In her 2016 bestselling book, “Lab Girl,” University of Oslo geoscientist Professor Hope Jahren wrote, “People will tell you that you have to know math to be a scientist, or physics or chemistry. They’re wrong … What comes first is a question.” I believe this is an important universal and actionable message for us all to contemplate and implement at the start of a new school year.
Data from multiple studies indicates that 4-year-olds ask as many as 200 to 300 questions a day. Another says that between the ages of 2 to 5, kids ask an average of 40,000 questions. How many questions do you ask each day now? The following somewhat familiar sounding statement is attributed to Sir Francis Bacon (1561 – 1626), celebrated as the ‘Father of the Scientific Method’: “We must become as little children to enter the kingdom of science.” The ‘kingdom of science’ can appropriately be extended to all knowledge and learning, for indeed, in its Latin origin, the word ‘science’ means knowledge.
Asking questions is a gateway to universal knowledge and human advancement. It is prerequisite to discovery and innovation of every kind – religious, scientific, philosophical, literary, technological, legal, artistic, and for normal everyday living. So, it is important to develop a lifelong mindset of questioning. School, at every level, ought to provide a great nurturing environment to master the important life skill of asking questions. Teachers should nurture questions with the immaculate care of a farmer for their seeds and seedlings.
Another immediate reason for asking questions is for enlightenment in the midst of the viral false claims and misinformation that have now become an everyday part of popular culture, politics and media. Questions can bring transparency, elicit evidence, or ascertain the lack thereof, foster critical thinking and clarity, reveal biases and misgivings, they can rend asunder veils and masks, and shine much-needed light in our search for truth. Like light upon darkness, so too are questions piercing through ignorance and myth. Questions can reveal inconvenient truths about even our most cherished beliefs. Every human era should be an age of Enlightenment; it ought not be limited or stipulated to specific times and ‘ages.’
What comes first is a question. Indeed, even the all-knowing God asks questions, and He does so with childlike persistence. His first was in the Garden of Eden in the cool of the day after Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. God asked, as recorded in Genesis 3:9, “Where are you?” That was not the last of His questions: “What is this you have done?” (Genesis 3:13), “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? (Job 38:4), “Son of man, can these bones live?” (Ezekiel 37:3), “Who do you say that I am?" (Matthew 16:15). Then there is God questioning God, in the darkness of Calvary, there comes a plaintive question that sends shock waves throughout the universe: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). Right there, in the raw existential fact of these questions, is a message about the humility of God and a poignant rebuke to those who think they know it all. These are essentially divine preemptive strikes upon our human vanity and pride.
Questioning is an essential value and practice for all learners and seekers that is distilled in these familiar words found in Matthew 7:7, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” I refer to this text as the Researcher’s or Seeker’s Creed. Yet, it is more. It is how we ‘seek knowledge, affirm faith, and change the world.’ Our affirmation of faith should not come by mindless repetition or by being ‘mere reflectors’ of tradition and doctrine but by careful inspection and thoughtful introspection. We cannot change the world unless we question its status quo and ascertain which practices are most civilizing. Yes, for World Changers to be made here they (we) must master the deep discipline of questioning. Included in this discipline is exercising due consideration to the time, place and social-emotional aspects of the query and the questioning process.
Asking questions comes out of our innate God-given desire or need to know, which is in a word, curiosity. Indeed, all human learning and knowledge flows from curiosity, either in its origination and/or transmission. Asking questions is an outgrowth, a manifestation, and evidence of a curious mind. Here is what some scientists have said about curiosity:
“I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious. The important thing is to not stop questioning.” – Albert Einstein, 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics
“… I’ve already got the prize. The prize is the pleasure of finding things out.” – Richard Feynman, 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics
“Satisfaction of one's curiosity is one of the greatest sources of happiness in life.” - Linus Pauling, 1954 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
“Every little kid is a natural scientist, because they are naturally curious … that’s what science is.” – Dudley Herschbach, 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
1981 Nobel Prize chemist Roald Hoffmann was asked in an interview, “What sets scientists apart?” Hoffmann replied, “First, and foremost, curiosity.”
In private communications, Andrews University English Professor Scott Moncrieff noted, “Sometimes I ask my writing students what the most important quality for a writer is. They often make useful suggestions having to do with writing itself, but then I tell them that in my estimation it’s curiosity. Without a high level of curiosity, the writer has little motivation to learn and little chance of adding value to a reader’s experience.”
These statements all speak to the supremacy and universality of curiosity. Asking questions is what scientists do as ‘enshrined’ in the scientific method. But it is also what all learners do and what all seekers do. Curiosity is our entry to a world, our world, this world which American poet Emily Dickinson wrote “is not conclusion.” Regardless of what we know and how much we know, there is always more to know and more questions to ask. As we pursue good grades, a satisfying career, and a life of generous service, may we never lose our curiosity and never stop asking questions.
Part II will provide specific how-to tips about asking questions.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.