March 19, 2025 • 33 mins
What happens when the world's most sophisticated AI meets the boundless imagination of a child?
That's the question we're tackling head-on in this thought-provoking exploration of human curiosity versus artificial intelligence.
While today's AI can pass bar exams, diagnose diseases, and generate convincing content in milliseconds, it fundamentally lacks the ability to wonder, to be genuinely curious, or to think independently.
Through fascinating neuroscience research and real-world examples, we uncover why a child asking "do fish get thirsty?" is demonstrating a form of intelligence that no machine can replicate.
The stakes couldn't be higher for parents and educators.
As teenagers increasingly rely on AI for instant answers, they risk becoming passive consumers of information rather than active questioners.
But there's hope. We dive into three science-backed strategies to nurture "AI-proof thinking" - teaching kids to ask better questions, encouraging exploration without rigid goals, and modeling curiosity ourselves.
You'll discover why curiosity isn't just a personality trait but a biological superpower that triggers specific brain activity and dopamine release, hardwiring information in ways that enhance learning and retention.
Through compelling examples from MIT's Media Lab and University of California research, we examine how children naturally outgrow AI as their questions become more abstract and imaginative.
The future belongs not to those who know all the answers, but to those who ask the most insightful questions.
Then watch their uniquely human imagination light up with possibilities no machine could ever dream of.
Show Notes Link: 50 Questions to Spark Curiosity At Home
If you enjoyed today's episode, please take the time to rate our podcast. Your rating means the world to us and it allows us to continue to share and grow our message of support to other fabulous humans out there!
For more free resources, check out my guide to the 5 secret habits of teens who succeed. Jam packed with advice, tips and strategies. Yours free!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Challenge your Mind, change the World.
I'm your host, francesca Hudson, and today we're diving
headfirst into one of thebiggest debates of the 21st
century.
And if you are a parent of ateenager or a child, then this
is going to affect you.
And the debate is this canartificial intelligence think
(00:22):
like a teenager or think like achild, if you have children that
aren't quite a teenager statusyet?
Now we live in a world where AIcan pass the bar exam, it can
diagnose medical conditions andit can even write poetry.
It can answer the toughestacademic questions in
milliseconds, it can predicttrends and it can generate
(00:45):
images that look almostindistinguishable from real art.
But here is the real questionCan it think, not just process
information, not just predictoutcomes, but truly wonder about
the world the way a child does,the way a teen does?
Can AI experience curiosity?
(01:08):
Think about the last time yourchild asked you a question that
caught you completely off guard,maybe something like do fish
get thirsty?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould it be?
Or and this is one and up fromour house if mortis, aliens see
colors we can't even imagine.
(01:29):
Now, these aren't just cutecuriosities.
They reveal somethingfundamental about human
intelligence, something that AI,no matter how sophisticated,
may never fully replicate.
So today we're going to begoing beyond the surface level
conversations about AI andgetting into the science, the
(01:50):
neuroscience of curiosity, thecognitive differences between
children and artificialintelligence, and why the
ability to ask great questions,not just answer them, is what
makes your child or yourteenager's mind one of the most
powerful forces in the world.
And before we get started, Iwant to hear from you what's one
(02:13):
question your child or youryoung person has asked that left
you completely stumped,laughing or in awe.
I'd love to hear, drop it inthe comments or tag me on social
media, because I would love tofeature some of your answers in
future episodes.
All right, buckle up, becausetoday we're going on a deep dive
(02:33):
into the AI versus humancuriosity debate.
Let's start by setting therecord straight AI is powerful,
but it is not imaginative, it'snot curious and it's not capable
of independent thought.
Now, what I mean by this is intoday's world, we often hear
people say things like AI is sosmart now, or AI is practically
(02:55):
human, but those statementsoverlook something really
crucial AI isn't actuallythinking in the way that we do.
It isn't dreaming up ideas orwondering about things outside
of what it's actually beingtrained on.
And, at its core, ai is aprediction machine.
Okay, prediction machine.
It scans through massive datasets and recognizes patterns and
(03:18):
generates outputs based onprobability, but it predicts.
It doesn't ponder.
It processes, but it doesn'twonder.
Young people, on the other hand,are wired with curiosity.
Their brains are designed toseek out the unknown, to explore
and to question.
The prefrontal cortex, that'sthe part of the brain
(03:39):
responsible for higher orderthinking, develops rapidly
during early childhood, peakingbetween the ages of three to
seven, so we're talking about areally young age here.
This is why young childrenalways seem to ask why every
five seconds.
It's their way of constructingmeaning, testing ideas and
making sense of the world, and a2014 study from the University
(04:05):
of California, berkeley, foundthat young children learn faster
than AI algorithms whenpresented with new information,
because their brains aren't justdetecting patterns, they're
actually forming conceptualunderstandings.
Children create their ownmental models of how the world
works, they experiment,sometimes by accident, and they
(04:25):
learn through failure.
Ai, on the other hand, does notlearn in the way a child does.
It's trained.
Ai needs explicit data inputsright, and even when it
generates new ideas, those ideasare fundamentally derivative,
meaning that they're based onthings it already has been
exposed to.
So let's put this to test with areal-world example.
(04:46):
So one of the biggest AIbreakthroughs happened in 2016,
when Google DeepMind's AlphaGodefeated the world's best Go
player, lee Sedol.
Lee Sedol, I hope I'm sayingthat right.
So Go is an ancient board gamewith more possible moves than
there are atoms in theobservable universe, right?
(05:08):
Huge Meaning that no humancould memorize every possible
outcome.
Now, alphago's victory wasstunning because it made an
unexpected move, one that eventhe expert players had never
considered, and people calledthis move creative.
But was it really?
Here's the key difference.
Alphago didn't create that movethe way a human would.
(05:31):
It didn't have a flash ofinsight or wonder you know what
if I tried something totallyunexpected?
Instead, it analysed millionsof past games, it calculated
probabilities and it made a movebased on statistical
likelihoods.
Now, that's not the same as achild inventing a completely new
game, which is something kidsdo all the time.
(05:52):
Let me give you an example ofhow a child's mind works.
If you hand a group of kids apile of sticks and tell them to
play a game, what happens?
Well, they don't just play anexisting game, they start
inventing rules.
I'm smiling because this is socommon.
In my house I've got two boys.
They're ultra competitive.
We start with the base supportgame and then it goes completely
(06:18):
sideways because they both wantto win.
So they both invent their ownrules.
But I digress.
So when you hand a group ofkids a pile of sticks, they
don't just play an existing game, they start inventing rules,
naming things, testing ideas,adapting strategies.
They don't need a data set ofpast stick games to draw from,
they just explore.
And a child's ability to createsomething from nothing right,
(06:40):
that's pretty cool is not basedon past data, but it's based on
imagination, and that's whatsets human intelligence apart.
Now, ai is fundamentallyincapable of true curiosity.
But let's take thisconversation one step further.
What happens when kids becometeenagers?
The way children think andquestion the world changes
(07:01):
drastically as they grow, and byadolescence the quantity of
questions they ask decreases,but the quality becomes more
profound, because during teenageyears, the brain undergoes a
massive remodeling process.
The prefrontal cortex, which isresponsible for critical
thinking and decision-making, isstill developing, but the brain
(07:23):
also starts pruning awayconnections that aren't
frequently used, and this meansif curiosity isn't nurtured, it
can actually decline over time.
Now, what does this mean in theAI era?
Well, teenagers are at thecrossroads.
They have access to instantinformation at their fingertips
thanks to AI, but they are alsothe most at risk of becoming
(07:45):
passive consumers of knowledgerather than being active
questioners.
Think about it when a teenneeds an answer, do they A
Google it or ask ChatGPT or Btake the time to deeply question
, explore and think critically.
Now I know we all know theanswer to this.
Most often it's A because it'seasier.
But here's the danger If AIprovides instant answers but
(08:10):
teenagers stop developing theskill of critical inquiry, are
they really thinking at all?
This is where parents andeducators play a massive role.
We need to challenge teens togo beyond just asking questions.
We need them to start askingquestions that AI can't easily
(08:30):
answer.
And what I mean by this is,instead of saying, instead of
asking, what is the capital ofIceland, try asking instead how
do geography and climate shapenational identity?
Or I'll give you anotherexample Instead of asking how
does gravity work, you could askinstead could gravity ever be
(08:53):
manipulated in the future?
It's those sort of rhetoricalquestions that allow opinion to
come into the answer and theability to think deeply and ask
original questions is what willset human intelligence apart
from AI.
Now, ai is fundamentallyincapable of true curiosity.
(09:14):
Children will ask why.
Ai, on the other hand, will askwhat's next.
Or children will generate brandnew ideas, whereas AI will
recombine old ones.
Or children will challengerules, whereas AI will follow
them.
Imagine a five-year-oldwatching a rainstorm and asking
(09:34):
does the sky get sad when itrains?
Now, an AI would process thatsentence and say no, rain occurs
during the condensation ofwater vapor in the atmosphere.
A child, however, is engaging inabstract, metaphorical thinking
.
They aren't looking for ascientific explanation.
They are creating a mentalmodel of the world, one that
(09:55):
connects emotion and nature andstorytelling, and this is why AI
, despite all its advancements,struggles with original
storytelling, it struggles withhumor and it struggles with
really deep creativity.
So can AI think like a child ora teenager?
No, it can't.
Ai can simulate human responses, it can sound like humans, it
(10:16):
can pick up on mannerisms andfrequently use words or phrases
that somebody of note might use.
It can answer questions withincredible accuracy.
It can even appear creative attimes, but it does not think, it
does not wonder and it does notdream.
And here's the big idea themost valuable skill we can
nurture in our kids isn'tmemorization or data recall.
(10:39):
Lean in for this.
It's curiosity, because in aworld where AI can answer any
factual question in seconds, thepeople who ask better questions
will always be the ones whostay ahead.
Now, curiosity is more thanjust a personality trait.
It's actually a biologicalsuperpower.
It's the engine that driveshuman learning, it drives
(11:01):
innovation and it drivescreativity.
And neuroscientists at theUniversity of California Davis
conducted a study on curiosityand learning, and the results
were mind-blowing.
They were oh my God, they wereso amazing.
They found that when people aregenuinely curious about a topic
, their brains undergo aremarkable transformation.
(11:22):
I'll summarize the key findingsinto three parts.
So they found that whenparticipants were curious, that
their hippocampus, which is thepart of the brain responsible
for memory formation, lit upwith activity.
They found that curiosity alsotriggered a dopamine release,
which is the same brain chemicalassociated with pleasure,
(11:42):
motivation and learningreinforcement.
And they found that thiscombination meant that when
someone was curious about asubject, they learned faster and
retained information far longer, even if the information wasn't
directly related to theirinitial question.
Now the translation of allthese findings curiosity
hardwires information in ourbrains.
(12:04):
That's what it comes down to.
It's why we rememberfascinating facts from childhood
, but we forget random data wewere forced to memorize in
school.
Now, this is where AI completelyfalls short.
Ai doesn't feel curiosity.
It doesn't have an inner driveto explore beyond what it
already knows.
Imagine giving AI a data set ofevery question ever asked on
(12:27):
the internet.
Could it predict what the nextquestion should be?
Yes, could it come up with aninteresting or unexpected
question on its own?
No, why?
Because AI is limited to whathas already been programmed into
it.
It doesn't wonder about theunknown.
It only calculatesprobabilities based on existing
data, and I'll give you a casestudy to show you what I mean.
(12:51):
So a study from MIT's Media Labtested this by observing young
children interacting withAI-driven conversational bots.
Now, initially, the kids wereentertained.
Ai could answer these simplequestions and respond in fun
ways.
Think about Siri on your phone.
My kids had fun with Siri allthe time, but after a while,
(13:12):
something fascinating happened.
The kids outgrew the AI, andyou'll probably find this at
home when your kids are playingaround with Siri too.
Why?
Because children naturally pushboundaries.
They start asking questionsthat AI simply can't process.
For example, the kids in thestudy asked what would colors
look like if we could hear theminstead of see them?
(13:33):
Or does the sky know it's blue?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould colors look like if we
could hear them instead of seethem?
Or does the sky know it's blue?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould it be?
These aren't just randomquestions.
They require abstract thought.
They require metaphoricalreasoning and creative problem
solving.
These are things that AIstruggles with because they
don't rely on passionrecognition, and this is proof
that curiosity is an AI-proofskill.
(13:57):
But what happens as kids growolder?
Do teenagers retain this levelof deep questioning?
Because curiosity takes on awhole new role in adolescence?
And while young children arenaturally curious, something
happens in the teenage years.
Studies show that as kids growolder, they start asking fewer
questions.
Why?
(14:17):
Because they become moreself-conscious.
They worry about lookingfoolish.
The education system oftenprioritizes knowing the right
answer over asking the rightquestion, and with instant
access to AI-powered searchengines, there's less incentive
to wonder when you can justGoogle the answer.
But here's the danger Ifteenagers become passive
(14:40):
consumers of information ratherthan being active thinkers in
their own right, they risklosing the very skill that makes
them irreplaceable in anAI-driven world, and I want you
to ponder this really criticalquestion If a teenager relies on
chat, gpt, to write their essay, solve their math problem or
(15:01):
summarize a book, what part oftheir own brain is doing the
work?
I want you to ponder on that,because imagine a high school
student writing an essay on thefuture of technology.
If they ask AI, what willtechnology look like in 2050?
Ai will generate a reallywell-researched answer based on
(15:22):
existing data.
But if they ask themselves,what kind of world do I want to
create in 2050?
Now we're entering into therealm of true human thought.
That question requiresimagination, vision and
independent thinking, things AIsimply doesn't possess.
(15:44):
So how do we help teenagersmaintain and strengthen their
curiosity?
If we want to prepare teens fora future where AI plays a
bigger role, we need to trainthem to ask better questions,
and here are threescience-backed strategies that
you can try at home.
We need to teach them to teachinquiry over answers.
(16:05):
So instead of rewarding ourstudents and our children for
getting the right answer, weneed to encourage them to ask
better questions.
Getting the right answer weneed to encourage them to ask
better questions Now.
A 2018 Harvard study found thatstudents who are trained in
question asking technologiesdevelop stronger problem-solving
skills and deeper criticalthinking.
(16:27):
So the next time your team asksyou something, respond with what
do you think?
And then explore the topictogether, put it back on them to
try and problem solvethemselves Now.
The second way you can do thisis to encourage open-ended
thinking.
Now, ai can answer who, what,where, when and how, but it
(16:47):
struggles with why and what ifquestions.
So you could try this exercisewith your teenager Instead of
asking.
So you could try this exercisewith your teenager Instead of
asking, how does climate changeaffect the planet?
That's a really easy,google-able answer.
You could ask instead if we hadto redesign human civilization
to work in harmony with nature,what would it look like?
(17:09):
Now, that's creative, that'sabstract and that's human-driven
thought.
It's getting your teenager tostart thinking creatively now.
The third way that we canencourage our teenagers to start
asking better questions is toreward intellectual risk taking.
So teenagers avoid and what Imean by this is teenagers avoid
(17:32):
curiosity when they fear gettingthings wrong.
But true learning happens inthe uncomfortable space of not
knowing.
For example, instead of gradingan assignment based solely on
accuracy.
If you're an educator, you givepoints for originality and the
depth questioning shown and thisis a question for the teachers
(17:53):
listening to this to theeducators what if schools had an
assignment called AI can'tanswer this, where students come
up with a question that even AIstruggles to answer?
Now, that's a challenge thatwill get teens thinking.
I'll leave you with that thought, because, in a world where AI
can provide instant answers, themost valuable skill we can
(18:15):
teach kids and teenagers is howto ask better questions, because
while AI can process, that itcan predict and it can mimic, it
cannot wonder or dream orimagine something entirely new.
That is a human gift, and if wewant to future-proof the next
generation, we must train themnot to accept quick answers, but
to keep questioning, to keepexploring and to keep thinking
(18:39):
beyond what AI can comprehend.
So here's a little bit of achallenge for you this week Ask
your child or your teen aquestion today that AI couldn't
easily answer.
Then watch how their mindsparks with curiosity.
And to help you, to give you alittle bit of a nudge along, I'm
going to link some questionsthat will get the conversation
(18:59):
started that you can downloadand pick one or two or three or
whatever you'd like to try outwith your children at home.
I'll link it in the show notes.
I think it's important toremember that curiosity is more
than just a childhood habit.
It's a lifelong superpower and,as we just mentioned, in a
world where AI can instantlygenerate answers, the real
(19:19):
advantage goes to those who canask the better questions.
They can think independentlyand they can explore without
limitations.
So the question is how do wenurture curiosity in a way that
helps kids and teens stay ahead?
We don't want our children tosimply become better at
memorizing facts.
Ai already does that.
We want them to develop thecognitive flexibility, the
(19:42):
creativity and theproblem-solving skills that make
them irreplaceably human.
The good news Curiosity can betaught.
Anyone can develop theircuriosity skills.
I've got three science-backedstrategies to raise AI-proof
thinkers, and we'll look at howthese strategies evolve from
early childhood into the teenageyears.
(20:03):
So the first one is to teachkids and teens to ask better
questions.
We touched on this briefly inthe practice before.
Now, while it works, the rightquestion can unlock entirely new
ways of thinking.
Now, while it works, the rightquestion can unlock entirely new
ways of thinking.
A Harvard researcher, danRothstein, found that students
who were explicitly taught toformulate their own questions
developed strongerproblem-solving skills, better
(20:24):
critical thinking and a greaterability to learn independently.
Now, in contrast, when studentswere only given answers, they
became passive learners, whichmeant relying on external
sources rather than their ownintellectual curiosity.
Now why does this matter in anAI-driven world?
Well, ai can answer just aboutanything, but it can't generate
(20:46):
those original,paradigm-shifting questions the
way humans can.
The ability to question asubstance, to challenge existing
knowledge and to thinkcritically is what will separate
human intelligence from AI inthe future.
So how do we apply this withkids and teens?
(21:07):
Well, starting with young kids,when they ask a question, pause
before answering and say whatdo you think?
For example, if they say why isthe sky blue, instead of
immediately explaining, say hmm,great question, what do you
think causes it?
Now, with teenagers, you canchallenge them to come up with
(21:29):
questions that AI can't answer.
So, for example, instead ofasking AI what are the causes of
climate change, you could askif we had to rebuild human
civilization from scratch withtoday's technology, how would we
design it to be fullysustainable?
Oh, now, this forces deepthinking and creative problem
(21:51):
solving and innovation allthings that AI really struggles
with.
And if you're a parentlistening to this, you could
create a question of the daychallenge in your home.
Or if you're an educator, inyour classroom and the goal is
to ask the most mind-bendingAI-proof question possible.
Turn it into a challenge.
You can have a lot of fun withthat.
(22:12):
Now my second science-backedstrategy for developing
curiosity is to let our kids andour teenagers explore without a
goal, and in education we callthis unstructured play and
learning.
But why it works?
I'll tell you why it works.
A University of Chicago studyfound that children who engage
(22:33):
in unstructured play, which iswhere there are no fixed rules
or predetermined outcomes,develop higher cognitive
flexibility and betterproblem-solving skills than
those who follow strictstep-by-step instructions.
So, essentially, re-explorationstrengthens the brain's ability
to adapt and to thinkdivergently.
(22:53):
Now why does this matter toadapt and to think divergently?
Now why does this matter?
Well, ai thrives on structureddata.
It learns best when given clearpatterns or objectives and
constraints, but humanintelligence flourishes in
uncertainty and ambiguity and anopen-minded, open-ended
exploration.
So how do we apply this withchildren and with teenagers?
(23:14):
We'll start with kids.
So at home, you could encourageopen-ended, creative play.
Give them Lego, art supplies orcardboard boxes and just see
what they come up with.
Let's really get them tostimulate their imagination.
So, example, instead of sayinglet's build a castle, just hand
them the materials and say Iwonder what you create with
(23:36):
these.
And we, we get these everymonth.
We get kiwi boxes at home,which are really cool.
They're.
They're a great thing.
We got them when the pandemicstarted and we had to learn from
home and we just carried onsince then because they are so
good.
They come in different agegroups and my oldest son now is
at a point where the kiwi boxwill come.
It's called the tinker box andinstead of following the
(23:59):
instructions, he actually juststarts creating his own things
from it.
It's really cool.
And I just let him go because Iknow that that's firing up the
neurons in his brain and he'smaking new connections and all
that sort of thing.
So I think it's a great waywhatever way that you can find
an in with your kids, whateverthey're interested in, to start
fostering that curiosity.
Go with it, lean into it.
(24:19):
Now, with teenagers, the bestway is to encourage learning and
experimentation without animmediate goal or outcome.
So, for example, instead ofsaying you need to learn coding
so you can get a tech job.
You could say, try learningcoding and see if you can create
something fun with it, maybe agame or a music generator or an
AI bot that tells jokes.
(24:40):
Because when learning isn'ttied to just grades or jobs or
practical applications,curiosity thrives.
So, if you're up for it, hereis a challenge for your teen.
At home, you could give yourteen a problem with no clear
solution and let them experiment.
So, for example, what I mean ishow would you redesign school
(25:02):
to make it more engaging?
Or, if money wasn't an issue,what the most innovative
business you'd start?
Now, this trains them to startthinking like innovators rather
than just passive learners themto start thinking like
innovators rather than justpassive learners.
Now my third strategy forfostering curiosity is model
curiosity yourself.
(25:23):
Why does this work?
Well, psychologist LevVitosky's research found that
children and teens learn best byobserving the adults around
them.
If they see parents andteachers acting curious,
inquisitive and eager to learn,they naturally mirror that
behavior.
Hey, I do meditation and everyday I will make sure that I have
(25:45):
a part of my day for meditation.
And I picked my child up fromschool the other day and I asked
him how it went.
And he said oh God, I wasfeeling a bit tired so I
meditated.
And he said, oh God, I wasfeeling a bit tired so I
meditated.
Because my youngest is turningseven.
So the thought of aseven-year-old having this
(26:08):
maturity to meditate take fiveminutes out to meditate it made
me smile.
But I realized just how muchthey absorb and they watch us as
adults.
Now why does this matter in anAI-driven world?
Well, if kids grow up in anenvironment where asking deep
questions, experimenting andseeking knowledge is the norm,
they will be far better preparedfor an unpredictable future.
So how do we apply this modelingcuriosity with younger kids?
(26:31):
What you could do is, when youdon't know the answer to
something they ask, say I wonderwhy that is, and research it
together.
So, for example, if your childasks why do we dream, you could
respond with that's such aninteresting question.
Let's see what the scientistssay about it.
And then, with teenagers, howyou can model this is by
(26:53):
exploring new topics yourself.
So, for example, if AI is thetopic of conversation, you could
try saying something like I'mreally curious about how AI is
changing music production.
Let's check it out together soyou can show your teens that
learning doesn't just stop afterschool, it's a lifelong mindset
, and you could even go as faras having something like
(27:15):
curiosity nights, where eachfamily member brings a question
to discuss something fascinatingthat they learned that week,
something new that they didn'tknow beforehand.
Because AI is changingeverything about the way that we
learn, the way that we work andthe way that we interact with
information.
But there's one thing it can'treplace, which is human
curiosity and creativity and theability to think in new ways.
(27:37):
If we want to raise childrenand teenagers who will thrive in
the AI era, we must teach themto ask better questions, to give
them the freedom to explorewithout those rigid goals, and
to model curiosity and lifelonglearning ourselves, because in a
world where AI can generateanswers, the humans who generate
better questions will always bethe ones who lead.
(28:01):
Let's circle back to the titleof this podcast episode Can AI
Ever Truly Think Like a Child?
The short answer is no, and notjust because AI lacks emotions
or consciousness or a human soul, although those are certainly
vectors.
The real reason AI will neveror consciousness or a human soul
, although those are certainlyvectors.
The real reason AI will nevertruly think like a child is
because, thinking as we humansdo, it isn't just about
(28:25):
processing data, it's aboutcuriosity and creativity and
imagination.
Ai can predict, but it can'twonder.
Ai can answer, but it can'tquestion deeply.
And AI can predict, but itcan't wonder.
Ai can answer, but it can'tquestion deeply.
And AI can simulate, but itcan't feel a spark of
inspiration.
This is why, in an AI-drivenworld, the most important thing
(28:48):
we can do as parents and aseducators and leaders is raise
thinkers, children and teenagerswho question, explore and
challenge ideas, rather thanjust accept the answers given to
them.
I want you to take a momenttoday and really listen to the
questions your child or yourteenager asks, because in those
moments, whether it's afive-year-old asking where does
the wind go when it's doneblowing, or a teenager asking
(29:12):
what if we could solve worldhunger using 3D printed food,
they are doing something AInever will.
They are wondering aboutpossibilities that don't yet
exist.
And that, my friends, is theultimate superpower.
Curiosity isn't just a trait.
It's the fuel for every greatinnovation, discovery and
(29:33):
breakthrough in human history.
From Einstein's theory ofrelativity to the invention of
the internet.
It all started with a question.
So we want to future-proof ourchildren, not just against AI.
I'm not against AI, but againststagnation, complacency and a
world that increasingly valuesautomation over original thought
(29:55):
.
We need to nurture ourchildren's ability to think
beyond what already exists,because the future won't be
written by those who can simplymemorize and regurgitate
information.
It will be written by those whodare to ask.
What if, as we wrap up today'sepisode, I have a final
challenge for you.
Tonight, at dinner or duringyour next conversation with your
(30:18):
child or your teen, ask them aquestion AI wouldn't be able to
answer.
Maybe something playful, likeif animals had their own schools
, what subjects would they learn?
Or maybe something futuristic,like what's one invention the
world doesn't have yet butabsolutely needs.
Or maybe something profound.
If you could teach the worldone lesson that no one has
(30:38):
thought of before, what would itbe?
Whatever it is, let it be aquestion that sparks
conversation and, as I mentionedearlier, if you want some help
getting started with some ofthese questions, I'll link a
free download in the show notes,because, at the end of the day,
raising a child who knows howto think is far more valuable
than raising a child who simplyknows the answers, and that is
(31:00):
how we challenge our minds andchange the world and, on that
note, I would like to thank youfor tuning into today's episode.
If this conversation hassparked something in you, make
sure to subscribe and leave areview, and I'd love to hear
from you what's the bestquestion your child or your teen
has ever asked you Drop it inthe comments or tag me on social
(31:20):
media.
And until next time, staycurious and keep thinking beyond
the answers.
Bye for now.
Welcome to Challenge your Mind, change the World.
I'm your host, francesca Hudson, and today we're diving
headfirst into one of thebiggest debates of the 21st
century.
And if you are a parent of ateenager or a child, then this
is going to affect you.
And the debate is this canartificial intelligence think
(00:22):
like a teenager or think like achild, if you have children that
aren't quite a teenager statusyet?
Now we live in a world where AIcan pass the bar exam, it can
diagnose medical conditions andit can even write poetry.
It can answer the toughestacademic questions in
milliseconds, it can predicttrends and it can generate
(00:45):
images that look almostindistinguishable from real art.
But here is the real questionCan it think, not just process
information, not just predictoutcomes, but truly wonder about
the world the way a child does,the way a teen does?
Can AI experience curiosity?
(01:08):
Think about the last time yourchild asked you a question that
caught you completely off guard,maybe something like do fish
get thirsty?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould it be?
Or and this is one and up fromour house if mortis, aliens see
colors we can't even imagine.
(01:29):
Now, these aren't just cutecuriosities.
They reveal somethingfundamental about human
intelligence, something that AI,no matter how sophisticated,
may never fully replicate.
So today we're going to begoing beyond the surface level
conversations about AI andgetting into the science, the
(01:50):
neuroscience of curiosity, thecognitive differences between
children and artificialintelligence, and why the
ability to ask great questions,not just answer them, is what
makes your child or yourteenager's mind one of the most
powerful forces in the world.
And before we get started, Iwant to hear from you what's one
(02:13):
question your child or youryoung person has asked that left
you completely stumped,laughing or in awe.
I'd love to hear, drop it inthe comments or tag me on social
media, because I would love tofeature some of your answers in
future episodes.
All right, buckle up, becausetoday we're going on a deep dive
(02:33):
into the AI versus humancuriosity debate.
Let's start by setting therecord straight AI is powerful,
but it is not imaginative, it'snot curious and it's not capable
of independent thought.
Now, what I mean by this is intoday's world, we often hear
people say things like AI is sosmart now, or AI is practically
(02:55):
human, but those statementsoverlook something really
crucial AI isn't actuallythinking in the way that we do.
It isn't dreaming up ideas orwondering about things outside
of what it's actually beingtrained on.
And, at its core, ai is aprediction machine.
Okay, prediction machine.
It scans through massive datasets and recognizes patterns and
(03:18):
generates outputs based onprobability, but it predicts.
It doesn't ponder.
It processes, but it doesn'twonder.
Young people, on the other hand,are wired with curiosity.
Their brains are designed toseek out the unknown, to explore
and to question.
The prefrontal cortex, that'sthe part of the brain
(03:39):
responsible for higher orderthinking, develops rapidly
during early childhood, peakingbetween the ages of three to
seven, so we're talking about areally young age here.
This is why young childrenalways seem to ask why every
five seconds.
It's their way of constructingmeaning, testing ideas and
making sense of the world, and a2014 study from the University
(04:05):
of California, berkeley, foundthat young children learn faster
than AI algorithms whenpresented with new information,
because their brains aren't justdetecting patterns, they're
actually forming conceptualunderstandings.
Children create their ownmental models of how the world
works, they experiment,sometimes by accident, and they
(04:25):
learn through failure.
Ai, on the other hand, does notlearn in the way a child does.
It's trained.
Ai needs explicit data inputsright, and even when it
generates new ideas, those ideasare fundamentally derivative,
meaning that they're based onthings it already has been
exposed to.
So let's put this to test with areal-world example.
(04:46):
So one of the biggest AIbreakthroughs happened in 2016,
when Google DeepMind's AlphaGodefeated the world's best Go
player, lee Sedol.
Lee Sedol, I hope I'm sayingthat right.
So Go is an ancient board gamewith more possible moves than
there are atoms in theobservable universe, right?
(05:08):
Huge Meaning that no humancould memorize every possible
outcome.
Now, alphago's victory wasstunning because it made an
unexpected move, one that eventhe expert players had never
considered, and people calledthis move creative.
But was it really?
Here's the key difference.
Alphago didn't create that movethe way a human would.
(05:31):
It didn't have a flash ofinsight or wonder you know what
if I tried something totallyunexpected?
Instead, it analysed millionsof past games, it calculated
probabilities and it made a movebased on statistical
likelihoods.
Now, that's not the same as achild inventing a completely new
game, which is something kidsdo all the time.
(05:52):
Let me give you an example ofhow a child's mind works.
If you hand a group of kids apile of sticks and tell them to
play a game, what happens?
Well, they don't just play anexisting game, they start
inventing rules.
I'm smiling because this is socommon.
In my house I've got two boys.
They're ultra competitive.
We start with the base supportgame and then it goes completely
(06:18):
sideways because they both wantto win.
So they both invent their ownrules.
But I digress.
So when you hand a group ofkids a pile of sticks, they
don't just play an existing game, they start inventing rules,
naming things, testing ideas,adapting strategies.
They don't need a data set ofpast stick games to draw from,
they just explore.
And a child's ability to createsomething from nothing right,
(06:40):
that's pretty cool is not basedon past data, but it's based on
imagination, and that's whatsets human intelligence apart.
Now, ai is fundamentallyincapable of true curiosity.
But let's take thisconversation one step further.
What happens when kids becometeenagers?
The way children think andquestion the world changes
(07:01):
drastically as they grow, and byadolescence the quantity of
questions they ask decreases,but the quality becomes more
profound, because during teenageyears, the brain undergoes a
massive remodeling process.
The prefrontal cortex, which isresponsible for critical
thinking and decision-making, isstill developing, but the brain
(07:23):
also starts pruning awayconnections that aren't
frequently used, and this meansif curiosity isn't nurtured, it
can actually decline over time.
Now, what does this mean in theAI era?
Well, teenagers are at thecrossroads.
They have access to instantinformation at their fingertips
thanks to AI, but they are alsothe most at risk of becoming
(07:45):
passive consumers of knowledgerather than being active
questioners.
Think about it when a teenneeds an answer, do they A
Google it or ask ChatGPT or Btake the time to deeply question
, explore and think critically.
Now I know we all know theanswer to this.
Most often it's A because it'seasier.
But here's the danger If AIprovides instant answers but
(08:10):
teenagers stop developing theskill of critical inquiry, are
they really thinking at all?
This is where parents andeducators play a massive role.
We need to challenge teens togo beyond just asking questions.
We need them to start askingquestions that AI can't easily
(08:30):
answer.
And what I mean by this is,instead of saying, instead of
asking, what is the capital ofIceland, try asking instead how
do geography and climate shapenational identity?
Or I'll give you anotherexample Instead of asking how
does gravity work, you could askinstead could gravity ever be
(08:53):
manipulated in the future?
It's those sort of rhetoricalquestions that allow opinion to
come into the answer and theability to think deeply and ask
original questions is what willset human intelligence apart
from AI.
Now, ai is fundamentallyincapable of true curiosity.
(09:14):
Children will ask why.
Ai, on the other hand, will askwhat's next.
Or children will generate brandnew ideas, whereas AI will
recombine old ones.
Or children will challengerules, whereas AI will follow
them.
Imagine a five-year-oldwatching a rainstorm and asking
(09:34):
does the sky get sad when itrains?
Now, an AI would process thatsentence and say no, rain occurs
during the condensation ofwater vapor in the atmosphere.
A child, however, is engaging inabstract, metaphorical thinking
.
They aren't looking for ascientific explanation.
They are creating a mentalmodel of the world, one that
(09:55):
connects emotion and nature andstorytelling, and this is why AI
, despite all its advancements,struggles with original
storytelling, it struggles withhumor and it struggles with
really deep creativity.
So can AI think like a child ora teenager?
No, it can't.
Ai can simulate human responses, it can sound like humans, it
(10:16):
can pick up on mannerisms andfrequently use words or phrases
that somebody of note might use.
It can answer questions withincredible accuracy.
It can even appear creative attimes, but it does not think, it
does not wonder and it does notdream.
And here's the big idea themost valuable skill we can
nurture in our kids isn'tmemorization or data recall.
(10:39):
Lean in for this.
It's curiosity, because in aworld where AI can answer any
factual question in seconds, thepeople who ask better questions
will always be the ones whostay ahead.
Now, curiosity is more thanjust a personality trait.
It's actually a biologicalsuperpower.
It's the engine that driveshuman learning, it drives
(11:01):
innovation and it drivescreativity.
And neuroscientists at theUniversity of California Davis
conducted a study on curiosityand learning, and the results
were mind-blowing.
They were oh my God, they wereso amazing.
They found that when people aregenuinely curious about a topic
, their brains undergo aremarkable transformation.
(11:22):
I'll summarize the key findingsinto three parts.
So they found that whenparticipants were curious, that
their hippocampus, which is thepart of the brain responsible
for memory formation, lit upwith activity.
They found that curiosity alsotriggered a dopamine release,
which is the same brain chemicalassociated with pleasure,
(11:42):
motivation and learningreinforcement.
And they found that thiscombination meant that when
someone was curious about asubject, they learned faster and
retained information far longer, even if the information wasn't
directly related to theirinitial question.
Now the translation of allthese findings curiosity
hardwires information in ourbrains.
(12:04):
That's what it comes down to.
It's why we rememberfascinating facts from childhood
, but we forget random data wewere forced to memorize in
school.
Now, this is where AI completelyfalls short.
Ai doesn't feel curiosity.
It doesn't have an inner driveto explore beyond what it
already knows.
Imagine giving AI a data set ofevery question ever asked on
(12:27):
the internet.
Could it predict what the nextquestion should be?
Yes, could it come up with aninteresting or unexpected
question on its own?
No, why?
Because AI is limited to whathas already been programmed into
it.
It doesn't wonder about theunknown.
It only calculatesprobabilities based on existing
data, and I'll give you a casestudy to show you what I mean.
(12:51):
So a study from MIT's Media Labtested this by observing young
children interacting withAI-driven conversational bots.
Now, initially, the kids wereentertained.
Ai could answer these simplequestions and respond in fun
ways.
Think about Siri on your phone.
My kids had fun with Siri allthe time, but after a while,
(13:12):
something fascinating happened.
The kids outgrew the AI, andyou'll probably find this at
home when your kids are playingaround with Siri too.
Why?
Because children naturally pushboundaries.
They start asking questionsthat AI simply can't process.
For example, the kids in thestudy asked what would colors
look like if we could hear theminstead of see them?
(13:33):
Or does the sky know it's blue?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould colors look like if we
could hear them instead of seethem?
Or does the sky know it's blue?
Or if time had a smell, whatwould it be?
These aren't just randomquestions.
They require abstract thought.
They require metaphoricalreasoning and creative problem
solving.
These are things that AIstruggles with because they
don't rely on passionrecognition, and this is proof
that curiosity is an AI-proofskill.
(13:57):
But what happens as kids growolder?
Do teenagers retain this levelof deep questioning?
Because curiosity takes on awhole new role in adolescence?
And while young children arenaturally curious, something
happens in the teenage years.
Studies show that as kids growolder, they start asking fewer
questions.
Why?
(14:17):
Because they become moreself-conscious.
They worry about lookingfoolish.
The education system oftenprioritizes knowing the right
answer over asking the rightquestion, and with instant
access to AI-powered searchengines, there's less incentive
to wonder when you can justGoogle the answer.
But here's the danger Ifteenagers become passive
(14:40):
consumers of information ratherthan being active thinkers in
their own right, they risklosing the very skill that makes
them irreplaceable in anAI-driven world, and I want you
to ponder this really criticalquestion If a teenager relies on
chat, gpt, to write their essay, solve their math problem or
(15:01):
summarize a book, what part oftheir own brain is doing the
work?
I want you to ponder on that,because imagine a high school
student writing an essay on thefuture of technology.
If they ask AI, what willtechnology look like in 2050?
Ai will generate a reallywell-researched answer based on
(15:22):
existing data.
But if they ask themselves,what kind of world do I want to
create in 2050?
Now we're entering into therealm of true human thought.
That question requiresimagination, vision and
independent thinking, things AIsimply doesn't possess.
(15:44):
So how do we help teenagersmaintain and strengthen their
curiosity?
If we want to prepare teens fora future where AI plays a
bigger role, we need to trainthem to ask better questions,
and here are threescience-backed strategies that
you can try at home.
We need to teach them to teachinquiry over answers.
(16:05):
So instead of rewarding ourstudents and our children for
getting the right answer, weneed to encourage them to ask
better questions.
Getting the right answer weneed to encourage them to ask
better questions Now.
A 2018 Harvard study found thatstudents who are trained in
question asking technologiesdevelop stronger problem-solving
skills and deeper criticalthinking.
(16:27):
So the next time your team asksyou something, respond with what
do you think?
And then explore the topictogether, put it back on them to
try and problem solvethemselves Now.
The second way you can do thisis to encourage open-ended
thinking.
Now, ai can answer who, what,where, when and how, but it
(16:47):
struggles with why and what ifquestions.
So you could try this exercisewith your teenager Instead of
asking.
So you could try this exercisewith your teenager Instead of
asking, how does climate changeaffect the planet?
That's a really easy,google-able answer.
You could ask instead if we hadto redesign human civilization
to work in harmony with nature,what would it look like?
(17:09):
Now, that's creative, that'sabstract and that's human-driven
thought.
It's getting your teenager tostart thinking creatively now.
The third way that we canencourage our teenagers to start
asking better questions is toreward intellectual risk taking.
So teenagers avoid and what Imean by this is teenagers avoid
(17:32):
curiosity when they fear gettingthings wrong.
But true learning happens inthe uncomfortable space of not
knowing.
For example, instead of gradingan assignment based solely on
accuracy.
If you're an educator, you givepoints for originality and the
depth questioning shown and thisis a question for the teachers
(17:53):
listening to this to theeducators what if schools had an
assignment called AI can'tanswer this, where students come
up with a question that even AIstruggles to answer?
Now, that's a challenge thatwill get teens thinking.
I'll leave you with that thought, because, in a world where AI
can provide instant answers, themost valuable skill we can
(18:15):
teach kids and teenagers is howto ask better questions, because
while AI can process, that itcan predict and it can mimic, it
cannot wonder or dream orimagine something entirely new.
That is a human gift, and if wewant to future-proof the next
generation, we must train themnot to accept quick answers, but
to keep questioning, to keepexploring and to keep thinking
(18:39):
beyond what AI can comprehend.
So here's a little bit of achallenge for you this week Ask
your child or your teen aquestion today that AI couldn't
easily answer.
Then watch how their mindsparks with curiosity.
And to help you, to give you alittle bit of a nudge along, I'm
going to link some questionsthat will get the conversation
(18:59):
started that you can downloadand pick one or two or three or
whatever you'd like to try outwith your children at home.
I'll link it in the show notes.
I think it's important toremember that curiosity is more
than just a childhood habit.
It's a lifelong superpower and,as we just mentioned, in a
world where AI can instantlygenerate answers, the real
(19:19):
advantage goes to those who canask the better questions.
They can think independentlyand they can explore without
limitations.
So the question is how do wenurture curiosity in a way that
helps kids and teens stay ahead?
We don't want our children tosimply become better at
memorizing facts.
Ai already does that.
We want them to develop thecognitive flexibility, the
(19:42):
creativity and theproblem-solving skills that make
them irreplaceably human.
The good news Curiosity can betaught.
Anyone can develop theircuriosity skills.
I've got three science-backedstrategies to raise AI-proof
thinkers, and we'll look at howthese strategies evolve from
early childhood into the teenageyears.
(20:03):
So the first one is to teachkids and teens to ask better
questions.
We touched on this briefly inthe practice before.
Now, while it works, the rightquestion can unlock entirely new
ways of thinking.
Now, while it works, the rightquestion can unlock entirely new
ways of thinking.
A Harvard researcher, danRothstein, found that students
who were explicitly taught toformulate their own questions
developed strongerproblem-solving skills, better
(20:24):
critical thinking and a greaterability to learn independently.
Now, in contrast, when studentswere only given answers, they
became passive learners, whichmeant relying on external
sources rather than their ownintellectual curiosity.
Now why does this matter in anAI-driven world?
Well, ai can answer just aboutanything, but it can't generate
(20:46):
those original,paradigm-shifting questions the
way humans can.
The ability to question asubstance, to challenge existing
knowledge and to thinkcritically is what will separate
human intelligence from AI inthe future.
So how do we apply this withkids and teens?
(21:07):
Well, starting with young kids,when they ask a question, pause
before answering and say whatdo you think?
For example, if they say why isthe sky blue, instead of
immediately explaining, say hmm,great question, what do you
think causes it?
Now, with teenagers, you canchallenge them to come up with
(21:29):
questions that AI can't answer.
So, for example, instead ofasking AI what are the causes of
climate change, you could askif we had to rebuild human
civilization from scratch withtoday's technology, how would we
design it to be fullysustainable?
Oh, now, this forces deepthinking and creative problem
(21:51):
solving and innovation allthings that AI really struggles
with.
And if you're a parentlistening to this, you could
create a question of the daychallenge in your home.
Or if you're an educator, inyour classroom and the goal is
to ask the most mind-bendingAI-proof question possible.
Turn it into a challenge.
You can have a lot of fun withthat.
(22:12):
Now my second science-backedstrategy for developing
curiosity is to let our kids andour teenagers explore without a
goal, and in education we callthis unstructured play and
learning.
But why it works?
I'll tell you why it works.
A University of Chicago studyfound that children who engage
(22:33):
in unstructured play, which iswhere there are no fixed rules
or predetermined outcomes,develop higher cognitive
flexibility and betterproblem-solving skills than
those who follow strictstep-by-step instructions.
So, essentially, re-explorationstrengthens the brain's ability
to adapt and to thinkdivergently.
(22:53):
Now why does this matter toadapt and to think divergently?
Now why does this matter?
Well, ai thrives on structureddata.
It learns best when given clearpatterns or objectives and
constraints, but humanintelligence flourishes in
uncertainty and ambiguity and anopen-minded, open-ended
exploration.
So how do we apply this withchildren and with teenagers?
(23:14):
We'll start with kids.
So at home, you could encourageopen-ended, creative play.
Give them Lego, art supplies orcardboard boxes and just see
what they come up with.
Let's really get them tostimulate their imagination.
So, example, instead of sayinglet's build a castle, just hand
them the materials and say Iwonder what you create with
(23:36):
these.
And we, we get these everymonth.
We get kiwi boxes at home,which are really cool.
They're.
They're a great thing.
We got them when the pandemicstarted and we had to learn from
home and we just carried onsince then because they are so
good.
They come in different agegroups and my oldest son now is
at a point where the kiwi boxwill come.
It's called the tinker box andinstead of following the
(23:59):
instructions, he actually juststarts creating his own things
from it.
It's really cool.
And I just let him go because Iknow that that's firing up the
neurons in his brain and he'smaking new connections and all
that sort of thing.
So I think it's a great waywhatever way that you can find
an in with your kids, whateverthey're interested in, to start
fostering that curiosity.
Go with it, lean into it.
(24:19):
Now, with teenagers, the bestway is to encourage learning and
experimentation without animmediate goal or outcome.
So, for example, instead ofsaying you need to learn coding
so you can get a tech job.
You could say, try learningcoding and see if you can create
something fun with it, maybe agame or a music generator or an
AI bot that tells jokes.
(24:40):
Because when learning isn'ttied to just grades or jobs or
practical applications,curiosity thrives.
So, if you're up for it, hereis a challenge for your teen.
At home, you could give yourteen a problem with no clear
solution and let them experiment.
So, for example, what I mean ishow would you redesign school
(25:02):
to make it more engaging?
Or, if money wasn't an issue,what the most innovative
business you'd start?
Now, this trains them to startthinking like innovators rather
than just passive learners themto start thinking like
innovators rather than justpassive learners.
Now my third strategy forfostering curiosity is model
curiosity yourself.
(25:23):
Why does this work?
Well, psychologist LevVitosky's research found that
children and teens learn best byobserving the adults around
them.
If they see parents andteachers acting curious,
inquisitive and eager to learn,they naturally mirror that
behavior.
Hey, I do meditation and everyday I will make sure that I have
(25:45):
a part of my day for meditation.
And I picked my child up fromschool the other day and I asked
him how it went.
And he said oh God, I wasfeeling a bit tired so I
meditated.
And he said, oh God, I wasfeeling a bit tired so I
meditated.
Because my youngest is turningseven.
So the thought of aseven-year-old having this
(26:08):
maturity to meditate take fiveminutes out to meditate it made
me smile.
But I realized just how muchthey absorb and they watch us as
adults.
Now why does this matter in anAI-driven world?
Well, if kids grow up in anenvironment where asking deep
questions, experimenting andseeking knowledge is the norm,
they will be far better preparedfor an unpredictable future.
So how do we apply this modelingcuriosity with younger kids?
(26:31):
What you could do is, when youdon't know the answer to
something they ask, say I wonderwhy that is, and research it
together.
So, for example, if your childasks why do we dream, you could
respond with that's such aninteresting question.
Let's see what the scientistssay about it.
And then, with teenagers, howyou can model this is by
(26:53):
exploring new topics yourself.
So, for example, if AI is thetopic of conversation, you could
try saying something like I'mreally curious about how AI is
changing music production.
Let's check it out together soyou can show your teens that
learning doesn't just stop afterschool, it's a lifelong mindset
, and you could even go as faras having something like
(27:15):
curiosity nights, where eachfamily member brings a question
to discuss something fascinatingthat they learned that week,
something new that they didn'tknow beforehand.
Because AI is changingeverything about the way that we
learn, the way that we work andthe way that we interact with
information.
But there's one thing it can'treplace, which is human
curiosity and creativity and theability to think in new ways.
(27:37):
If we want to raise childrenand teenagers who will thrive in
the AI era, we must teach themto ask better questions, to give
them the freedom to explorewithout those rigid goals, and
to model curiosity and lifelonglearning ourselves, because in a
world where AI can generateanswers, the humans who generate
better questions will always bethe ones who lead.
(28:01):
Let's circle back to the titleof this podcast episode Can AI
Ever Truly Think Like a Child?
The short answer is no, and notjust because AI lacks emotions
or consciousness or a human soul, although those are certainly
vectors.
The real reason AI will neveror consciousness or a human soul
, although those are certainlyvectors.
The real reason AI will nevertruly think like a child is
because, thinking as we humansdo, it isn't just about
(28:25):
processing data, it's aboutcuriosity and creativity and
imagination.
Ai can predict, but it can'twonder.
Ai can answer, but it can'tquestion deeply.
And AI can predict, but itcan't wonder.
Ai can answer, but it can'tquestion deeply.
And AI can simulate, but itcan't feel a spark of
inspiration.
This is why, in an AI-drivenworld, the most important thing
(28:48):
we can do as parents and aseducators and leaders is raise
thinkers, children and teenagerswho question, explore and
challenge ideas, rather thanjust accept the answers given to
them.
I want you to take a momenttoday and really listen to the
questions your child or yourteenager asks, because in those
moments, whether it's afive-year-old asking where does
the wind go when it's doneblowing, or a teenager asking
(29:12):
what if we could solve worldhunger using 3D printed food,
they are doing something AInever will.
They are wondering aboutpossibilities that don't yet
exist.
And that, my friends, is theultimate superpower.
Curiosity isn't just a trait.
It's the fuel for every greatinnovation, discovery and
(29:33):
breakthrough in human history.
From Einstein's theory ofrelativity to the invention of
the internet.
It all started with a question.
So we want to future-proof ourchildren, not just against AI.
I'm not against AI, but againststagnation, complacency and a
world that increasingly valuesautomation over original thought
(29:55):
.
We need to nurture ourchildren's ability to think
beyond what already exists,because the future won't be
written by those who can simplymemorize and regurgitate
information.
It will be written by those whodare to ask.
What if, as we wrap up today'sepisode, I have a final
challenge for you.
Tonight, at dinner or duringyour next conversation with your
(30:18):
child or your teen, ask them aquestion AI wouldn't be able to
answer.
Maybe something playful, likeif animals had their own schools
, what subjects would they learn?
Or maybe something futuristic,like what's one invention the
world doesn't have yet butabsolutely needs.
Or maybe something profound.
If you could teach the worldone lesson that no one has
(30:38):
thought of before, what would itbe?
Whatever it is, let it be aquestion that sparks
conversation and, as I mentionedearlier, if you want some help
getting started with some ofthese questions, I'll link a
free download in the show notes,because, at the end of the day,
raising a child who knows howto think is far more valuable
than raising a child who simplyknows the answers, and that is
(31:00):
how we challenge our minds andchange the world and, on that
note, I would like to thank youfor tuning into today's episode.
If this conversation hassparked something in you, make
sure to subscribe and leave areview, and I'd love to hear
from you what's the bestquestion your child or your teen
has ever asked you Drop it inthe comments or tag me on social
(31:20):
media.
And until next time, staycurious and keep thinking beyond
the answers.
Bye for now.
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