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I have a preference for the Fannie Farmer cookbook, personally. I regularly flip between my 1918 edition and my 1986 edition to see how cooking styles, preferences, and procedures have changed. The 1986 edition also has some excellent sections on the process of (for example) baking in general, rather than just a list of recipes.
We (and by 'we' I mean the general American public) learn it in school, fairly early on. Children who question, explore, experiment, and tinker are often chastised for "jumping ahead" or "not paying attention" or "being disruptive" or a half-dozen other complaints made by harried or exhausted teachers, or fearful parents.
Children are not often (anymore) encouraged to simply try things out to see if they work. In school they're not really encouraged to explore, but instead to stay with the group. At home, they're often inhibited from tinkering with pretty much anything. "You might break it!" is a pretty common parental reaction to a child tinkering with anything remotely mechanical.
I'm not sure that's what the author specifically had in mind, when calling this behavior "learned", but it's certainly something I've seen fairly often.