Toward the middle, the book arrives at what feels like the point Leslie has been itching to make: there is no getting around the grunt work of acquiring true understanding.

Technological advances may be paradoxically stifling inquisitiveness and creativity.

In fact, some experts think we live during a period of “great stagnation”-a relative lack of innovation and invention. Yet by giving users exactly what they want, these innovations end up limiting curiosity. Technologies-such as computers and the search engine Google-would seem to open the world to exploration. Like any other skill, curiosity requires cultivation, which, Leslie argues, is happening less and less. Curious babies make better adolescent students parents can foster curiosity by asking their children questions and infants can sense when they are interacting with an “idiot.” For instance, when children receive useless information from adults, their drive to know more wilts. He then gives us a tour of the science of curiosity. Leslie begins his exploration by defining three types of curiosity: diversive curiosity, best exemplified by the meandering exploration of the toddler epistemic curiosity, the drive to understand how things work and empathic curiosity, the desire to know what other people are thinking and feeling. Leslie asserts that being curious will incidentally engender these other basic qualities and more. In recent years we have heard a lot about what is required for success-grit, perseverance and focus, among other traits. In his new book, writer and adman Leslie focuses on curiosity, the drive to explore and understand, which he believes is an essential but often overlooked criterion for a rewarding life. If we are lucky, maybe we procreate and experience the selflessness of parenthood. What is required for a fulfilling life? First, the basics: food, shelter and, because we are social animals, companionship. The Quest for Knowledge: Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It

Curious by Ian Leslie