"Do you know how a toilet works? Surely, right? You push the handle, water flows, everything disappears. Simple. But how does the bowl empty without a pump? If you pour a lot of water into the bowl, shouldn't it overflow and make a mess on your floor? Maybe you don't actually know how a toilet works. Cognitive scientist Phil Fernbach calls this the illusion of explanatory depth. We mistake familiarity for understanding. Because we use a toilet every day, we assume we know how it works. But using something and understanding something are completely different things. This doesn't just apply to toilets. It applies to political policies, economic systems, medical treatments. We form strong opinions about things we can barely explain. So perhaps the next time you start to draw conclusions about how something works, ask yourself, do I actually understand this? Or do I just think I do? For more insights about the science of the mind, tune into Hidden Brain on Apple, Spotify, or hiddenbrain.org."