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Quasi-quote from Jim Davis, author of Garfield: "If I can't think of anything funny, I have one of the characters hit another."
Well, yeah, but that's Garfield.
Which reminds me of an observation I've made: Consider that almost anything you can do to Garfield makes it funnier. (See: the Garfield Randomizer, Garkov, Garfield Minus Garfield, Garfield As Garfield, Lasagna Cat, Realfield, Square Root Of Minus Garfield, etc.) This does not work on things that are merely unfunny. In the same way that reversed stupidity is not intelligence, reversed unfunniness is not humour. This means that Garfield is not merely unfunny, but antifunny.
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An obvious implication of this post is that if someone tells you that you "should have known better", then rather than getting upset and instantly trying to defend yourself, it might be a better idea to calmly ask the person "How should I have known better?".
Possible answers include:
1) "using this simple and/or obvious method that I recommend as a general strategy" 2) "using this not simple and/or not obvious method that I didn't think of until just now" 3) "I don't know" 4) "how dare you ask that!"
The first two of those answers are useful information about how to do things, and thus valuable. You can then perform a quick cost/benefit analysis to check if the cost of implementing the suggested strategy outweighs the cost of risking another instance of whatever mistake you just made.
The third is a result of a successful use of the technique, generally. The speaker now realizes that maybe you didn't have any way to know better, and so maybe it would be inappropriate to blame you for whatever went wrong.
The fourth is a sign that the person you're talking to is probably someone you would be better off not interacting with if you can help it (and thus is useful information). There are ways of dealing with that kind of person, but they involve social skills that not everyone has.
Another obvious implication of this post is, if you're about to tell someone else that they "should have known better", then it might be a good idea to take a moment to think how they should have known better.
The same 4 possible answers apply here.
Again, in cases 1 and 2, you might want to take a moment to perform a quick cost/benefit analysis to check if the cost of implementing the suggested strategy outweighs the cost of risking another instance of whatever mistake the person just made. If your proposed solution makes sense as a general strategy, then you can tell the person so, and recommend that they implement it. If your proposed solution doesn't make sense as a general strategy, then you can admit this, and admit that you don't really blame the person for whatever went wrong. Or you can let the other person do this analysis themself.
In case 3, you can admit that you don't know, and admit that you don't blame the person for whatever went wrong. Or you can just not tell the person that you think they "should have known better", skipping this whole conversation.
In case 4, you obviously need to take a moment to calm down until you can give one of the other answers.