“On Being Curious”

What is curiosity? Is it an emotion? A behavior? A cognitive process? Curiosity seems to be an abstract concept — like love, perhaps, or justice — far from the realm of those bits of nature that science can possibly address. However, contrary to intuition, leading theories of curiosity from history, philosophy, and psychology are surprisingly amenable to formalization in an emerging branch of mathematics known as network science. Such a formalization allows theories of curiosity to be explicitly tested and validated in linguistic and behavioral data. In understanding the foundational processes of curiosity, we can turn to pressing societal questions that can only be addressed through interdisciplinary work that foregrounds a critical consciousness. How can we practice, mentor, and teach curiosity? In what ways might we value and support diverse curiosities? What is an ethical curiosity?