Ian Leslie is the author of Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It. He also has written Born Liars, and his work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Slate and The Economist. In addition, he presented the show Before They Were Famous on BBC Radio 4. He lives in London.
Q: You write that "a major concern of this book is that
digital technologies are severing the final link between effort and mental
exploration." How is that link being severed, and can this be reversed?
A: The modern web is a wonderful tool for the curious.
Google and Wikipedia can launch us on amazing journeys of discovery.
But here's the thing: the web is also great for the
incurious, or the plain lazy (and let's face it, most of us, including me, are
lazy some of the time).
If you want an instant answer to a question, any question,
there is no better way to get it than online. You just bang in a few words to
the search box and before you've finished typing, there is your answer.
At which point, your curiosity is quenched before you even
had time to feel its itch. When everything is made so easy for us, we can fall
out of the habit of the hard thinking that is a crucial part of the curious
mind.
So part of the reason I wrote the book is to urge people not
to accept those top line answers, to use Wikipedia as a starting point, not a
destination, to dig down, to accumulate knowledge - to make an effort.
Q: How is curiosity affected by age?
A: We are born curious. As any parent knows, a young child
is a question machine. In fact it's been estimated that between the ages of 3
and 5 a child asks 40,000 questions.
Not just any old questions either, but “explanatory
questions” – “why” and “how” questions. We have this innate hunger to learn
about the world in which we find ourselves.
But as we get older, we ask fewer questions. As Henry James
put it, "the mental grooves and channels are set." Partly, this is
inevitable and a good thing - it shows we have learnt enough to get along in
the world.
But we should distrust our own comfort with what we know,
and keep asking ourselves what we don't yet know. Otherwise we become mere
automatons. And they're building smarter ones than us!
Q: You write, "Curiosity is underwritten by love."
What is the dynamic between the two?
A: It's been shown that children who feel loved and secure
are more likely to explore, both physically (crawling around the room) and
mentally. Curiosity is a bonus, really - it's what we get to do when we know
our basic needs, like security, are taken care of.
The two great killers of curiosity are complacency (see
previous answer) and fear. When people are scared, they focus on survival, on
getting through the day, on keeping their job, and stop allowing their minds to
wander and explore. Curiosity is nurtured when we feel safe - and for children
in particular, that means loved.
Q: What first got you interested in, or I should say curious
about, this topic?
A: I've always counted myself lucky to have grown up in a
curious household, full of conversation, questions and answers, books and
newspapers.
And it has always struck me that one of the biggest
differences between people is between those who are curious and those who
aren't. You know what it's like when you meet an incurious person - it's dull
and frustrating! So how do people get like that?
That's where I started, and then when I researched further I
realised that curiosity is something we have to work at throughout our lives -
it doesn't just happen to us.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I'm researching a few different topics (I'm curious about
so much). One of them is popularity. Why are some people more popular than
others? Is it something they do, or is it some quality we assign to them?
Should it matter as much as it does to us?
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: Lots! But I'm trying to keep you curious, so...
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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