From sports, and particularly originating in tennis, we get the notion of unforced errors. It refers to a “missed shot or lost point […] that is entirely a result of the player’s own blunder and not because of the opponent’s skill or effort.”
As an image, think of one player hitting the ball into the net or way wide, when they were not under particular pressure by their opponent, i.e. they were not really pushed into making a mistake.
Those are the kinds of things that we think of, when we say that a game was lost by one side, rather than won by the other.
You can imagine that this transfers well to many other contexts. Whether it is play or work you always encounter situations, where you can get it wrong, where it is possible for you to get an outcome that is worse than it could have been. Not, because reality conspired against you or because someone outmaneuvered you. Instead, you got it wrong, you committed an unforced mistake.
Conceptually this is interesting, but to make the explanation more useful, we have to add precision. There are at least two different types of such mistakes, due to what categorically led to them.
- Epistemic. You did not know or misunderstood what you needed to do.
- Akratic. You did know what to do, but did not do it.
The distinction is important and the classification is diagnostic in that it clarifies how to think and what to do about the mistake. Accuracy here matters, because if you miscategorize, then your solution will probably not fit the problem.
Let’s take a look at both types individually.
Epistemic
Epistemology is about knowledge, knowing. Ignorance does not protect you from consequences. Simply not knowing about something does not change its importance. The approach you follow in an activity, may inherently lead you to poor outcomes.
Consider the following examples.
- You increased your weekly running mileage too quickly, because you did not understand the risk of stress injuries.
- You built a complicated product, before knowing whether anyone actually wants it.
- You built a software service that worked well in testing and failed in production, because you misunderstood the requirements about anticipated load.
Experiencing the consequences, when you believe you really tried, though unbeknownst to you followed a flawed approach, can clearly be very frustrating.
Fundamentally this is all about the map and territory disconnect. Your mental model differs in significant ways from the reality you are facing, thus leading you to making mistakes.
Realize that your mental model is inherently disconnected from reality. You will always be at least slightly off in your thinking. Pay close attention to feedback and strive to update your beliefs based on it, commit to better.
Akratic
When you commit an akratic mistake, you knew better.
Akrasia refers to the phenomenon of acting against one’s better judgment—the state in which one intentionally performs an action while simultaneously believing that a different course of action would be better.
Wikipedia on Akrasia, retrieved March 5, 2026.
You knew what you should have done. Perhaps you even knew while you were doing it that you would probably come to regret it later. And yet.
Consider these examples.
- You knew those cookies are not healthy at all, but you ate them anyway, all of them, because they were that good.
- You were well aware that you needed to be well-rested for an early start of the big race, but allowed yourself to watch a movie late the evening before and spent another hour just browsing on your phone.
- You knew that critical piece of code needed thorough test coverage, but you did not worry about it, telling yourself that you would get to it later.
You are not lacking clearer understanding or better-fitting knowledge, you already knew what to do. The problem instead is one of execution and the solution might involve habits and environmental changes that make doing the right thing easier and more likely.
The specifics depend on context. If there is a negative outcome you can observe – whether it is your own, your team’s, customers, or others – it is useful to examine whether the issue is an epistemic or an akratic one.
As your knowledge grows in an area, the nature of your mistakes will also evolve. You will work on more difficult problems, so get to make more advanced epistemic mistakes. None of that growth will protect you from the akretic ones.
When the stakes are meaningful you should strive to understand what you should do. Then you need to actually do it, too.