Talk:Curiosity

etymology

I wonder where the word "curious" comes from because "kurios" in German means "quaint" by contrast the French word "curieux" means "curious", too.--Homei 17:51, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems to come from Latin curiosus meaning careful. However, the article on epistemic virtue says that their use of "curiosity bears the modern connotation of inquisitiveness, in contrast to the medieval connotation of attraction to unwholesome things." Do we believe that? DLeonard 14:02, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Picture Caption

For as long as I can remember the caption of the pic has been "A foolish feline forgets that curiosity killed the cat", but now it has been changed to "A curious kitten" by someone why claims to have "restored the original picture caption". I've been through the archive, viewed the last seven revisions or so, and tried some random samples from the rest of the archive, but I haven't found this caption in any of them. My first question is therefore, how is this the original caption?

Secondly, I plead that the previous caption be restored, because as far as I know it's the only example of an utterly harmless joke that hasn't been eliminated relentlessly by an overly serious editor in a grumpy mood. If there is any negativity to Wikipedia's reputation, it's that Wikipedians have no sense of humour. Fyrius 17:42, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

There's a difference between having no sense of humor and recognizing where humor is appropriate. While it may be funny to accuse a kitten of foolishness, and patently ridiculous to accuse an animal of forgetting something it never learned, it is not technically accurate (unless you can cite sources that this particular cat was foolish or forgetful of the adage in question) and not particularly appropriate as the caption to a picture illustrating a concept in an encyclopedia. I'm all for humor in its many splendors, so if you can find an accurate yet slyly humorous caption, be my guest, but in the meantime I'm putting it back to the original caption (here - from when it was changed from the previous picture).

On a separate note, "A curious kitten." removes the link to Curiosity killed the cat, which it may be appropriate to add a mention of somewhere in the article.

Ruyn 20:23, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

(sigh) Well, all right. If you really insist that we be so obnoxiously serious at all times, I won't revert you again. But if we're going to be so strict about verifiability, maybe we should throw the picture out entirely. We can't verify that the kitten in question was curious at the moment when the picture was taken, nor does it add all that much to the value of the article. Curiosity in itself is too abstract to illustrate with a photograph. Fyrius 20:30, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Before going back to the original caption, I considered "A kitten displays its naturally inquisitive behavior by peering into a flower-pot. Cats are often associated with curiosity." as a new caption. What do you think? Ruyn 15:15, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

I think that might be a better caption, although it's a bit long. It would make the picture somewhat more relevant and verifiable. However, the second sentence contains what I believe is called a weasel word; it is against the policies to say some association is often made, or at least it is so without any references to convince the reader (or rather, any editors that may come across it) that this is true.

I would therefore refine it into "A kitten peers into a flower-pot. Cats are often proverbially associated with curiosity." It is after all more verifiable that this proverb exists than that people associate cats with curiosity. Fyrius 22:10, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Insects? Really?

"Curiosity ... is easy to observe in many other animal species. These include ... insects". I rather suspect that the brainpower of insects is too limited to permit curiosity. Any cites on this one way or the other? -- 201.19.77.39 10:46, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

There is not any evidence one way or the other that insects have curiosity. Besh (talk) 16:09, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

article already exists

isnt curiosity the same thing as intrest ? If so one of the two articles should be deleated. If not both articles should be eddited so that they clearly show the difference between the two articles. For example they would say something like curiosity is not be confused with intrest becuase... —Preceding unsigned comment added by Theunhappymitten (talk • contribs) 17:39, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

No, No it is not. 195.59.101.162 (talk)

Article Expansion

"Curiosity" is definitely very different from "interest", and I agree with Theunhappymitten that this difference should be clearly pointed out. Terms like "curiosity" have various meanings in different cultures, even of the same language, and can therefore be difficult to define accurately. However, curiosity has been defined for scientific purposes and studied in some detail (especially in the 1950's and 60's by Daniel Berlyne, and also more recently using fMRI and molecular experiments in animals). For this reason, I am considering making some significant changes to the curiosity wikipage in order to include the scientific investigations that have occurred, since it is something I have studied and continue to study. There are also interesting references in mythology (ex. Pandora's box) and history (discovery of new continents, motion of the stars, Albert Einstein). The article would certainly benefit from a detailed expansion, so long as each section is backed-up with the appropriate references. My general plan is to describe the variety of meanings that are ascribed to curiosity in the first section, and then to break it down in more detail in later sections. Berlyne, for example, divided curiosity into two broad categories: Epistemic and Perceptual, each with their own sub-divisions. His experiments from 50 years ago have been reproduced by other scientists recently and the study of curiosity is now emerging as an exciting new branch of cognitive neuroscience. Besh (talk) 16:16, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Curiosity as a catalyst to learning

Has any research been done to correlate the use of curiosity-driven teaching methods to the effectiveness of a student's learning? Linking to studies of this kind would take this article from being an interesting read to being a useful read. I'm curious about curiosity. Perhaps others are too. Hubby2debbie (talk) 18:40, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, in the 1950's Berlyne (referenced twice already on this page) demonstrated a link between curiosity and efficiency of learning. A molecular link between curiosity and learning was discovered in 2009, and is also referenced. I agree, showing the link here on wikipedia is a fantastic idea and I am happy to help increase the depth of this article. Besh (talk) 21:34, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

"Models" of curiosity

The recent expansion of this page is welcome, and I am eager to help improve further. For starters, it is not clear from where the so called "models" of curiosity originate - the only reference is a review article from 2005 published in a medium-ranking psychology journal. Where can we find the original proposal for the "Curiosity-drive model" or the "Optimal arousal model"? Citation to the primary sources would be appropriate if this section is to remain a part of the wiki article.

Also, given that these models are heavy on theory and sparse on evidence, the heading of this section (currently "Brain") is perhaps misleading. The field of psychology does not restrict itself to (or ever necessarily consider) what is known about the biology of the brain. Would a title something like "Psychological Theories" then be more appropriate?

Moreover, the "Integration of reward pathway" is vague and similarly unsupported by primary citations. For example, the statement "This is the neurobiology that motivates exploratory behavior" is much too definitive, given bodies of evidence that indicate other processes are also key, as even the very next sentence suggests (opioids).

I make these statements before modifying the article to give the recent editors(s) a chance to discuss how to best go forward. Besh Jan 9, 2013 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.60.51.125 (talk) 12:53, 9 January 2013 (UTC)

Additions

You have done great work with this article so far. I would suggest maybe explaining further how one can observe curiosity. You mentioned it is easily observable under the causes section, but more detail explaining how one is able to observe it might make it clearer. Nice work so far! Jlederz (talk) 01:06, 2 July 2015 (UTC)

Hey Jenny,

Thanks! I agree. Didn't think about it until you mentioned it, but I totally agree. How do you observe curiosity? What benefit is observable quality of curiosity? I am definitely going to make this a section. Thanks for teh recommendation!

-MK --Mkburnett4 (talk) 22:30, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Copy-Edit suggestions

Hey MK! The article is coming along nicely. As I was reading, two specific things came to mind... First, under the Causes section, you mention infancy and adulthood. With the average layperson in mind, perhaps defining these and/or giving an example may help clarify. Also, under the Brain section there are many, many subsections. I'm not sure what your plans are with this section, but upon first glance, that section is overwhelming. I'm not entirely familiar with the topic so maybe all of those sections are necessary. But I would suggest, if at all possible, to either expand on the most important areas of the brain and get rid of the others, or organize them in a more user-friendly way. Excited to see the end product! LaurStuart (talk) 19:42, 2 July 2015 (UTC)

Hey Lauren,

I think that is one of the hardest things for me in this project; reminding myself that this is not a scholarly paper instead needs to be written for the masses. I will pay attention to language choices and make some edits. And the brain section- I want to keep some of it but I agree it is overwhelming even for the clinical eye. That section is on my "to-do" list for sure.

Thanks for the input! MK --Mkburnett4 (talk) 22:33, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for speedy deletion

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You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 05:51, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

Theories

I'm new to this, but the information in the theories seems a little short and could use more relevant sources, the optimal-arousal theory only has a source from 1960 that was over 60 years ago.75.174.50.5 (talk) 04:21, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Archer159 (talk) 20:20, 28 September 2022 (UTC)== Organization ==

There are several changes that should be made to the article in relation to the organization of the article's sections. Several of the references are out of date and could use some more modern sources to either support them or to replace the outdated information with more current information.Archer159 (talk) 23:00, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Humans vs. animals

Humans are primates so the article should read "humans and other animals". Otherwise, it implies that humans are not animals, which is simply not factual and is in essence a biased viewpoint (aka an opinion). My attempt to correct this was rejected. IsabellaOL (talk) 14:28, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

There are many definitions of 'animal' - some exclude humans and some do not. For an article lead, shorter and simpler is better, and there is no need to get hung up on questionable technicalities. MrOllie (talk) 17:19, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Good to get this debate going. I understand the point and openly concede that there are many anthropocentric definitions of animals. English is, after all, a human language so us humans get to do what we want.

And yet, we can do better as a species.

For starters, this separation of humans from the animal kingdom is at the root of the current climate and ecological challenges facing all living beings on the planet. Take, for example, this article from the UK-based BBC and in particular the closing pararaph:

"As we stand on the brink of a biodiversity crisis and increasingly technologised lives, it’s time for us to rethink not only what’s precious to us about our animal life but to recognise that we don’t have the monopoly on valuable lived experiences. A little more humility would serve our species well if we want to be better prepared, both morally and mentally, for the future."

Are humans animals? - BBC Science Focus Magazine

My argument is that anywhere we see the humans versus animals idea being peddled, we need to call it out! IsabellaOL (talk) 17:47, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

AI "curiosity" is just jargon that happens to have the same name

The AI section really does not belong here... The "curiosity" metric of an AI agent during training is wildly different from actual human curiosity. It is just a bit of jargon, and all it actually means is: "rewarding models for widely exploring their phase space during training helps keep them out of local minima and find more globally optimal solutions."

If you think about that statement, there's really nothing profound being said... we wouldn't label simulated annealing as curiosity but that's more or less what's happening here. It's "curious" in the way that humans can feel an intrinsic reward when exploring new situations, which is why the metric is named the way it is. But it's a numeric optimization approach, that is all. Neural networks aren't actually alive.

The parallels between the two are perhaps philosophically interesting, but the section as it's currently written contributes basically nothing of value here.

So, I guess what I'm saying here is, the section should either be deleted entirely, reduced to a single sentence noting that the jargon exists, or expanded upon to draw a parallel between the AI training metric and actual human curiosity in a meaningful way. Orange.no.rhyme (talk) 14:58, 30 April 2025 (UTC)