How to Discover Secrets in Leadership Land, Part 1
Using imaginary time travel to study secrets • Inconceivabilia and the Veil of (In)comprehension • Supernatural properties of Cerebrium (crystallized secrets)

In last week’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Can't Tell You Secrets, we argued that leaders who don’t want to be superseded by the impending mech-egemony should spend more time searching for secrets.
Sounds great in theory…but secrets don’t exactly grow on trees. How are you supposed to go secret-seeking?
Buckle Into Your Time Machine
Secret-seeking becomes a little easier when you adopt a certain mindset. We started shifting you into this mindset when we introduced the concept of “anti-knowledge” two weeks ago in Why Epistemology is Important in Leadership (And How to Apply It). In that article, we defined anti-knowledge as the presence of something unknown to distinguish it from “ignorance” (the absence of knowledge). We’ll explain at the end of Part 2 why the distinction is important. For now, let’s complete the mindset shift by pretending that we’re traveling forward and backward in time.
What could imaginary time travel possibly have to do with secrecy, you ask? Our response:
Imaginary time travel requires imagination, which artificial intelligence doesn’t have (yet). An AI can mimic human creativity by using statistical sorcery, but only in realms that are both structured and verifiable.
Anti-knowledge is unseen, unheard, and unknown, so you can’t observe it directly. Hopping into your imaginary time machine allows you to observe anti-knowledge indirectly by studying the patterns of how anti-knowledge becomes knowledge, and vice versa.
To illustrate, hoist your mind out of the present moment and put yourself into the shoes of 1) your past self when you were eight years old, 2) your past self from a decade ago, and 3) your future self ten years in the future. What did (will) the world look like to your alternate selves?
When you were eight years old, you had boundless curiosity. The world was full of wonderful secrets and you probably thought the grown-ups had all the answers. Then at some point, you matured and – surprise! – discovered that your elders were figuring it all out as they went along too. You realized that when your parents were your age, they didn’t know any better than you. You’ve uncovered so many secrets since then: the adults who wield all the authority are no more infallible than kids! Bosses are no more infallible than their subordinates! Nations are no more infallible than their citizens! How did it feel to replace your innocent naïveté with wisdom? Was it sobering to transition from anti-knowledge to knowledge?
In the past ten years, you’ve said and done many things that make you cringe when you think about them today. What was so mysterious to you back then that seems so blatantly obvious in hindsight? Do you wish you could reach through ten years of time, grab your younger self by the metaphorical lapels, and warn past-you about all the stupid things that past-you will be doing?
In the next ten years, you’ll say and do a lot of stupid things that will make you cringe in ten years. What’s so mysterious to you today that will seem blatantly obvious in hindsight? You can’t answer that, but take this as consolation: if future-you reaches through a time portal to grab you by the metaphorical lapels today, that’s a good thing – it means you’ll be learning a LOT in the next decade. The surest sign of stagnation is when you stop learning.

Secrets are only impenetrable when you’re trapped in the present. Imagine traveling forward and backward along the arrow of time to witness how a secret looks so different from one side (pre-enlightenment) vs. the other side (post-enlightenment). What seems obvious to you now used to be a complete mystery. What’s mysterious to you now might become obvious in the future. Anti-knowledge is inaccessible and inscrutable today, so start time-traveling!
In this article, we’re going to study the anti-knowledge life cycle. That is, the patterns of how anti-knowledge transforms into knowledge, and vice versa. In Part 2, we’ll reverse-engineer the process to help you find secrets.
Perfect Dark of the Unknown Abyss
Let’s visit the deepest, darkest part of Leadership Land: the Unknown Abyss. Down here, anti-knowledge begins its life cycle as…
Inconceivabilia
Inconceivabilia is anti-knowledge in its purest form: undetectable, unknowable…inconceivable.
Let’s time-travel back to 400 BC, when almost everyone believed the earth was the center of the universe. They also believed the sun was a divine being, rather than a perfectly average ball of exploding gas among billions and billions of similar exploding gas balls elsewhere in a vast universe. Modern astronomy is built on telescopes, spectrometers, Newtonian physics, and Copernican heliocentrism – none of which existed in 400 BC. Back then, the concept of an extraterrestrial traveling to our planet from another star system just like ours was literally inconceivable.1
Thus, the concept of aliens flying around in UFOs was Inconceivabilia back in 400 BC. But today, the idea of extraterrestrial aliens has advanced into another category of anti-knowledge called…
Mysteries
Mysteries are things we can conceive of, but don’t have answers to. We know that aliens can exist, and there are many science fiction franchises built around a Milky Way galaxy full of diverse alien species that inexplicably speak North American English. But at present, we don’t have any way of confirming or refuting the existence of extraterrestrial life. If we get back in our time machine, maybe we’ll visit a future where the questions about extraterrestrial life are no longer Mysteries, but rather…
Secrets
Secrets are answers to Mysteries, just waiting to be discovered in the Unknown Abyss. Secrets begin forming just beneath the Veil of (In)comprehension, which is the boundary that separates the Unknown Abyss from the known, already-mapped geology of Leadership Land.
Immediately above the Veil of (In)comprehension, you’ll find the…
Faint Glow of the Secret Grottos
Leaders who dig deep into Leadership Land end up in the Secret Grottos. Located just above the Unknown Abyss, the Secret Grottos are where anti-knowledge transforms into knowledge.
When you discover a secret at the upper boundary of the Unknown Abyss, the Veil of (In)comprehension recedes before your eyes. The secret manifests in the physical world as Cerebrium: a crystal that glows with enlightenment.
Normally, we describe Cerebrium and the Secret Grottos in appreciative terms. This article takes a somber view, highlighting the suffering and damage that secrecy can inflict. We still believe it’s worth digging for Cerebrium beneath Leadership Land, but we won’t gloss over the negative consequences of discovering secrets.
Not all anti-knowledge is valuable
All secrets start out as anti-knowledge, but not all anti-knowledge are secrets. That’s because a lot of hidden information simply isn’t worth knowing. The precise volume of moonshine your coworker consumed last night before blacking out is anti-knowledge to everyone (including himself), but it’s not exactly a valuable secret. Like real-life ore deposits, Cerebrium is surrounded by gangue – worthless material to be separated and discarded, leaving only the valuable minerals.
All secrets are valuable, but not all valuable things are pleasant
Finding out that you were adopted from birth parents who didn’t want you is a devastating secret. Did we mention that Cerebrium crystals can fracture into shards that cut deeper and leave uglier scars than any knife?
Two weeks ago in Why Epistemology is Important in Leadership (And How to Apply It), we wrote that:
In fragile situations (more to lose than to gain), anti-knowledge tends to be more harmful than helpful
In anti-fragile situations (more to gain than to lose), anti-knowledge tends to be more helpful than harmful.
Secrets inherit this property. Consider a fragile marriage: a spouse coming home early from work to deliver a surprise gift is very pleasant, but it’s quickly forgotten upon discovering the other spouse in bed with a coworker.
Now consider a fragile organization, where secrecy between management and employees can breed apathy, mistrust, and dysfunction. Secrecy among managers enables backstabbing, fiefdoms, and resource-hoarding in the Middle Management Foothills. And that’s just internal strife – imagine what happens when a star employee suddenly defects to a competitor. Or when that same competitor unveils a Cerebrium superweapon they’ve been developing in secret and points it at you!
This isn’t to say that militaries should abandon their “need to know” protocols, or that for-profit companies should give up their trade secrets. This is simply to illustrate that in fragile scenarios, surprises are typically unpleasant, or the unpleasant surprises vastly outweigh the pleasant ones. With rare exceptions, we believe that secrets (however excruciating they may be) are important to decision-making.
Secrets of nature vs. secrets of people
In Peter Thiel’s Zero to One, he classified secrets into two categories: “secrets of nature” and “secrets of people.” We sometimes use “secrets of nature” interchangeably with scientific discoveries. “Secrets of people” are synonymous with hidden intentions.
Most people agree that Cerebrium is valuable in general, but the value of a specific secret isn’t readily apparent to everyone. Consider these examples where secrets were overlooked:
Secrets of nature – Mesoamerican cultures invented the wheel as early as 1,500 BC but only used them in children’s toys. There is no evidence of the wheel being used in wheelbarrows, potter’s wheels, handcarts, etc. until Europeans arrived 3,000 years later. This seems like a glaring oversight…except we didn’t think to put wheels on suitcases until 1972 – after we landed a man on the moon2.
Secrets of people – These are sometimes hidden so deeply that we’re unaware of our own intentions, and we lie to ourselves to cover them up. We wrote about this in Lies We Tell in Leadership, Part 1: Self-Deception.
Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead
Remember the concept of “information asymmetry” from two weeks ago? Information asymmetry is when one person has more (or better) information than others:
Information asymmetry allowed the ancient Chinese to monopolize silk production for almost a thousand years. Before the secret of silkworm farming leaked out, the Romans believed that silk grew on trees! Two monks eventually smuggled live silkworms out of China and into Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), which allowed the Byzantine Empire to dominate the European silk trade for another six centuries…until the Italians invaded, seized the secret, and established their own silkworks. From there, the secret of silk production quickly spread to France, England, and the rest of Europe.
You could say that silk manufacturing used to be the world’s greatest trade secret! The history of silk illustrates that secrets are inherently asymmetric: it’s very difficult to learn and keep a secret, but very easy to divulge a secret.
This brings us to Cerebrium’s unique property: its glow becomes dimmer when more people behold its secret light. The crystal doesn’t physically change, but its glow becomes weaker as more people learn the secret contained within. The dimming accelerates when someone takes a secret out of the Secret Grottos, thereby….
Transporting Cerebrium toward the Surface
In general, there are two ways for Cerebrium to reach the surface of Leadership Land. These are general trends, not ironclad rules:
Secrets of people/hidden intentions usually rise to the surface via the Taboo Tunnels. Some secrets of people are relatively benign, but they remain trapped in the Tunnels because we lack the vocabulary to convey our experiences. Examples in this category include “shamecrastination” (we’ve written about it) and muditā. Less-benign secrets of people usually take a detour through Liar’s Lair.
Secrets of nature/scientific discoveries tend to come up through the Contrarian Caves. Every earth-shaking development in history clashed with the prevailing wisdom at the time. The Institute of Conventional Wisdom fiercely resists any Cerebrium that threatens the old guard’s worldview. Galileo Galilei dared to suggest that the earth wasn’t the center of the universe, and he spent his last decade under house arrest. Ignaz Semmelweis dared to suggest that doctors should wash their hands between handling cadavers and delivering newborn babies, and he died in an insane asylum. Alfred Wegener dared to suggest that the earth’s continents were once conglomerated into a giant landmass before drifting apart, and he froze to death in Greenland.
Some secrets take a long time to reach the surface of Leadership Land. Secrets of people often become taboos. The intellectual elite can suppress secrets of nature until their authority crumples under the weight of empirical evidence. Until Cerebrium is widely acknowledged, it continues to glow weakly at shallow depths.
On the Next Expisode of Adventures in Leadership Land…
We’ll complete the anti-knowledge life cycle in How to Discover Secrets in Leadership Land, Part 2. We will see what happens to Cerebrium when it reaches the surface of Leadership Land, how secrets return to the Unknown Abyss, and most importantly: how to reverse-engineer the life cycle to discover secrets.
This is post #5 in the Leadership Land Consistency Experiment, Phase I. We’re building better writing habits by publishing weekly between 12/20/24 – 2/28/25, instead of once every someday. Are we compromising quality for increased quantity? Was this post any better or worse than usual? Please share your comments below or reply directly if you’re reading the newsletter!
To be fair, many cultures had mythological equivalents of aliens who lived in different planes of existence from ours (rather than really far away in the same universe). For example, Nordic mythology had Jötunheimr (home of the “giants” that weren’t necessarily large) and Svartálfheimr (home of the dark elves), among other realms. An incursion of dark elves from another dimension would be like an alien invasion today.
Note that absence of evidence ≠ evidence of absence. Just because archaeologists haven’t found wheels and axles in Mesoamerican dig sites doesn’t mean they never existed in the pre-Columbian Americas…just that they probably didn’t. Also, wheeled luggage was invented in the 1950s (before the moon landing), but the patent and mass production came almost two decades later.