Why does anyone want to read a story? The opening paragraphs of a story do most of the work. My favorite opening line of a story is, “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit”; “The Hobbit” by J.R.R. Tolkien. When I read that I was hooked and spent the next few weeks learning about hobbits and middle earth. As curious as I am(and was) with regard to how the ‘real’ world worked. This line drew me into a completely different world.
The question I have considered for a few years now is, why can’t introductions to the sciences and mathematics be as engaging? The opening sentence in the preface to a recent physics text starts, “The physical universe is enormously complex in its detail. Every day, each of us observes a great variety of objects and phenomena”; “College Physics”, by Urone and Hinrichs. I think many imaginative genius are turned away from making major contributions because the stories in the sciences are often buried deep in quite obtuse stories.
In an earlier piece I said that there may be more truth in fiction and more fiction in truth than we realize(or something to that effect). So, if one couched physics in an exploration of, “It was a vast, shining globe and it cast a light of lambent topaz into space–but it was not a sun”; “Star Wars: A New Hope”; by George Lucas, what would happen?
I suspect more young potential scientists read that line and were hooked than by any science textbook. Discovery is exciting; why is it often lost during education?