Learning Something New Every Day
We’ve all heard that (in)famous phrase, “You learn something new every day!” For the most part, I agree with it. We watch the news. We pick up gossip. We discover that we’re out of toilet paper at just the wrong moment. Unfortunately, many of us seem to stop there. We become complacent living our lives in a way that (we think) makes us happy, and neglect to pick up knowledge at the speeds our minds are capable of.
Surely, no matter how stressful our lives are, most of us get bored on occasion. And what do we do in those cases? Flip on the TV, of course! (Or see who’s on AIM, read Cosmo, or go drinking.) The next time you’re bored, hold off that temptation, and instead just ask yourself a simple question. One question, that’s it; preferably one that you don’t know the answer to, about a topic that interests you. Here are some examples:
- Where did that phrase, “You learn something new every day” originate?
- How much do American students really learn compared to students in other countries? Why the differences?
- How do people in other countries perceive America?
- How do Americans perceive people in other countries?
- Just how serious is global warming?
- Are we ever going back to the Moon?
- How fast would college students, not held back by government bureaucracy, be able to plan a mission to Mars?
- It can’t be that hard to build a space shuttle… right?
- Seriously, why are most buildings square and boring? Don’t we have more creative architects?
- How often do square buildings collapse compared to, say, spherical ones? (Rolling away doesn’t count.)
- If a spherical building rolled away, would the people inside be able to run around like hamsters?
- How many calories would you burn by running in a hamster ball for one hour? How many more would it be if you were chased by an extremely large and hungry cat?
- Okay, I want a final verdict on caffeine: Healthy, unhealthy, or neutral?
- What’s all the hype about green tea?
- What’s the best way to sleep less and feel better? (By now, I think you all know the answer to this…)
- Why do we need sleep, anyway?
- What happens when a computer hibernates?
- What is this thing called Linux, and why is it ten million times better than Windows? (Sorry, just an opinion. From a Computer Engineering major.
) - Why is Windows Vista such a disappointment? (Okay, I’ll stop with the opinions. But they’re true, ya know.)
- What is DRM, and why are all the entertainment companies touting it while the tech gurus denounce it?
- How can I get a blog as cool as this one?
As you can see, there are basically no restrictions on the type of questions you could ask. If you’re in a silly mood, ask a silly question - it’s that simple. Then try to answer it! If your question was good, you shouldn’t be able to answer it immediately and will have to do a little digging, hence stirring up your curiosity, and (*gasp*) causing you to learn something new! You’ll be amazed at how deep you can dig on a topic that really interests you. I can’t tell you how many times a simple inquiry has lead me to do hours of research (polyphasic sleep is a prime example). Yes, it’s pretty nerdy, but I believe that by challenging ourselves and developing ourselves mentally when we aren’t obligated to, we’ll be much more prepared to use our noggins when it really counts.
So what are you waiting for? Go learn something! 
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You’d be shocked how many times I do something similar to that anyway. I use google pretty much on a daily basis to answer questions in my head. It helps that there’s a google search bar as par of my toolbar… but I can also be very guilty of just turning on the tv or reading cosmo or checking aim or facebook or whatever.