/movies/deciphering-donald-h-rumsfeld-in-the-unknown-known.html|access-date=April 4, 2014|year=2014|newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref> In it, Rumsfeld initially defines "unknown knowns" as "the things you think you know, that it turns out you did not", and toward the end of the film he defines the term as "things that you know, that you don't know you know".<ref>Morris, Errol (Director) (December 13, 2013). ''The Unknown Known'' (Motion picture). Los Angeles, CA: The Weinstein Company.</ref>

Rumsfeld's comment earned the 2003 [[Foot in Mouth Award]] from the British [[Plain English Campaign]].<ref>{{cite news |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/3254852.stm |title=Rum remark wins Rumsfeld an award |work=[[BBC News]] |date=2 December 2003 |access-date=30 September 2012}}</ref>