Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It

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Curiosity is the spark that starts a flirtation—in a bar, at a party, across the lecture hall in Economics 101. And curiosity ultimately nourishes that romance, and all our best human relationships—marriages, friendships, the bond between parents and children. The curiosity to ask a simple question—“How was your day?” or “How are you feeling?”—to listen to the answer, and to ask the next question. While some educational theorists have argued that filling children with facts stifles creativity (it's the basic message of TED Talks' most popular video, by Sir Ken Robinson), neuroscience has demonstrated that true creativity depends on being able to make novel associations among many different facts and concepts, and that a knowledge-based education is critical for that. First, my life had just changed forever. When I reported for work as a legal clerk that Monday, they gave me a windowless office the size of a small closet. At that moment, I had found my life’s work. From that tiny office, I joined the world of show business. I never again worked at anything else. I had an idea for a TV series, what I was calling F. Lee Bailey’s Casebook of American Crimes—kind of a judicial version of Walt Disney Presents, using an expert to narrate the stories of these great cases. We hear the term “intellectual curiosity” bantered about so often these days. Ian Leslie goes beyond the rhetoric to remove any ambiguity about what this term really means and why it’s something that we need to embrace. He does so without preaching and also shows the reader HOW to accomplish the embrace.

Curiosity, under Leslie’s careful examination, is revealed in a way that makes the reader, well, more curious. The book travels into the realms of the philosophical, historical, social and economical. It places curiosity at the crossroads where necessity and danger meet. It is an exploration that leaves the reader feeling like a cold war spy, bound to their dangerous duty to be curious yet cautious about how they reveal their motives. And so on. After counting 17 "Why"-questions in a row during one session, I was exhausted and lost my patience, yelling:

I went to see F. Lee Bailey. Bailey was the most famous criminal trial attorney in the country at that point, having been the lawyer for Sam Sheppard and Patty Hearst. You can see some of that in T-Rex’s book choices. She’s got quite the collection. And this is the thing about books. It’s like leaping across lily pads. You might find one you like and from there you discover another and then maybe something in that leads you to one that’s a bit different. A journey of discovery without even setting foot outside your house. There’s just so much to learn and it’s all made so accessible by the clear, punchy writing and stunning artwork that we’re very much spoiled by when it comes to children’s books. Though I should add - not yet accessible enough in a world where not every child owns a book or has access to a library. Imagine if they did - imagine the great equalisers that books could one day be. Transporting us to other places

Okay, not everyone was equally charmed by my style in those days. I was a little scared of Nardino, but not scared enough to stop shouting out the window.I never meet anyone with a movie in mind (although in recent years, it’s clear that some people met with me because they thought that maybe I would do a movie about them or their work). The goal for me is to learn something.

Can you drop us a couple of examples? I gather there are passages about how to sire a multicoloured horse, or create an egg the size of a human head. Even the word “curious” itself remains strangely anti-curious. We all pretend that a curious person is a delight, of course. But when we describe an object with the adjective “curious,” we mean that it’s an oddity, something a little weird, something other than normal. And when someone responds to a question with the tilt of her head and the statement, “That’s a curious question,” she is of course saying it’s not the right question to be asking.

Table of Contents

Children’s books are an absolute gift for curious minds. They stretch across everything from nature and the stars to extraordinary people and movements in history, all kinds of life skills, and…look, I’m never going to be able to write an exhaustible list! You can find a book on every topic under the sun (especially if you have a LIBRARIAN to help you find it - there’s a reason why I dedicated this book to librarians). And if there’s something that hasn’t been written yet, you could bet your last biscuit there’s a writer out there working on it. The range of books is something I was always amazed by as a child stepping into a library. I still feel that way today when I think about what’s out there. The author combines the results of research with anecdotes to provide an illuminating volume on why curiosity is so important to lifelong learning and our advancement as a global society. He examines the risks inherent in some current technological trends, such as smart phones and internet searches, and how to overcome them. He looks at what arouses curiosity and what quenches it. There is interesting contrarian discussion arguing against Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Sir Ken Robinson about schools killing creativity. The more ideas (facts) we have in our head, the more opportunity for combining them into new creative patterns. This is something I can agree with.

I was so serious about the curiosity conversations that I often spent a year or more trying to arrange a meeting with particular people. I would spend hours calling, writing letters, cajoling, befriending assistants. As I got more successful and busier, I assigned one of my staff to arrange the conversations—the New Yorker did a little piece on the job, which came to be known as “cultural attaché.” For a while, I had someone whose only job was to arrange the conversations. 17 That was the start of something that changed—and continues to change—my life and my career, and which ultimately inspired this book. I already explained that first step, insisting on meeting everyone whose legal contracts I delivered. I took two things from my success with that. First, people—even famous and powerful people—are happy to talk, especially about themselves and their work; and second, it helps to have even a small pretext to talk to them. It finally dawned on me while writing another curiosity article how flawed this thought is. It’s impossible to “run out” of creativity if you’re curious. As long as you’re curious, you’ll never draw a blank on what to write for very long. If you pursue your curiosity, you’ll always stumble on new things to write about. Here’s how to be more curious and use it to boost your creativity for writing, based on research in psychology. Notice what surprises you and follow it

I've been slow-reading this, and remember the era of the first few chapters when the two main types of curiosity are discussed - Diversive (shallow/fleeting) and Epistemic (deep/effortful). There is also Empathic curiosity.