Incompetent and Ignorant of it

Most incompetent people do not know that they are incompetent. People who do things badly, are usually supremely confident of their abilities -- more confident, in fact, than people who do things well.

One reason that the ignorant also tend to be the blissfully self-assured, the researchers believe, is that the skills required for competence often are the same skills necessary to recognize competence. The incompetent, therefore, suffer doubly. "Not only do they reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it,''

- Incompetent People Really Have No Clue, Studies Find:They're blind to own failings, others' skills, San Francisco Chronicle

Ye Gods, it's so obvious! I haven't been able to put my finger on it, but in dealing with a large number of people over the years I have consistently encountered people like this. They are Losers, but they just cannot and will not realize it and make the changes necessary to get out of their losing streak. Although they consistently make bad decisions and get bad results, they persist in doing this, and have a completely unrealistic assessment of themselves and their abilities.

For them, it's always some external factor that caused the failure of their strategy, never their own incompetence.

The reason for this is explained in the study described in the article above, Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments:

The skills that engender competence in a particular domain are often the very same skills necessary to evaluate competence in that domain - one's own or anyone else's. Because of this, incompetent individuals lack what cognitive psychologists variously term metacognition, metamemory, metacomprehension, or self-monitoring skills.

Based on my own experience (so it's anecdotal, and not rigorously scientific), I think that people who stay stuck in this zone of (in)competence do so because they are holding on to something in their own psychology that prevents them from going further. I mean, beginners are always beginners and have difficulty assessing themselves and others in that particular area. However, it becomes pathological when a person constructs and reinforces a self-image or an organizational profile way out of step with their actual level of competence, and focuses on reinforcing that projection, rather than increasing their level of competence.

That's beyond the scope of the study, but this study is interesting and insightful research.

In the Hagakure, 18th century samurai Yamamoto Tsunetomo writes:

In one's life. there are levels in the pursuit of study. In the lowest level, a person studies but nothing comes of it, and he feels that both he and others are unskillful. At this point he is worthless. In the middle level he is still useless but is aware of his own insufficiencies and can also see the insufficiencies of others. In a higher level he has pride concerning his own ability, rejoices in praise from others, and laments the lack of ability in his fellows. This man has worth. In the highest level a man has the look of knowing nothing.

Srila B.R. Sridhar Maharaja would often explain that progress is spiritual life is measured in a negative way. The more advanced we become the more we become aware of how far we have in reality to go...

Eternal principles are universally applicable.