I enjoyed this interview with neuroscientist David Eagleman. I've pasted a sample of it, below.
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There are roughly 50 galaxies or 10 trillion stars per person in the currently known universe. Why do you think we all glibly forget this amazing fact? How can we keep wonder alive everyday?
Indeed, I'm often surprised that people aren't talking about these issues all the time. But the reason seems clear enough. Our brains have evolved to deal with issues at our own scales: mates, rivers, apples, rabbits, and so on. Our brains simply weren't built to understand the fabric of reality at the very small scales (quantum mechnics) or the very large (the cosmos). As Blaise Pascal put it, “Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he emerges and the infinity in which he is engulfed.”
What advice would you give to a smart kid who's now in high school?
Watch TED talks: smart people will distill their life’s work down to 20 minutes for you. Follow links through infinite trajectories of Wikipedia. Watch educational videos on topics that resonate with you.
There are a million ways to waste time on the net; reject those in favor of ways that teach you exactly what you want to know. Never before have we enjoyed such an opportunity for tailored, individualized education.
And be sure to get off-line often, to take digital sabbaths. As much as the net provides a platter of mankind's learning, there is a different kind of learning to be had from a hike in the woods, the climbing of a tree, an afternoon building a dam in a stream.
http://boingboing.net/2011/10/19/an-interview-with-david-eagleman-neuroscientist.html