89 Curiosity Quotes Encouraging You to Keep Learning

These curiosity quotes will inspire you to learn more about the world around you.

We have all heard the expression, “Curiosity killed the cat.”

Chances are, you haven’t stopped to think about how that saying came to be popular.

The underlying meaning of this saying is that curiosity is not worth the risk of poking your nose into something that may turn out to be harmful.

The phrase is intended to discourage curiosity.

But why is curiosity an important value to nurture?

Curiosity, at its root, is the desire to learn.

Learning more about our world helps us make decisions, and ultimately even control our destiny.

From the two-year-old incessantly inquiring, “Why?” to NASA launching a rover named Curiosity to Mars, when something piques our curiosity, we can achieve wonderful things.

This collection of curiosity quotes will help you fan the flame of your own curiosity, allowing you to achieve beyond your horizons.

Don’t forget to also read these interesting Minion quotes that will charm and delight you.

If you love this quote collection, read out our most popular quote article about short inspirational quotes for daily motivation. 

If you need more inspirational quotes, check out our motivational quotes category page.

Curiosity Quotes About Where Curiosity Can Take You

1.) “Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” – Leo Burnett

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2.) “Satisfaction of one’s curiosity is one of the greatest sources of happiness in life.” – Linus Pauling

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3.) “Curiosity is lying in wait for every secret.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

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4.) “As a documentarian, you think, ‘Follow your curiosity.’” – Ron Howard

5.) “Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.” – Steven Wright

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6.) “I have always had a sense of curiosity and aspiration.” – Waris Ahluwalia

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7.) “As long as you’re interested in people and things, that curiosity propels you forward.” – Joanna Coles

8.) “Curiosity will conquer fear even more than bravery will.” – James Stephens

9.) “Curiosity is the best motive for writing: curiosity about the world at large, or about oneself.” – Michael Korda

10.) “Curiosity is one of the great secrets of happiness.” – Bryant H. McGill

11.) “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

12.) “Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.” – E. E. Cummings

13.) “What I have is a malevolent curiosity. That’s what drives my need to write and what probably leads me to look at things a little askew. I do tend to take a different perspective from most people.” – David Bowie

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14.) “My favourite words are possibilities, opportunities and curiosity. I think if you are curious, you create opportunities, and then if you open the doors, you create possibilities.” – Mario Testino

15.) “Curiosity is the essence of human existence. ‘Who are we? Where are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going?’… I don’t know. I don’t have any answers to those questions. I don’t know what’s over there around the corner. But I want to find out.” – Gene Cernan

16.) “I’m talking about enjoying and finding pleasure and interest and happiness and curiosity every moment.” – Valerie Harper

Quotes About Curiosity as a Virtue

17.) “Pay attention to those employees who respectfully ask why. They are demonstrating an interest in their jobs and exhibiting a curiosity that could eventually translate into leadership ability.” – Harvey Mackay

18.) “Life must be lived and curiosity kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

19.) “What interests me in life is curiosity, challenges, the good fight with its victories and defeats.” – Paulo Coelho

20.) “Curiosity is what keeps me open to a sense of hope. It staves off negativity.” – Carrie Brownstein

21.) “I am generally fascinated by what are the big, challenging questions – that’s behind my curiosity.” – Paul Allen

22.) “When people don’t have any curiosity about themselves, that is always a bad sign.” – Irvin D. Yalom

23.) “Replace judgment with curiosity.” – Lynn Nottage

24.) “Joy in the universe, and keen curiosity about it all – that has been my religion.” – John Burroughs

25.) “The greatest virtue of man is perhaps curiosity.” – Anatole France

26.) “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my life, it’s that curiosity might kill cats, but it doesn’t kill people.” – Tracy Morgan

27.) “One of the secrets of life is to keep our intellectual curiosity acute.” – William Lyon Phelps

28.) “A tree you pass by every day is just a tree. If you are to closely examine what a tree has and the life a tree has, even the smallest thing can withstand a curiosity, and you can examine whole worlds.” – William Shatner

29.) “Creativity flows when curiosity is stoked.” – Neil Blumenthal

30.) “The four characteristics of humanism are curiosity, a free mind, belief in good taste, and belief in the human race.” – E. M. Forster

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Curiosity Quotes About Children

31.) “It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education.” – Albert Einstein

32.) “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” – Albert Einstein

33.) “Seize the moment of excited curiosity on any subject to solve your doubts; for if you let it pass, the desire may never return, and you may remain in ignorance.” – William Wirt

34.) “You can’t just give someone a creativity injection. You have to create an environment for curiosity and a way to encourage people and get the best out of them.” – Ken Robinson

35.) “Education was the most important value in our home when I was growing up. People don’t always realize that my parents shared a sense of intellectual curiosity and a love of reading and of history.” – Caroline Kennedy

36.) “Standardized testing is at cross purposes with many of the most important purposes of public education. It doesn’t measure big-picture learning, critical thinking, perseverance, problem solving, creativity or curiosity, yet those are the qualities great teaching brings out in a student.” – Randi Weingarten

37.) “All children are born with stars in their eyes, and they are curious. It is important for teachers to be careful not to kill this curiosity. A lot can go wrong. Children can be teased, even by teachers.” – May-Britt Moser

38.) “Kids are naturally curious about what they don’t know, or don’t understand, or what is foreign to them. They only learn to be frightened of those differences when an adult influences them to behave that way and censors that natural curiosity.” – Aimee Mullins

39.) “I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

40.) “The first and simplest emotion which we discover in the human mind, is curiosity.” – Edmund Burke

41.) “Kids are born curious about the world. What adults primarily do in the presence of kids is unwittingly thwart the curiosity of children.” – Neil deGrasse Tyson

42.) “Children are remarkable for their intelligence and ardor, for their curiosity, their intolerance of shams, the clarity and ruthlessness of their vision.” – Aldous Huxley

43.) “We read our children stories starring elephants and monkeys and bears to teach them about nobility, curiosity and courage, to warn them against selfishness and stubbornness.” – Lydia Millet

Curiosity Quotes About Science and Learning

44.) “Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.” – Zora Neale Hurston

45.) “Science is fun. Science is curiosity. We all have natural curiosity. Science is a process of investigating. It’s posing questions and coming up with a method. It’s delving in.” – Sally Ride

46.) “I happen to love science… Scientists are all slightly mad. There is truth in the stereotype of the mad scientist. They are mad with curiosity.” – Richard Preston

47.) “We’re born with a curiosity about the universe. Those people who don’t have a curiosity don’t have it because it’s gotten beaten out of them in some way.” – Kip Thorne

48.) “Curiosity is one of the most permanent and certain characteristics of a vigorous intellect.” – Samuel Johnson

49.) “Curiosity is the lust of the mind.” – Thomas Hobbes

50.) “Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning.” – William Arthur Ward

51.) “Some advice: keep the flame of curiosity and wonderment alive, even when studying for boring exams. That is the well from which we scientists draw our nourishment and energy. And also, learn the math. Math is the language of nature, so we have to learn this language.” – Michio Kaku
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52.) “I want people to believe in themselves. I want intellectual curiosity. I want someone who realizes that they don’t know it all and that they’re dying to learn.” – Kevin Plank

53.) “If you’re curious, you’ll probably be a good journalist because we follow our curiosity like cats.” – Diane Sawyer

54.) “I’m naturally curious, and I’ve always been driven by my curiosity. Curiosity gets people excited. Curiosity leads to new ideas, new jobs, new industries.” – Anne Sweeney

55.) “Lean into your curiosity about any issue, and there will likely be people to share a little bit more of their knowledge and insight and give you ideas on how to make change.” – Opal Tometi
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56.) “What is the intersection between technology, art and science? Curiosity and wonder, because it drives us to explore, because we’re surrounded by things we can’t see.” – Louie Schwartzberg

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57.) “Often have I wondered with much curiosity as to our coming into this world and what will follow our departure.” – Petrarch

58.) “The enemy of science is not religion. Religion comes in endless shapes and forms… The true enemy is the substitution of thought, reflection, and curiosity with dogma.” – Frans de Waal

59.) “Curiosity is as much the parent of attention, as attention is of memory.” – Richard Whately

60.) “I love learning, and I think that curiosity is a wonderful gift.” – Andie MacDowell

More curiosity quotes and sayings

61. “Curiosity is, in great and generous minds, the first passion and the last.” – Samuel Johnson

62. The public have an insatiable curiosity to know everything, except what is worth knowing.” – Oscar Wilde

63. “Enjoy every step you take. If you’re curious, there is always something new to be discovered in the backdrop of your daily life.” – Roy T. Bennett

64. “Curiosity is only vanity. We usually only want to know something so that we can talk about it.” – Blaise Pascal

65. “Curiosity is the engine of achievement.” – Ken Robinson

66. “Curiosity is what separates us from the cabbages. It’s accelerative. The more we know, the more we want to know.” – David McCullough

67. “Love is curiosity sometimes. Concentrated wondering about the other one.” – Kij Johnson

68. “Stay human, stay curious and let the entire world know that you are.” – Micheal Stevens

69. “I know you were just wondering, but sometimes wondering is better than knowing.” – Christopher Scotton

Motivational Curiosity Quotes to Inspire Learning

70. “I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.” – Albert Einstein

71. Intelligence follows curiosity.” – James Clear

72. “Curiosity and questions will get you further than confidence and answers.” – Maxime Lagacé

73. “Following your genuine intellectual curiosity is a better foundation for a career than following whatever is making money right now.” – Naval Ravikant

74. “I don’t know anything, but I do know that everything is interesting if you go into it deeply enough.” – Richard Feynman

75. “Boredom leads to one of these two things: more boredom or more creativity.” – Matthew Kobach

76. “If I know what I shall find, I do not want to find it. Uncertainty is the salt of life.” – Erwin Chargaff

77. “Intellectual curiosity is a superpower.” – Anthony Pompliano

78. “Do stuff. Be clenched, curious. Not waiting for inspiration’s shove or society’s kiss on your forehead.” – Susan Sontag

79. “Curiosity is insubordination in its purest form.” – Vladimir Nabokov

Curiosity Quotes To Help You gain Knowledge

80. “I have a certain curiosity for life that drives me and propels me forward.” — Rachel McAdams

81. “Curiosity takes courage. The most important promises are the ones you make to yourself. Pay Attention. Appreciate. Listen. Imagine.” — Mary Anne Radmacher

82. “I have always had a curious nature; I enjoy learning, but I dislike being taught.” — Winston Churchill

83. “When you meet people, show real appreciation, then genuine curiosity.” — Martha Beck

84. “First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity.” — George Bernard Shaw

85. “Curiosity is natural to the soul of man and interesting objects have a powerful influence on our affections.” — Daniel Boone

86. “What we have to do is to be forever curiously testing new opinions and courting new impressions.” — Walter Pater

87. “Oprah has this intense curiosity that I haven’t found with any interviewer.” — Genevieve Gorder

88. “My own curiosity and interest are insatiable.” — Emma Lazarus

89. “Morality comes with the sad wisdom of age, when the sense of curiosity has withered.” — Graham Greene

Where will your curiosity lead you?

It might be in your career, your studies, or your personal life.

Maybe you are an artist or an athlete, and pursuing your curiosity will help you develop a new technique or explore a new concept.

Curiosity can drive science and creativity, but it can also bring us closer with those who are most important to us.

Perhaps it will help you better understand a friend or family member, or even yourself.

Wherever your curiosity leads you, remember to always listen to the inner voice that asks, “Why?” and seek enlightenment in the areas where you wonder.

Listen to the questions others ask and allow your own curiosity to be piqued as well.

What’s your biggest takeaway from these curiosity quotes and sayings?

Do you have any other insightful quotes to add?

Let us know in the comment section below.