Curiosity
Overview
 
Curiosity is an emotion
Emotion
Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical and environmental influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves "physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience." Emotion is associated with mood,...

 related to natural inquisitive behavior
Behavior
Behavior or behaviour refers to the actions and mannerisms made by organisms, systems, or artificial entities in conjunction with its environment, which includes the other systems or organisms around as well as the physical environment...

 such as exploration
Exploration
Exploration is the act of searching or traveling around a terrain for the purpose of discovery of resources or information. Exploration occurs in all non-sessile animal species, including humans...

, investigation, and learning
Learning
Learning is acquiring new or modifying existing knowledge, behaviors, skills, values, or preferences and may involve synthesizing different types of information. The ability to learn is possessed by humans, animals and some machines. Progress over time tends to follow learning curves.Human learning...

, evident by observation in human
Human
Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...

 and many animal
Animal
Animals are a major group of multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia or Metazoa. Their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later on in their life. Most animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and...

 species. The term can also be used to denote the behavior itself being caused by the emotion of curiosity. As this emotion represents a drive to know new things, curiosity is the fuel of science and all other disciplines of human study.
Although many living beings have an innate capability of curiosity, it should not be categorized as an instinct
Instinct
Instinct or innate behavior is the inherent inclination of a living organism toward a particular behavior.The simplest example of an instinctive behavior is a fixed action pattern, in which a very short to medium length sequence of actions, without variation, are carried out in response to a...

 because it is not a fixed action pattern
Fixed action pattern
In ethology, a fixed action pattern , or modal action pattern, is an instinctive behavioral sequence that is indivisible and runs to completion...

; rather it is an innate basic emotion
Emotion
Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical and environmental influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves "physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience." Emotion is associated with mood,...

 because while curiosity can be expressed in many ways, the expression of an instinct is typically more fixed and less flexible.
Quotations

"Blessed are the curious for they shall have adventures." ~ Lovelle Drachman

"Curiosity is only vanity. Most frequently we wish not to know, but to talk. We would not take a sea voyage for the sole pleasure of seeing without hope of ever telling." ~ Blaise Pascal(Pensées)

“To be curious about that which is not one's concern while still in ignorance of oneself is ridiculous.” ~ Plato

"Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect." ~ Steven Wright

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

“It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education.” ~ Albert Einstein

"Only barbarians are not curious about where they come from, how they came to be where they are, where they appear to be going, whether they wish to go there, and if so, why, and if not, why not." ~ Isaiah Berlin

"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality." ~ Albert Einstein

“We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” ~ Walt Disney

“When you're curious, you find lots of interesting things to do.” ~ Walt Disney

 
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