"I lived in India for many years, and I often encountered very intelligent, sophisticated people who had absolutely no curiosity about how things worked or technology. In fact, there are many people here, myself included, who are not "scientifically curious" about how an electric motor works, how far away the stars are, or what materials make up their clothing, their toothpaste, or their shoes. We take some things as beyond the need for curiosity; other peoples take more, other, and different things as such. The tribal people I lived with in India saw the airplane from Calcutta to Delhi fly overhead every day; they shrugged, wondered briefly if it was a steel bird, and then went back to being totally uncurious about it."
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June 1, 2004, Tekumel Discussion Group, quoted in Inloes (2018)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/M._A._R._Barker
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M. A. R. Barker
Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman Barker (born Phillip Barker; November 2, 1929 – March 16, 2012) was an American linguist who was professor of Urdu and South Asian Studies and created one of the first roleplaying games, Empire of the Petal Throne. He wrote several fantasy/science fantasy novels based in his associated world setting of Tékumel.
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