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Some people don't have this. A lot of people aren't very curious at all. Last night in Austin I saw a full self driving car from Cruise drive by with no driver while I was at a crosswalk. No one noticed or cared that a car just drove by with no one in it! It was one of the most incredible things I've ever seen, and the people around me did not notice or care.
I haven't looked at the research yet, but this feels like it may have some correlation with a psychological trait called dogmatism, which is a defined as exhibiting great certainty about the correctness of one's views and an unwillingness to consider new evidence, or an unwillingness to adjust one's views in light of new evidence. Obviously, they're not the same. NFC pertains more to the desire to go through the proc…
See: the Big 5 personality matrix.
> Need for cognition is closely related to the five factor model domain openness to experience, typical intellectual engagement, and epistemic curiosity
Too much thinking is like a heavy dish, it makes you sluggish and sleepy. Remember that everything that moves quickly and elegantly through the world does so without too much thought.
I haven't looked at the research yet, but this feels like it may have some correlation with a psychological trait called dogmatism, which is a defined as exhibiting great certainty about the correctness of one's views and an unwillingness to consider new evidence, or an unwillingness to adjust one's views in light of new evidence. Obviously, they're not the same. NFC pertains more to the desire to go through the proc…
At some point the algorithms in our head has to stop trying to think about things and instead just go with an option. That happens at different points for everyone, some stop thinking earlier while others basically never stops thinking about things so have a hard time getting started with anything.
I don't think that it is fair to say that one is better than the other, they are just different and are good at solving different kinds of problems.
I haven't looked at the research yet, but this feels like it may have some correlation with a psychological trait called dogmatism, which is a defined as exhibiting great certainty about the correctness of one's views and an unwillingness to consider new evidence, or an unwillingness to adjust one's views in light of new evidence. Obviously, they're not the same. NFC pertains more to the desire to go through the proc…
But cognition is as precious a resource as attention or compute these days, so maybe there's something to learn from them.
Too much thinking is like a heavy dish, it makes you sluggish and sleepy. Remember that everything that moves quickly and elegantly through the world does so without too much thought.
And everything that withstands assault does so with thought.
You know, I could believe that, but I can't help wondering if the people who do research in psychology (or most people in academia really) are not more likely to be high-NFC types, and thus not exactly objective in deciding what potential advantages/disadvantages to research. For example, who is less likely to be swayed by empirical evidence?
Some people don't have this. A lot of people aren't very curious at all. Last night in Austin I saw a full self driving car from Cruise drive by with no driver while I was at a crosswalk. No one noticed or cared that a car just drove by with no one in it! It was one of the most incredible things I've ever seen, and the people around me did not notice or care.
This is such a transient thing.
If you're not primed to notice a self driving car (already thinking about it / having read it) you may miss it.
And once you've seen it a few times, the novelty decreases a lot.
I try to keep wonder for things that I have experienced already (Holy crap; I'm in a metal tube that's going close to the speed of sound 7 miles high!) But pretty soon other things win (How long do I have to sit in this little seat? And I'm hungry...).
Arguably the thing that is most extraordinary is that we've made these wonderful, bizarre things such a matter of routine. Look around you. Nearly every object in the civilized world is a constructed object, borne from human thought. Every street, every edifice, every artifice. Even almost all of the foods and raw ingredients have been crafted to meet our needs. Wow. But flour is a >30,000 year old technology and not something people get excited about...