Teaching by arousing

It seems that there are two and only two types of information that I crave from writers/philosophers/scientists/anyone trying to teach me something:

1. Stuff that surprises me, throws me off guard, makes me question my unquestioned beliefs.

2. Stuff that I know is true and useful, but just needed to hear clearly articulated in order to have it absorbed into my fleshy software.

Anything in between, all the dry facts and theoretical frameworks and reasonable-sounding ideas, I could do without. That’s actually too gentle. I would pay to do without that stuff.¹ I would make sacrifices to get only the above two types of information and have the rest systematically eradicated like diseased vermin.

Although the two types of information seem to be at opposite ends of the continuum, I think they actually have something important in common: They are both arousing. They both get me riled up, and it is that arousal that leads (necessary? sufficient?) to learning.

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¹Business opportunity, anyone? What if there was a site like Reddit or Digg that filtered information based on these two criteria?