Curiosity: Another BIG Word

My most recent Marketing Matters column for Business North highlighted four big words, noteworthy for their depth and broad application. The idea was extracted from weekly meetings with the late Dan Hansen as we plotted and developed what we'd hoped would be an epic Wild West novel. 

It wasn't a long list yet, but it was strong. While reading the history of math in James D. Nickel's Mathematics: Is God Silent? it became apparent that curiosity was a major feature of nearly all advances in math, science and human understanding. Why does an apple fall and not go up? Why does the sun rise in the east and set in the west? Why does the Fibonacci sequence keep repeating itself throughout nature?

Curiosity is one of the great engines of civilization. Long before formal science or organized philosophy, human beings were asking questions: What lies beyond the horizon? Why do the seasons change? What causes illness? How do the stars move across the sky? That restless impulse to know more—to look past the obvious and probe the unknown—has propelled nearly every significant advance in human history.

The earliest explorers were driven not merely by necessity, but by wonder. Seafaring cultures pushed into open water without certainty of what awaited them. Their curiosity expanded maps, connected continents, and reshaped economies. The same impulse animated the thinkers of ancient Greece, who refused to explain the world solely through myth and instead sought rational patterns behind natural phenomena. From those inquiries came philosophy, mathematics, and the foundations of democratic thought.

Curiosity also transformed medicine. Questions about the causes of disease gradually replaced superstition with observation and experiment. The scientific revolution emerged from individuals willing to doubt inherited assumptions and test them against evidence. Curiosity drove men to create telescopes and microscopes to explore the skies above and the incredibly tiny phenomenon invisible to the naked eye. Telescopes, microscopes and later the laboratory were tools born of the desire to see more clearly and understand more deeply.

Technological innovation followed the same pattern. The steam engine, electricity, flight, and digital computing all began with someone asking, “What if?” 

Civilizations stagnate when curiosity is suppressed; they flourish when inquiry is encouraged. Businesses and people likewise.

[EdNote: In light of these things, it's a curious thing that we warn people against being too curious by repeating the maxim, "Curiosity killed the cat." Where are the admonitions to be curious?]

Importantly, curiosity is not mere idle speculation. It requires humility—the recognition that we do not yet know—and courage—the willingness to challenge established ideas. It invites risk, but it also opens possibility.

Dan Hansen's fundamental motivational driver was this insatiable curiosity. If you're feeling a measure of deadness inside, it may be because you've become trapped in your routines. Routine dulls the senses; curiosity sharpens them. It pulls us out of autopilot and into engagement.

Curiosity makes us feel more alive because it awakens us to possibility. When we ask questions, explore new ideas, or notice something unfamiliar, the world expands.  To be curious is to lean forward into life rather than drift through it.

Think about it.

IdeaSpotting

"Curiosity is one of the most permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous mind." ~ Samuel Johnson

When I read Sam Harrison's IdeaSpotting in 2008, it was as good as I anticipated. His approach to the material is itself handled creatively. The pages are designed in an original manner. It is not a typical "book" in the sense of having only words on the pages. Every page is a new layout, appealing to the eye, though thematically it holds together and the design does not interfere with the message.

 

On page 25 the heading is, "Open your mind, and people will show you what's on their minds." He quotes Clint Eastwood: "Once you feel you know everything, you're done. You're either repetitive or boring, or both."

 

This notion reminded me of my college days when we'd sit or lie around on the college green at Ohio University talking about the meaning of life. There was this one fellow there who always said the same thing. "We're born, we procreate, and then we die." The first time he said it was cool, it seemed sort of a nugget to chew on. He had a professorial attitude, deep voice, beard and avant garde dark shades with turtleneck look. On another occasion we were discussing something and he was there. The only words he spoke were, "We're born, we procreate, and then we die." Months later, again the same.

 

Evidently he had had a profound LSD experience and "figured out the universe" and knew all he needed to know, because he'd definitely become repetitive and boring. The "cool" mystique that we originally saw in him never went beyond being a veneer. He was a guy you couldn't get to know. And he wasn't interested in getting to know us. He became as captivating as a broken record.

 

If we want to learn new things, we need to explore the world around us, and inside others... to listen and hear and see in new ways. Ask questions. Pay attention. And "maybe even eavesdrop." There are new things to discover all around you. This is the fodder for new ideas. And underneath it all you may even hear gentle rumbles of the voice of God.

BONUS TRACK

Three Quotes about Curiosty

"I am neither especially clever nor especially gifted. I am only very, very curious." – Albert Einstein 

"The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity." 
– Dorothy Parker 

 “Old age begins when curiosity ends.”– Saramego

 

The Art of Digital Photography

When you were a kid, did you ever 

take things apart to see how they worked? 

These are parts from the dismantling of a few old digital cameras.

It's probably similar to taking the engine apart on your car. 

The challenge is putting Humpty Dumpty back together again.

No, not the cameras, just the car engine.

Curiosity and a Canary: How Ordinary Events Become Extraordinary

The introduction to a book on Andre Gide and Curiosity begins like this: "In the autobiography of Andre Gide, the 15-year-old Andre is walking down a Paris street when he sees a canary flying toward him like the Holy Spirit. It lands on his head, designating him, he believes, as a writer."

The author describes how the young Andre is both curious regarding the canary, and simultaneously an object of the canary's curiosity. This statement from the book's description especially stood out for me: "Curiosity was a credo for Gide. By observing the world and then manifesting in writing these observations, he stimulates the curiosity of readers, conceived as virtual conduits of a curiosity once his own."

Reading these few lines brought several moments from my own life back into view, the first being that specific moment in time when I myself felt called to be a writer.

Other memories also came to mind of encounters with nature, or experiences in which I witnessed something unusual that seemed to have special significance for me. Like Gide's encounter with the canary, one of these involved an encounter with a fawn. The incident occurred in the fall of my junior year at Ohio University, 1973. I'd gone for a walk with my sketchbook as sunset approached, seeking a place to sit and draw. I found a quiet open space that overlooked a vast expanse to the west, hemmed on both sides forest, delightfully peaceful. I still remember the vivid colors of that red and gold sky, the swoop of the valley's architecture, the silhouettes of the trees as darkness approached.

Drawing, like any creative endeavor, becomes timeless when you've lost yourself in it, and on this occasion I must have been in the zone as it were, quietly absorbed in the moment. Suddenly I became aware of a young fawn that had evidently been creeping along the path, curious about this strange person sitting in her way. Her head bent forward below her shoulders, she kept approaching me, tentative and uncertain. Our eyes locked as I studied her face, each of us expectant, though she was no doubt more wary than relaxed.

Suddenly, two rifle shots echoed in the distance and my curious friend became alert but she didn't run. Eventually she sauntered back to the woods in the direction from which she came.

* * * *

I've been re-affirmed by the presence of a dove.

The incident must have made an impression on me because a couple years later I woke one morning with the first stanza of a poem tumbling and swirling in my head, along with the other images from this experience. The poem that I crafted became As A Young Fawn, I, a retelling of this incident from the point of view of the fawn.

During the night as I lay thinking about these things I was also reminded of the story of the Magi from the East written about in the Gospel according to Matthew in chapter 2. These priest sages who had been students of the heavens recognized a star of major significance and connected it with the birth of the anticipated Messiah spoken of by Jewish prophets. The Bible never says there were three, as the song "We Three Kings" suggests. It does, however, acknowledge a connection between nature and our human story, both individually and collectively. There are moments when something breaks through from Beyond that our modern scientific minds tend to dismiss, disregard, ignore.

Bringing this all full circle, the Magi were men whose mystical inclinations made them curious about the greater meaning of things. How they learned about this miraculous birth isn't explained in this passage, its historically documented that Israel's Northern Kingdom had been overthrown by Assyria circa 720 B.C. and the remaining Jews of the Southern Kingdom taken captive by the Babylonians circa 587 B.C. The Magi were undoubtedly familiar with, and curious about, the sacred texts of these peoples. Their arrival in search of the newborn child was no coincidence. 

Psalm 19 begins, "The heavens declare the glory of God." Open your mind. Sometimes a canary, or a dove, is more than just a bird.

Merry Christmas.

Northern Lights courtesy John Heino Photography.

Ramble On

"I have no special gift. I am only passionately curious." ~ Albert Einstein

What was it that made men like Einstein and Newton and Copernicus and Aristotle stand out from the herd? Einstein puts his finger on the nub of it right there. They were inordinately curious. They asked questions. They wanted to understand how the world worked. They didn't just accept things as they were.

For some reason, when we're kids we're taught that "curiosity killed the cat." This is repeated ad nauseaum in our childhood so as to make curiosity something bad, like lying. In reality, curiosity is part of the fabric of who we are. And it is essential to learning.

Making art is a thrill for creative personalities because it employs curiosity in the process of creation. What will happen if I do this? What happens if I do that? There is a sense of being an audience to one's own creations.

By way of contrast, most artists I know hate the way our culture wants "products" which can be reproduced. There's nothing more boring for an artist than mass production. It stunts this natural desire to see what will happen if I color it this way or that. Business people may like mass production for its efficiencies and the revenues generated. But I don't know many artists who want to make 1,000 identical baskets of flowers, teddy bears and ribbons.

According to our friend Merriam-Webster, the word ramble is an intransitive verb of 15th century Middle English origin which means to move aimlessly from place to place or to explore idly. I like the second part of that first definition: "To explore idly."

When we allow our minds to ramble and roam, amazing things happen. We discover gems. We find connections between new ideas and past experiences. There's a therapeutic aspect to it as well.

Every once in a while it's OK for our minds to drift, our thoughts to ramble. I don't know if it's healthy to keep our thoughts tightly coiled all the time. This might be a facet of music's wonder in that as we lose ourselves in the rhythms and harmonies and contours of sounds, whether sweet or discordant, we find a measure of freedom from our inward tyrannies.

Rambling as a lifestyle is also energizing for some. I know a few writers who travel the world, writing articles about what they see here, there and everywhere. I'm sure it's fascinating to meet so many interesting people, become engaged in so many cultures, to see so many scenic wonders.

But books can do a lot for us, too. And surfing the net, idly rambling across an uncharted sea of URLs... There really are marvels out there.

Relax. Enjoy the view. Ramble on.

NOTE: ALL ART AND IMAGES ON THIS BLOG ARE MY OWN CREATIONS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED. FEEL FREE TO BORROW WHAT YOU SEE HERE SO LONG AS ATTRIBUTION IS GIVEN. COPYRIGHT ED NEWMAN