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Captain Amazing: I knew you couldn't change.
Casanova Frankenstein: I knew you'd know that.
Captain Amazing: Oh, I know. And I knew you'd know I'd know you knew.
Casanova Frankenstein: But I didn't. I only knew that you'd know that I knew. Did you know that?
Captain Amazing: *clears throat* ...Of course.
Paranoia can be a funny thing. It seems no matter how well you've prepared, no matter how far in advance you've laid things out, there's always someone who can mess your plan up if he knows about it. Ah, but how do you know he knows? He may be acting like he doesn't know so you won't do anything different that he can't predict. This, inevitably, leads to the following paranoid rant:
"Yes, but if he knows I know he knows, he may do (X) instead. But what if he knows more than I think he does? He could be acting like he only knows that I know he knows, when in fact he knows that I know he knows I know he knows!"
Typical punchline: "...what was I doing again?"
Something of an overblown version of the classic chess axiom "think three moves ahead", this is one of the most common sights in a duel of Chessmasters. A Xanatos Roulette may also have them, as the level of paranoia necessary to pull one off suggests he's suspecting everyone of knowing and reacting accordingly. Of course, if there's a Thirty Xanatos Pileup in the making, that attitude might be justified...
May not feature the exact line, but often uses a scene where one character or the other remarks on how his opponent would react if he knew, and what he's doing in case that happens.
See also most instances of the Poisoned Chalice Switcheroo. Frequently a consideration in Feed The Mole.
Usually results in an Overly Long Gag. Frequently ends with an "I Didnt See That Coming". May result in Archive Binge-like behavior when plans are laid for both eventualities, and then for both of those eventualities, and then all four of those, and then all sixteen...
Examples
Anime
- One episode of Yu-Gi-Oh did this pretty much word-for-word, during Joey's battle with Yugi. He gives a long internal monologue about whether or not the card Yugi placed down was a trap card or if that was too obvious...
- "Eh. Who cares? I'm just gonna attack."
- Pretty much every fight during the second part of Jojos Bizarre Adventure follows this pattern. Jojo attacks, the opponent declares they saw it coming and counters, Jojo explains he saw that coming and twists the attack as needed, and so on until one side or the other goes down.
- Kaiji's E-card match against Tonegawa is a prime example of this trope.
- Appears in Ghost In The Shell Stand Alone Complex, strangely not as a part of an Xanatos Gambit, but in a sniper duel. In fact, the whole episode revolves around knowing and predicting enemy tactics.
- This is ALL of Spiral once the Blade Children storyline starts.
- And all of Death Note from the time L shows up. So, all of it, really.
- The third round in Liar Game becomes this with Akiyama and Yokoya. It's likely that the upcoming fourth round will feature it even more.
- Most of the point of Legend of Galactic Heroes is like this, with Yang Wenli and Reinhard (and various other pairs) making plans, which may include knowing their opponent's plans (and sometimes involve a plan being an opponent seeing though the plan, with an entire extra layer of fake planning below it).
- Eyeshield 21 does this a bit. However it's more of the form "Oh no...Is that what you expected me to say?"
Film
- The Princess Bride has this between Vizzini and the Man in Black, as he attempts to figure out which goblet contains the poison. (See the Literature entry below.)
- The Lion in Winter played this straight, albeit slightly lampshaded, complete with the line itself: "I know. You know I know. I know you know I know, we know that Henry knows and Henry knows we know it. We're a knowledgeable family."
- Monkeyed around with in Mystery Men:
Captain Amazing: I knew you couldn't change.
Casanova Frankenstein: I knew you'd know that.
Captain Amazing: Oh, I know. And I knew you'd know I'd know you knew.
Casanova Frankenstein: But I didn't. I only knew that that you'd know that I knew. Did you know that?
Captain Amazing: ... Of course.
- The Swedish movie The Shark Who Knew Too Much opens with the main lead chased by a helicopter while shouting this sort of dialogue. Given that he's spent his whole life masquerading as a group of identical triplets who can't stand each other's presence just to trick his father into giving him shareholder majority of the company, it's obvious there's a lot of deception involved.
- In Sneakers, Martin is interrupted while breaking into an office. In the course of inventing a plausible explanation for why he's there, he finds himself inadvertently entangled in one of these:
Martin: And never let him know that you know what he thinks you don't know you know... y'know?
- and give him he—- he...lp.
- Give him head?! — Be a beacon?!
- The villain of Under Siege 2 does this while explaining to the muscle of the operation that he's going to demonstrate the power of his earthquake-shooting satellite by using it on, of all things, a fertilizer plant in China: "[The fertilizer plant] is actually a secret chemical weapons testing facility. We know this. The Chinese know that we know. However, we pretend we don't know, and they pretend they don't know that we know that they know we know. But know that we know. In the end, everyone knows."
- Inverted in a long-distance sort of way in We Were Soldiers, where throughout the entire battle, Colonel Hal Moore emphatically knew what his Vietnamese counterpart was going to try, whereas the Vietnamese CO emphatically did not.
- Specifically because the Vietnamese were using more or less standard tactics, and Moore, using a never-before-testing air calvary method, was forced to make up tactics as he went along.
- The Bride says this at the end of Kill Bill:
As I said before, I've allowed you to keep your wicked life for two reasons. And the second reason is so you can tell him [Bill] in person everything that happened here tonight. I want him to witness the extent of my mercy by witnessing your deformed body. I want you to tell him all the information you just told me. I want him to know what I know. I want him to know I want him to know. And I want them all to know they'll all soon be as dead as O-Ren.
- "Hot lead and cold Feet" had the Sheriff deliver this line. " 'Cause he's here and I know he's here. And he knows I know he's here! But he doesn't know I know he knows I know he's here, but I know. So I got the edge!"
- In Dodgeball:
White Goodman: Cuz I know you. And you know you. And I know that you know that I know that you know you.
- From the description above, the classic quasi-comedy "The Court Jester". Everyone knows the pellet with the poison's in the flagon with the dragon, but the vessel with the pestle has the brew that is true!
Literature
- A hilarious example exists in The Princess Bride with mid-level villain Vizzini. He goes through all sorts of permutations on which goblet has the poison in it, based on his observations and the defeat of his minions. In the end, he was right in all his deductions, as every conclusion he reached was that he could NOT choose one of the two goblets, but he failed to take his deductions to the logical conclusion: his opponent had poisoned both goblets of wine. He'd spent four years building up an immunity to that particular poison.
- The big reveal in Book XI of The Brothers Karamazov relies on this type of logic played seriously. You can almost see it coming when it is occurring at an earlier point in the novel (some hints are dropped that something is going on at either rate), but when you learn precisely what took place in one character's mind as a result of seemingly-irrelevant events, it forces you to re-evaluate everything else that has happened.
- Edgar Allan Poe plays this one straight in one of his mystery stories, "The Purloined Letter". Private eye Auguste Dupin actually explains that this is the reason he can outwit the police and get his man. The police have searched every nook and cranny for the titular letter; they're not smart enough to realize it's disguised as another letter and hidden in plain sight.
- Vetinari plays this game subtly off-screen in Discworld. Specifically, his package to Uberwald was clearly tampered with, as expected, and he specifically uses codes that are ALMOST unbreakable. (As for himself? He ALWAYS poisons both glasses. It doesn't matter who knows what, he gets out ahead either way!)
- In Timothy Zahn's The Thrawn Trilogy (Star Wars Expanded Universe books), part of Magnificent Bastard Thrawn's effectiveness in battle is based on his reputation: his enemies know fully well he's a a nigh-unparalleled master strategist and tactician, so to their perspective each and every move he makes is like Schrodinger's Gambit, existing in a state of It's A Trap and It's Not A Trap until they open the box and the waveform collapses.
- The climax of the third book brings this to an epic level. Thrawn knows that the New Republic wants to capture an important bit of technology, of which only two are known to exist, both on Imperial worlds. The New Republic knows that Thrawn knows this. They also know that one system is heavily protected while the other is not. Thrawn knows that they know this. The New Republic knows that Imperial Intelligence is very good and will pick up disinformation that shows an attack on the lightly protected system is in the works. Meanwhile they actually plan to attack the heavily-fortified one. Thrawn knows that the New Republic knows that his intelligence is that good, and that the "secret plans" are a deception, so he disregards those attack plans and prepares for the real attack.
- In the Hand Of Thrawn Duology, set a decade later, a trio of Imperials conspire very successfully to make it look like Thrawn is Back From The Dead. When Han Solo finally sees the (fake) Grand Admiral and has his suspicions deftly countered, it's a shock. Thrawn was, after all, alarmingly good at anticipating what people would do.
Han: "From now on, we can't trust anything we see. Anything we see, anything we hear, anything we think we ought to do. Not with Thrawn back on the scene."
Lando: "Thrawn or no Thrawn, the Empire is still down to eight sectors. Maybe this is really all he's going for, hoping to confuse Coruscant so badly it just freezes up."
Han: "Who knows? That's what drives you so crazy about him. You try to do something and odds are it's exactly what he wanted you to do. You stand still and don't do anything, and he runs a smartrope around you."
- Zhuge Liang's Empty City Ruse
 (from the fictionalized parts of Romance Of The Three Kingdoms) relies on this.
- Played with in Twilight. Edward and Alice Cullen play a chess game by using their abilities to figure out what move the other is going to make next...and countering...and being countered...and countering again...and so on...The game is finished in their minds before two pieces are physically moved.
- Used without being named in one of Ayla's Whateley Universe stories, "Ayla and the Network". The ENTIRE plot is various groups having a Xanatos Roulette. The winner, of course, is the one who can end the "I know you know" game. It's Thuban and Ayla. Ayla, who knows people would break through any security she has, so BOTH her laptops are traps, and Thuban, who set up the ENTIRE blackmail plot!
- A children's book titled Finding Buck Mc Henry, about a man who may or may not be a retired pro baseball player, has the young narrator going, "I knew. And he knew that I knew. And I knew that he knew that I knew. Stop. You're making yourself dizzy." The story Mack Henry eventually tells is half true; he did play baseball as a young man, but he wasn't the same man the kids are confusing him with.
- In Mistress of Dragons, Draconis knew that Edward knew that Draconis knew that Edward didn't trust him. I had to spend 5 minutes interpreting that.
- In "Riding the Bullet", by Stephen King, the main character is on the verge of freaking out when he dizzies his own mind with how he can't let the dead guy next to him know that he knows that he knows that he's dead (or something, I'm quoting from memory).
Live Action TV
- Nearly every sitcom with wacky secret hijinx ever. Especially when someone hatches a Counter Zany.
- Data does this in the TNG episode "Peak Performance", right here. Troi points out he's overanalysing.
- In an episode of Friends, Phoebe and Rachel find out about Monica and Chandler's secret relationship, and something of an arms race begins regarding whether or not "they know we know they know we know!" Joey gets caught in the middle (since he's known for a while), and eventually throws up his hands when he can't keep track of who knows what.
- Parodied in the same episode, when Monica walks into the apartment and dramatically says, "They know." Cue the confusion.
- During Draft Day betting at Sports Night Dana and Casey try to figure out if the other knows anything about Tommy Castro's knees, and if so, do they know that the other person actually doesn't know anything about... etc. Ends when Casey explains the entire I Know You Know I Know situation to Dan, while wired so Dana can hear him.
- The Doctor Who one-off comedy special The Curse of the Fatal Death has the Doctor and the Master engaging in a round of this. Since both have access to time machines, it quickly gets complicated.. ("624 years in a sodding sewer!")
- The BBC book The Doctor Trap has an entire plot based off this. The villain is convince the Doctor knows something the villain doesn't. Not really. The titular trap, the Doctor explains is what they think you know that they don't. Confused? Yeah, join everyone else in the book.
- A fourth Doctor book (forget which one) had the Doctor going on and on like this, until Sarah Jane Smith tells him to shut up.
Sarah: "You know they're lying."
Doctor: "Of course I know. And they know that I know. And I know that they know, and they know that I know that they know (etc etc)."
- Happens quite a few times in Yes Minister - especially funny due to Sir. Humphrey's penchant for Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness.
- Used in the Stargate SG-1 episode "Ripple Effect", with a slight dash of Xanatos Gambit thrown in for good measure.
- A common sight in Survivor, with the convoluted backstabbing, double-dealing, and mind-gaming that the players perpetrate on one another.
- Relied on by Shawn in Psych, as it is unclear whether/how much most of the main cast believes his psychic stint.
- Lampshaded in the theme song, of all places.
- Played with in NCIS when Gibbs asks for Ziva's weapon. And her backup weapon (revolver in ankle holster). And her backup backup weapon(a knife). He then hands the knife back to her, and points out that he wanted her to know he knew.
- Recently used in Chuck, after the staff of the buy more is told to behave Morgan goes through this to try and work out whether or not they should misbehave due to the person telling them knowing they'd know he knows they know he knows how they'd act.
- Burn Notice talks about this during season 2. Michael, having started to become much more enlightened as to Carla's objectives and methods, begins to spy on her. Unfortunately, as he points out, he can't do anything different because it would clue her in to the fact that he already knows a little of what's going on.
Theater
- In Arsenic And Old Lace, the bluffing game regarding which characters know about the murders committed by the other characters reaches truly epic levels.
Video Games
- When dealing with conspiratorial spy-types, it's always important to keep track of who knows what, and how they know it. City of Heroes plays with this by having the character knowingly sent into a trap, just to cause confusion among the enemy.
Indigo: ...So, they've decided to set a trap. However, I know that it's a trap, and I must assume that they know I know it's a trap. So really, it's more of an invitation. An invitation to ambush. Shall I send your RSVP? ...Oh, and do play along some if you get the chance. That should really help to freak them out.
- City Of Heroes loves this, especially with scanner/newspaper missions. Villains (or heroes) will call out your character for a fight, set an ambush, and attempt to take you down. The fact that you know it's an ambush in no way deters you from walking right into it, but, in spite of Insurmountable Odds, you always eventually walk out too.
- The Dinosaur King DS game descends into this sometimes with the hints that opponents give about their next move.
Web Comics
Western Animation
- Kronk does this in one episode of The Emperors New School. He is faced with a choice of two levers and is instructed to pull the one he wouldn't pick, due to his ineptitude with levers. He does an I Know You Know I Know for a while until Kuzco interrupts by saying "Yeah, this went on for another two hours," and fast-forwards through the whole thing.
- Done in Fosters Home For Imaginary Friends, where Bloo is setting up a humiliating surprise party for Mac, and all his efforts play right into Bloo's hands, even when he thinks he's doing the opposite of what Bloo thought he'd do.
- Taken to extremes in the Danger Mouse episode "The Statue of Liberty Caper", where Danger Mouse and Baron Greenback both try to outwit each other with regards to the location of a trapdoor in the floor, leading Danger Mouse to say "I guessed that you'd guess I guessed you guessed I'd guessed you'd guessed and out-guessed your guess, I guess".
- Kim Possible and Ron notice that Shego left a far too obvious clue that she had stolen the Mc Guffin, so clearly she and Drakken were setting up a trap. Unless they wanted them to think it was a trap and avoid it, in which case the way to confound them was to go ahead into it, except it was a "trap-trap": Drakken knew that they knew that Drakken knew that they knew that it was a trap.
- Played straight (as straight as anything on that show, anyway) on Cartoon Planet during the following conversation about network executives:
Zorak: Maybe that's just what they want us to think!
Space Ghost: Hey, you know what? I think that's just what they want us to think!
Zorak: I think, that they think, that we think, that that's just what they want us to think!
Space Ghost: Brak, what do you think?
Brak: I just, I don't even have the slightest idea what you're talking about.
- Played awesomely on an episode of Chowder where the titular character was trying to stop his Hyde-like Sleep-Eating form from finding the stash of food he hid, literally thinking about three steps ahead of himself, sadly to no avail.
- In The Penguins Of Madagascar, things get out of hand when Skipper tries to get back real fish instead of the tasteless fish cakes the penguins have been forced to eat. Julien tried to sabotage the operation.
"So you see, we have the crates with the real fish, while yours are filled with only the phony fish cake. So hahaha-ing." -Julien
"Oh, nice try, Ringtail. But I know how much you hate the smell of fish. I was expecting a move like that, which is why I switched the crates before you even got back to the zoo." -Skipper
"Ah, but I was expecting you to be expecting that, so we switcheroo-ed the crates on the pier before the fish got loading on to the truck. Haha!"
"Doesn’t really matter, because I just switched these crates during your last flashback."
"Well I switched them while you were saying you switched them."
"And I switched them last the time you blinked."
"Yes, but I pretended to switch them so you actually switched them back."
"Oh, but I double switched."
"And I triple switched."
"I million zillion switched."
"And I switched them to infinity! So you have to shut up a little bit."
"Okay, nicely played. But if you are me, then by processing of elimination, I must be you!"
"Maybe, maybe. But if you are me, and I am you, then we must both be…"
Other
- Riddle Example: The Blue Eyes riddle uses this trope to some degree. Even knowing that, it's still pretty hard.
- In the party/forum game of Mafia, this is known as "WIFOM logic", stemming from the "Wine In Front Of Me" scene from The Princess Bride. In truth it's a Logical Paradox that yields no useful information.
- From the final mission of the Whiteboard War game Chop Raider: "We're not going to force you to do it, but we know you won't decline."
- From the Harry Potter Alternate Commentary Gag Dub Wizard People, Dear Readers: "Then, dear readers, Harry notices a tear in Snake's pants & blood all over her leg, & Snake notices that Harry has noticed, & he notices she noticed that! I mean, there is a trade of noticing going on that is just bewildering."
- Bob Dylan's song "Tell Me, Momma".
- Hank Green's ten-word song, heard here.
- Johnathan Larson's semi-autobiographical musical, [i]tick, tick... BOOM[/i], contains a song called "Therapy". Essentially, the song is a dialogue between two characters detailing how, if they'd known that the other knew what they knew... things would be different. It's really quite brilliant.
- A semi-real life example, meaning it's actually an urban myth, is Winston Churchill's Coventry dilemma. Allegedly, Churchill had to allow the city of Coventry to be bombed, to prevent the Nazis from finding out about the British spies in Germany.
- In reality, the British tried to jam the Germans' radio guidance system, but had to take a guess at the frequency to use. They got it wrong.
Real Life
- When Alexander Litvenenko died, some of the speculation on who killed him got to this level.
- Comes up, of all places, in economic theory, as a result of the tendency of economists to use "rational economic actor" to mean a nigh-omniscient agent who outdoes Spock in terms of rigid logic.
- There is a formal system called modal logic that can be used to model what certain agents in a system know (including what they know/do not know about what the other agents know/do not know).
- Proper poker strategy, especially at higher levels, requires this kind of thinking and trying to stay one step ahead of your opponent(s). At its highest levels, the whole thing can get ridiculous, break down, and require game theory to come up with an ideal solution.
- Blackjack strategy (eg, "counting cards") and trying not to let casinos notice you thinking too much is a meta-gambling example which can, at its extreme, surpass anything you've read in a spy novel.
- Really, any competitive game is like this, as even this competitive Pokemon player can attest. Playing To Win has an excellent summary of this.
- One classic example from the Second World War: an agent was sent to Great Britain by the Germans, who intended that the British intelligence service capture him and use him as a double agent, at which point he could tell the Germans how British counterintelligence functioned. He proceeded to explain this plan to the Brits, who then had him send back two different sets of reports to Germany. One contained what the Brits wanted the Germans to know; the other contained what the Brits wanted the Germans to think the Brits wanted them to know.
Web Original
- Experienced players in Mitadake High pull this kind of thing all the time when debating whether or not to give out their PDA Numbers.
Comic Books
- Peanuts has used this joke quite a few times, when Charlie Brown is on the pitcher's mount, trying to figure out whether the hitter is expecting his fast ball.
- There was another incident involving Lucy's football-pulling stunt, which was...let's just say "confusing" and leave it at that.
- Here it is anyway, in all it's mind blowing glory.
Charlie Brown: Ha! I know what she's got on her mind! Every year she pulls the same trick on me...she jerks the ball away just as I try to kick it...Well, this time I think she has a different idea. I think she's going to try to fool me by not jerking the ball away! This time she knows I know she knows that I know she knows I know what she's going to do...I'm way ahead of her! (Hilarity ensues)
Lucy: I figured you knew that I knew you knew I knew that you knew I knew you knew, so I had to jerk it away!
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