Thoughts about Curiosity and Others
Last Thursday, with several colleagues in my company, we went to a nearby elementary school to do the “Kids in Chemistry Program”. We demonstrated to the kids at 4-grade what two chemicals called acid and base are and how they behave differently. My group has four 10-year old kids. The kids were so interested in the new phenomena they saw. Lisa, one of the girls, was so exciting about the chemicals that she literately used all the vinegar (acid) and ammonium (base) bottles. She laughed happily almost through the whole experiments.
I had a lot of fun than I anticipated. In fact, I think that I gained a lot more from the kids than the little chemical knowledge I gave to them. What really stroked me was their high degree of curiosity and happy faces, which were rarely seen on adults like us. It also motivated me to think about my beliefs about God and my life.
One of the basic differences between human being and animal is curiosity, which is a great thing that God gives to everyone of us. I remembered that I read about Adam, the first man God made, ate the apple that he should not eat, in the beautiful
I would be bore. In fact, bore to death. Everyday is the same. Everyday the sky is blue, fruits everywhere, birds were singing. I probably spent the first 10 years or so to chase animals, then, spend the next 30 years to catch birds, and next 200 years to grow every kinds of trees in that garden. Then, I probably going to try to change something, cut the branches of pear trees to connect them to an apple tree, put the rabbits with rats together to see if there is any new kinds of animals would come out … Of course, I am not Adam, who is definitely smarter than I am. So I suspect that Adam tried a lot more other things.
Then, several thousands of years passed (time is meaningless if you never die and stay at the same place). Adam probably tried everything that he can think of (plus his wife’s every idea). Now, he was really bore, and probably really unhappy. God saw this, and then, we know the rest of the story from bible.
I guess that one very possible reason that Adam ate the apple is not due to the snake or his wife, but rather due his own curiosity nature. The reason that I think about this is, as I described above, that I would try to eat the forbidden apple myself.
So, is curiosity a good thing or bad thing? I don’t know because I think the question is a false one. Just like technology is neither good nor bad, it depends on how you use it for. We, as human being, are born with it. It is in our nature. God gave it to us when he made us. It is one of the things that distinguish us from the animals.
Curiosity is a gift from God. As a Christian, I think that we should remember this. Almost every improvement (I mean improvement, not just changes) in human’s history comes from a person or a group of persons asking “why …”, “can we change it?” “how to …”. Although many brothers and sisters think that human being is desperate and hopeless now, just as thousands of years ago, I don’t agree this view at all. Two thousands years ago, in Jesus period, life was difficult for the majority of people. Society is separated in different levels. Majority of the population was in the low level, which has very little hope to get a better life. Today, all developed countries in the world are democratic countries. By law, everyone is equal, and everyone has chances. Today, people live a lot longer and healthier. Let alone to say that we practically have a lot more choices due to the technology advantages. You can live anywhere and do business as far as you have internet and UPS (which means you can be reached by a road/airport/port).
What didn’t change (and will not change) is human nature, like hope, greed, fear, remorse, and curiosity, which are all built in by our creator. What we need to do, is to learn how to balance these staffs. Besides, I don’t think that “bad” thing like greed is 100% bad, but that is another topic.
Different person at different time at different situations need different kinds of balance. I probably have a little bit more curiosity in my nature than an average person, which is the reason I like science. As a general observation, I notice that at the churches or bible study groups, people usually show little curiosity, something that I don’t like.
In human history, it has been repeat ably shown that whenever a country or a group is 100% agree on something, the chance of disaster happens is a lot higher than a diversified case. The reason for it is that the direction of this very powerful group is hanged on a single or a few leaders. Even when the leader is a logical and smart person who doesn’t do anything stupid during his whole life and has a wonderful leading record, vacuum usually appears after he dies. It is true that a unified group/country will be a lot more efficient and powerful than a diversified one, but eventually, something bad will happen. Usually, more unified and bigger the group, the potential of disaster will be larger.
That is the main reason that I do not advocate the concept that everyone on earth should believe in the same thing. Obviously, I am not a hardcore Christian even though I believe that Jesus died for us and we were saved through his blood. I also do not think that the whole human race is going to be unified in a real sense. In other words, even if 6 billion (or more) people eventually claim that they believe in Jesus someday, there will be many subgroups among them. People will fight about the details about the bible; there will be new kinds of names come out, and so on. And I think that is normal, and healthy, because that is our nature. And again, I don’t think our nature is all that bad.
People should keep their level of curiosity high for all their lives, because that is a gift from God, and I think it is a good thing. I really like those 10-year old 4-graders in the school I visited. I sincerely hope that I will have high degree of curiosity when I am 60, 70, and older. Because, in a sense, that is what God wants us to do in our life – to experience the life, to find out what is joyful, what is painful, to try, to discover, for ourselves.
