" Real curiosity, untethered, unsoftened, it's a pretty intense tool. And I think the kids haven't blunted the weapon by politeness or by fear of looking dumb or by the belief that there are certain things we should know. It's still sharp." - Lulu Miller
Lulu Miller first found the power of questions on a subway train, listening to an early Radiolab episode about fireflies that blink in unison. That question opened a door she had been looking for since childhood: another world, inside this one. Today she co-hosts Radiolab with Latif Nasser, co-founded Invisibilia, and created Terrestrials, a nature podcast for kids and families.
Her international bestseller, Why Fish Don't Exist, begins with a question many of us carry quietly: what is the point? Her answer reminds us that the categories we trust are often questions we stop asking.
But the power scared her. She once fled journalism for a fiction MFA, convinced her questions could hurt people. Jad Abumrad's reframe brought her back: those worries are the sound of your moral compass.
In this conversation, Lulu shares three ways to move a conversation past the rehearsed version: ask something tactile, ask the elephant-in-the-room question, and interrupt with care. Then the kids on Terrestrials take over, asking NASA scientists and the poet laureate the blunt, open questions adults soften away. Real curiosity, unsoftened, is still sharp.
Who blunted ours?
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