Are science and art diametrically opposed?

[arildno]

I guess the modern authors that you are referring to are the ones who produce all the beach-reading stuff? I don't get that as well...

Not necessarily; Margaret Atwood is, for example, a great modern author.
Roald Dahl was a great short-story writer, and I happen to think that "Dolores Claiborne" by Stephen King is a great novel.

Of course, I won't deny that you can read all of them on the beach and get pleasure out of it..

 

[cragwolf]

Whether or not you are correct to say that art is incapable of giving (or at least has never given) new information about the external world, I still maintain that the purpose of art, aside from its entertainment and asthetic value, is to open up avenues by which one may attain self-knowledge.

Possibly, although I personally find it difficult to distinguish between self-knowledge, self-justification, and self-delusion. I'm skeptical of any knowledge which hasn't been passed through the wringer of experiment and logic. Unfortunately, many very important questions (especially those about the "internal world") can't be analysed in this way and thus will remain forever unanswered. Some people can't stand unanswered questions so they look elsewhere and naturally find the answers they want to hear. The previous sentence is a flippant, arrogant, throwaway line, so feel free to ignore it.

 

[loseyourname]

I'm not going to call your response flippant or arrogant, crag, but it is very cynical to think that you cannot know anything about yourself outside of what can be experimentally verified. Certainly people can delude themselves and often do, but one of the functions of good art is to help the viewer to see through these delusions. There are other ways; therapy comes to mind, as do random jarring events. Aside from all these lofty purposes, however, art performs a much simpler and less contentious function in that it can teach to better appreciate the world around you. Whether or not this constitutes any form of truth I won't comment on, but it is definitely a skill worth learning. This is actually one of the aspects of art that it has in common with science - both can teach you to look at the world in new and exciting ways, and to better appreciate what you see. They are different paths for different people. Many find science to be boring and difficult to grasp; many find art boring and difficult to grasp.

 

[motai]

We cannot hide behind the sturdy wooden gate of logic all the time. If something isn't experimentally viable at this point we speculate and postulate the different possible outcomes. This thought process closely follows not only scientists but also artists (who want to know things just as much as scientists do). We cannot answer everything at this point, but this shouldn't keep us from wondering possible circumstances, and it is this realm that art portrays itself quite well.

Does this mean that we are looking for answers we want to hear? Probably not. Because it is these possibilities that describe what we see around us, even if it is the most absurd thing around. It isn't just telling what we want to hear, but rather a reflection of the world around us (with exceptions to the pure-entertainment value items). In some level it is possible for us to relate to most abstract of work, though we may not necessarily understand it.

Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis was highly illogical, but even in this most absurd of circumstance, insight into human experience is shown through Samsa's surrealistic transformation into a dung beetle. Now, since this isn't experimentally verifyable and doesn't conform to the standard rules of logic, does this make Kafka's work any less valid than scientific results?

Instead of seeing art as a non-contributor to human experience since it doesn't follow the formal rules of logic, it would probably be better to see it as a means to explain the things that are usually not easily quantifyable.

 

[cragwolf]

Thanks to all for your replies. I'll keep ruminating over what has been said.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Thanks to all for your replies. I'll keep ruminating over what has been said.

Pertinent question: do you engage in any sort of artistic endeavors, yourself? Draw, paint, write fiction, play an instrument, compose music?

 

[cragwolf]

Pertinent question: do you engage in any sort of artistic endeavors, yourself? Draw, paint, write fiction, play an instrument, compose music?

Yes, in my spare time I play the piano and program computer games.

 

[zoobyshoe]

So would it be to our benefit if artists were to take up science and scientists were to take up art? Different views can thus inspire ideas on both sides, and would thus enrich both fields.

You may know, Motai, that Feynman took up art in his forties and became very interested in it, and actually very good at it fairly quickly. He was also, even before this, very fond of playing percussion instruments, and was good enough that he was asked to play percussion for dance performances and in Brazilian music bands.

I think, in general, that any science-minded person who delves into some kind of artistic self expression will find himself enriched by it. Not necessarily as a scientist, but certainly as a person.

Going the other way, from art into science, hardly ever happens in nature because, I think, it overtly demands that the individual concern himself with concepts that are "objective", by which I mean, unconcerned with his individual perspectives and opinions. f=ma, for example, is taken as scientific fact, and can't be obviated by mood. In art, a person's mood, attitude, and personal perspective is often the whole point.

I disagree that successful art is successful because it expresses something universal. A Hitchcock film, for instance, has a very specific mood and flavor that distinguishes it as a Hitchcock film. He found a fascinating way to present suspensful stories that is uniquely his own. Shakespeare is full of universal themes, but that isn't why we still read him. He has lasted because of the particularly resonant way he expressed them.

 

[nmondal]

Do we think that Scientists are over the Society?

Pals, let's check these things out.
Super-the h-bomb was invented as a fear of communism of a smart person, Neuman, Von.
Same with the ICBM.
Scientists are not over the society.

There is a nice similarity in science and art.
Suppose you see an unnamed flower, being a science guy you will approach and say "Oh...such a nice unknown thing.Let's have a paper, publish it and make the other know that it exists."
An artist will say "Oh, such a nice thing! Never heared of it, let's draw a picture or let's write a poetry about it..."

It's the same goal with 2 different approach. In the end, you are nothing. NOTHING.
In the cource of the lifetime of the Galaxy, you are star dust.

Artists are far ahead of us because they are meaningful to a lot of human population, we are say about 1 part in a million. We are not acceptable to the lay-race.

So, there is no difference btw science and art, apart from the fact that science is less poetic.

 

[motai]

You may know, Motai, that Feynman took up art in his forties and became very interested in it, and actually very good at it fairly quickly. He was also, even before this, very fond of playing percussion instruments, and was good enough that he was asked to play percussion for dance performances and in Brazilian music bands.

Wow. That's really cool. Though I have a difficult time picturing him in front of a congo playing salsa with a latin band.

Going the other way, from art into science, hardly ever happens in nature because, I think, it overtly demands that the individual concern himself with concepts that are "objective", by which I mean, unconcerned with his individual perspectives and opinions. f=ma, for example, is taken as scientific fact, and can't be obviated by mood. In art, a person's mood, attitude, and personal perspective is often the whole point.

Good point. It is probably easier for the scientist to engage in the arts than the former. Scientists have a different way of looking at things (methodical in a way) and that would probably be much more difficult for someone who is always used to abstract non-mathematical thinking.

I disagree that successful art is successful because it expresses something universal. A Hitchcock film, for instance, has a very specific mood and flavor that distinguishes it as a Hitchcock film. He found a fascinating way to present suspensful stories that is uniquely his own. Shakespeare is full of universal themes, but that isn't why we still read him. He has lasted because of the particularly resonant way he expressed them.

Yes, this is true. I'm sorry if I implied that the successfulness of art depends on its universality. As you said, it doesn't always have to be this way.

It's the same goal with 2 different approach. In the end, you are nothing. NOTHING.
In the cource of the lifetime of the Galaxy, you are star dust.

Artists are far ahead of us because they are meaningful to a lot of human population, we are say about 1 part in a million. We are not acceptable to the lay-race.

So, there is no difference btw science and art, apart from the fact that science is less poetic.

Just because we are nothing in the scope of things doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to expand our horizons and explain the unobserved and unknown. I wouldn't say that artists are more meaningful (perhaps to some but this is not a universal statement). Their work just accomplishes a different thing in a different manner, that doesn't mean that their work has more value than that of a scientist.

Science and mathematics can be quite "poetic" in the sense of conveying lots of information in a small amount of room (just look at any textbook equation!). There was a quote from Bertrand Russell, a mathematician and philosopher:

Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty--a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music, yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show. The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than man, which is the touchstone of the highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry. What is best in mathematics deserves not merely to be learned as a task, but to be assimilated as a part of daily thought, and brought again and again before the mind with ever-renewed encouragement.

Real life is, to most men, a long second-best, a perpetual compromise between the ideal and the possible; but the world of pure reason knows no compromise, no practical limitations, no barrier to the creative activity embodying in splendid edifices the passionate aspiration after the perfect from which all great work springs. Remote from human passions, remote even from the pitiful facts of nature, the generations have gradually created an ordered cosmos, where pure thought can dwell as in its natural home, and where one, at least, of our nobler impulses can escape from the dreary exile of the actual world.

 

[Bladibla]

When i play my instrument or paint some warhammer minatures (hurts your back a lot but is still fun) I feel the very essence of 'fun' within my mind, and sometimes (or nearly all the time) can be very addictive.

I also get 'fun' out of reading about science and mathematics. I remember reading about boltzmanns equation and the concept of entropy and being quite excited about it.

However, i do feel in my mind that these feelings while both 'fun', cannot be combined together. I read science books when i go to sleep (and too often, it MAKES me sleep) and i almost can't be bothered to touch a book after a personal session on a instrument or just painting until my back falls off.

From this, i do believe that science and Art gives excitation to a person in different aspects of a person. But they are NOT mutually exclusive of each other. I can't imagine myself just reading science books all the time, nor just playing my insturment.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Wow. That's really cool. Though I have a difficult time picturing him in front of a congo playing salsa with a latin band.

You don't have to imagine it. There is photographic evidence! When his lectures were first published he had a vague idea about wanting a drum head as the frontispiece ilustration because he felt that the complexities of drum head vibration were a fair representative of all wave phenomena. The editors and publisher misconstrued this request and put a picture of him playing the conga drum, sitting there grinning wildly, his hands a blurr.

I'm sure you would love Surely, you're joking, Mr. Feynman!, which is a collection of his autobiographical stories. There's not much physics at all in the book, it's sheer entertainment. a lot of it is hilarious. One of the chapters tells the story of how he got into art.

There are two books where you can see some of his drawings. One is his second collection of autobiographical stories, What Do You Care What Other People Think?, and the other is No Ordinary Genius, The Illustrated Richard Feynman by Christopher Sykes. Try your local library for any or all of these.

 

[russ_watters]

I know I'm late to this thread, but I was bored and figured I'd share my insight:

I'm an engineer. The only purely artistic pursuit I have ever engaged in is music, though I haven't played any in several years. I was a trumpet and piano player. I was pretty good at the trumpet, but didn't have the dexterity required for piano. I am utterly useless with a sketch-pad or paint brush.

Setting all that aside, engineering requires creative problem solving. The attached photo shows a fan that I did some work on when I was in Mexico last week. The intake bell (to the right) and fan were misaligned and rubbed against each other, throwing off sparks. After a short brainstorming session, we had a metal-worker craft the rig in the pic to jack-up the intake bell and re-align it to the fan.

Ok, so it didn't work - the point is, imo, creative problem solving is very similar to artistic pursuits. It requires the same eye (or ear, as in music) for the relationships between the elements of the field. Color perception, an ear for harmony, spatial perception - all elements of the same type of creativity, manifested in different ways.

 

[Moonbear]

Okay, I'm going to jump into this thread without having read most of the previous posts, just the opening post, so my apologies if this comes from left field.

Being creative is important in science, and sometimes art is what allows us to exercise and practice our creativity. There are also aesthetics involved in how we present our science. It may seem trivial, but creating a graph that is aesthetically pleasing is almost as important as the data it conveys (of course the data takes precedence, but you also want it to be noticed). Likewise, because my research involves a lot of neuroanatomy, my publications include figures that are images captured off microscopes of the cells I'm studying. This is something I enjoy doing because it allows me to be somewhat artistic in my selection of cells. I can pick any cell that shows the data I need to show, but picking a pretty one that nicely contrasts for the reader to see easily, and framing it to include other elements I want to show is as much an art as it is science. Of course this depends on what I'm illustrating. Sometimes the ugly photo is the one that best represents the data and I'm stuck with it.

There are also those who do science illustrations for textbooks and other such purposes. In the hands of the right artist, a picture really is worth 1000 words in conveying a point. And in those cases, detail and precision are very important.

Then again, I've known people who also use science as art. Take a film of your gel with a DNA ladder and make a B&W print of it, and it makes very pretty modern art.

 

[zoobyshoe]

the point is, imo, creative problem solving is very similar to artistic pursuits. It requires the same eye (or ear, as in music) for the relationships between the elements of the field. Color perception, an ear for harmony, spatial perception - all elements of the same type of creativity, manifested in different ways.

I agree, but I see a difference in the goals of each that ends up making them still very different kinds of activities. In art the goal is to produce a result that is interesting to the eye or ear. In engineering you are primarily aiming for something that works, or works better.
For my money, the engineer is working under more restraints imposed by physical reality than the artist, and, for that reason the average engineer is probably a more expert problem solver than the average artist.

 

[motai]

There are also those who do science illustrations for textbooks and other such purposes. In the hands of the right artist, a picture really is worth 1000 words in conveying a point. And in those cases, detail and precision are very important.

Then again, I've known people who also use science as art. Take a film of your gel with a DNA ladder and make a B&W print of it, and it makes very pretty modern art.

Not to mention that the artist can learn quite a lot from just creating the diagrams. I wouldn't mind doing a few myself, if I didn't suck so much at the visual arts (the only thing I can do is move pixels around). Like russ before, I am completely inept with a sketch pad.

Since there is much diligence in the creation of a good diagram, the pursuit of art to learn science seems to be an excellent way of learning (and showing others the subject at hand as well). One has to really know the material well in order to create an informative diagram (I've seen plenty of hokey and messed up diagrams in the past and some that are really good).

I often wondered if the artists who paint composites of things at NASA are really scientists in disguise :shy:.

 

[kleinwolf]

I think Dirac said something like :

"Science is the Art of explaining what nobody knows so that everybody understand

Art is the Science of explaining what everybody knows so that nobody understand"

 

[fuzzyfelt]

This is a fascinating thread. It is so refreshing to hear those of scientific bent with their own different understandings and enjoyment of aesthetics. I like this whole physics forum thing so much, so pleased I stumbled across it, as an artist I am here to learn about science, starting from a non-existent base, and it is really inspiring to be here. Mortai, I’d love to paint some diagrams!

Sorry my last entry was aggressive – nervous addressing people over the age of four – my usual audience! Also, though, being of visual arts bent, the suggestion that art has no value other than as entertainment was hard to take. A little like suggesting to a scientist that science is just another belief system.

I dnn’t wish to disturb Cragwolf’s ruminations, but did quickly want to touch on the words originality, creativity, discovery…. not to belittle quantum mechanics or Christopher Columbus’ discoveries, they were significant but not creative discoveries. With relativity, I do accept but don’t know for sure that there are instances of pure original thought, and this may well be the case regarding Einstein, but how do we know that he didn’t rely on analogy for his theories, and would that make them anything less? Aristotle said about creativity that the ‘greatest thing by far was command of the metaphor’, and creativity in both endeavours alike, are often by likening, combining vastly different ideas, as in art.

And also his type of proved truth. I wonder whether this is as important to the motivations of scientists as being born with a natural ability, plus curiosity or passion, and a belief of benefit to existence. If we were to swap the words ‘proved truth’ for ‘ benefit to existence’ art and science would have much the same motivation. If I did play the, ‘we can’t take physical proof as given’ line, then the aims would be even more similar, benefit to existence through one system of truth. Its this benefit that distinguishes art from entertainment (Cragwolfe)- all art is a new creation, a piano recital performed with different mood simply by being played in a new moment, a new utterance, a scribble on paper but this is one end of the spectrum. ‘Takeshi’s Castle’ is inane art, entertainment, yet it speaks volumes about society if the observer cares to look. The more thought, passion, cohesion, the greater the benefit. As others have put better, this benefit can be emotional help, reminders of the problems that face society or individuals and exploring possible solutions, or as some artists have believed about their work, universal truth.

This , describes a psychological similarity of scientists and artists in motivation and creativity- that both groups have a high level of hereditary mental disease, that this serves creativity through things like fluidity of thought (the metaphor), basically a freedom of thought, and that despite low fertility and high suicide rates could remain survivors in evolution because causing innovation benefits the larger group.

The role of science in art has been in flux over the centuries, vying with emotion. Plato felt art could accomplish a transcendent experience by showing the beauty of pure mathematics or something like that, whereas others have felt reason inhibits art.

I hope this makes better sense than my last post, in saying both fields have such similar motives and similar goals that they should not be limited to a provable truth only, that science can be improved with aesthetics and art with scientific reason for greater potential benefit to existence.

 

[fuzzyfelt]

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/serendipia/Serendipia-Preti.html is the this link beginning paragraph 5 that didn't work