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| "Oak fractured by a lightning. Allegory on the artist wife's death" (1842) by Maxim Vorbiev. |
This description suggests that those who do not have a "humanistic imagination"--scientists, perhaps?--are some kind of wonderless killjoys. How might someone with a "scientific imagination" respond to that characterization? How would you describe the appeal of the "scientific imagination"? Does one or the other--science or the humanities--have a much stronger appeal to you? How do you account for that appeal? Do you think a certain kind of personality is drawn to one or the other? Do you think our society is prejudiced in favor of the sciences or the humanities?
A scientist may find it slightly offensive as being regarded as a murderer of magic behind a story. People who lean more toward the sciences are usually more attracted to logic and reason rather than 'superstition', but there are still many unsolved mysteries about the functions of the brain that may or may never be discovered. Scientists enjoy finding straightforward, unambiguous answers to their questions, but in order to find explanations they must harness the power of critical thinking and imagination. This makes the scientific imagination quite fascinating, because both rationale and creativity must work together, one cannot be separate from the other. I am more attracted toward the humanities because it enables me to believe I have no limits in my thought process and what I can create. I may not succeed in everything I do but there are no concrete boundaries on what I decide to try. I do think certain personalities may be drawn to one or the other. For example, in art class I tend to find more introvert, spatial, and individually-oriented peers than I do in biology, where there is a larger number of students who may be extroverts and enjoy collaborating or who are more structured in how they perceive situations and plans. Many schools facing budget cuts usually eliminate subjects in the humanities such as studio art or drama in order to keep subjects such as calculus or anatomy which have a more direct and concrete application in future careers. I think both are equally important in how our society functions but one is undermined because it is ambiguous, seen more easily as entertainment or a stress-free activity, while the other is proven by modern standards to have the potential to save lives or cure illnesses.
ReplyDelete-Elsa Moseley
Elsa, I feel that you made several well-stated points in your comment. Like you, I gravitate more toward a humanistic imagination due to my love of art and open-minded approach to situations. However, also like you, I feel that those with scientific imaginations make up a vital part of today's society and are more than the "wonderless killjoys" that Gottschall may have unintentionally reduced them to. Without their analytical approach to questions and problems, our world would likely be disease-ridden and technologically basic. As with many things in life, a balance of the two is required in order to pave the way for societal advancements.
DeleteI enjoyed reading everyone's responses so far, especially because I have such little experiences in the humanities!
DeleteI guess as a science major I could add some input. Science is going to continually keep expanding because of creativity and imagination, therefore illuminating this “sacred preserve” in the process. So shouldn’t we keep moving forward, and in the process keep asking new questions based on our previous findings (just as science always does anyway)? I don’t feel like we’re wonderless killjoys (thanks Dr. Benton!) but we're instead detectives trying to understand the mysteries of life. Stating that science shouldn't try understand why dreams exist and how they work doesn’t mean that dreams will then be preserved as magic. Shouldn’t people be fascinated by how we work? One of my favorite quotes is by Neil deGrasse Tyson, and I think it fits this topic: “The good thing about science is that it’s true whether or not you believe in it.”
I agree with Elsa in the fact that many scientists would be offended at the accusation of murderers of magic. I am a theater major, which means I obviously gravitate towards humanities more, but I love the challenge of science. Something I think many people forget about scientists is that they are storytellers. Their words may not flow, or be as elaborate as we are used to, but every theory, every hypothesis, every probability is their story. They use their imagination just as much as an art major may have to. Scientists create bio-art and elaborate shapes and figures just by making a formula. I believe there isn't as much of a separation between the two as society makes it seem like today.
ReplyDeleteSomeone with a “scientific imagination” would, as other commenters have said, likely not be pleased to be labeled something akin to a magic-murdering machine. Scientists, or scientific thinkers, are not machines. They simply have their own form of magic. For scientific thinkers, I propose, magic is not in the unknown; magic is in discovering the unknown. Magic is using ideas, logic, and technology to both understand the way the world works and make something of it that has never been seen before. That in itself is the appeal of a scientific imagination. Without it, no one would be posting responses here. The idea that eventually became laptops, desktop computers, and smartphones would still be just that: an idea, a fantasy, a distant, impossible, unscientific “magic”.
ReplyDeleteIt might be evident in my previous statements, but I myself am a scientific thinker. I do have an appreciation of humanities, as well, but science will always hold my heart, possibly because I ere more toward logic than intuition. Both ways of thinking hold value in our society, of course. We move forward by combining the two, which creates, among other things, the rich stories experienced in video games.
I agree the that science will only continue expanding with the help of creativity and imagination. As a science major, like Linzi, I can not help but think about every scientific discovery that has ever been made. Didn't they all begin as impossible stories? Each and every one of them, in my opinion, began as a story that was so hard to believe, someone felt obligated to experiment to find out the truth. I cannot find it in me to believe that a scientists is a "murderer of magic" . I think a scientist is someone who does not find magic in imagination, but uses imagination to find magic in the real world.
ReplyDeleteI would also like to add that I LOVED Madison's comment.
As an individual with an imagination comprised mostly of logical deduction, I can clearly state that being called a “wonderless killjoy” is quite amusing! I propose that rather than being killjoys, individuals in search of true science are joy engenderers. What emotion can exist that is more enlightening than understanding? Is understanding not a necessary component of life? For the sake of curiosity and a desire for understanding, I appeal to science more so than humanities. I believe that individuals with concrete, logically-based personalities are more drawn towards the sciences, while individuals that have emotionally-based and open-ended personalities are drawn more towards humanities. I believe that society as a whole is prejudice in favor of humanities. Why? At the end of the day, many people would rather view the world only within the limitations of thought than to be shown the limits of how and why the world truly works.
ReplyDelete- Dillon Rea
I would love to say that I fall into the humanities category, yet is almost completely in the scientific. I have grown up in a story, or a daydream. I have lived most of my life in Neverland, and I have no intention of ‘moving out’. I live for the next adventure I can find between the pages of a book. Even so, the fact that scientist want to dissect how stories affect us, intrigues me. I have a love for the way our bodies work, that is why I am a Pre-Med major. For me, it won’t ‘murder’ the story at all. It will give us another reason to appreciate the amazing minds that we all have. I also think that by catagoianzing scientist as one type mindset makes us forget that without an imagination, large scientific steps wouldn’t have been taken.
ReplyDelete- Lauren Tucker
This is what I think, too. This isn't really an "us versus them" situation. Science-minded people are not at all without imagination.
DeleteI can say with certainty that I have a very scientific, logic seeking mind. But that in no way means I lack imagination. Scientists need imagination to even come up with some of the worlds greatest questions, and they need even more to find ways to answer them. Just as those with a more humanistic form of imagination need science. It took a great deal of imagination for Nicolaus Copernicus to think against the norm and state that the Earth wasn't the center of the universe. Just as it takes any great artist or baker to find the right mix of colors or ingredients to come up with the perfect hue or extraordinary flavor, texture and quality that they have in mind. In all reality, they are one in the same. They are the same sneaky, cunning cat wearing a different disguise.
ReplyDelete-Maranda Clymer
Maybe the scientist who are viewed as being killjoys are simply taking their creative power and using it to discover other mysteries of the world. One thing I have noticed while discovering something new is, more often than not, I am left with more questions, so once the scientist discover the "magic" of stories, they may also be presented with more questions to answer, which leads to wander and discovery and question again. My personal belief is, as humans, we are not going to ever truly understand everything there is to understand in the universe simply because we are not meant to. Us humans have an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. That being said, it takes much creativity and imagination to come up with possible explanations for the that may or may not fit in with what we already know to be true. Thinking "outside the box" is a must for any and all areas of life.
ReplyDeleteAshley Houchin
Anyone who has completed a science fair project could tell you that there must be a level of imagination and creativity in science, and anyone who has ever picked up a science fiction novel could tell you that science and magic are not enemies. Unfortunately, there is this idea that people must be one or the other. Chemists and physicists are pictured as people whose time clock only shows their work schedule, whereas artists and musicians can only be attracted to the tragedies and victories of people. There are two issues with this idea, though. The first problem is an entire group of people are ignored. Theoretical scientists and philosophers are those that indulge in both science and humanities, yet come out unscathed. The second and bigger issue is the idea that people can only exist in one way. You either enjoy summer or winter, football or theatre, cats or dogs. A lot of times, humans will leave out the grey area unintentionally, forgetting that humans are complex enough to exist with multiple facets that may seem contradictory to each other. Stories can and should have science. Science can and should have stories. How are we to believe a scientist that has never told a story? In Super Mario Bros., we see a plumber who rides a dinosaur on clouds in order to save a princess from a giant turtle. While the entire story seems farfetched, there are small elements of practicality in it, such as how far would this man would jump and eating the vegetables make you grow. Science and stories are often intertwined, but it has become so normalized to see them as opposites that we merely pass over their crossing paths.
ReplyDeleteSo I see we've finally come up to human vs. science. A controversial subject seeing as how we made science an active part of lives in the first place. A scientific imagination is no less wondrous than a humanistic imagination. A scientific imagination marvels at the minute details that create the bigger picture. It sees what caused the electrochemical storm and marvels that such a thing is a naturally occurring phenomenon. It knows how electricity moves to ground and understands how it works. On the other hand, a humanistic imagination takes things at face value. It sees, but does not observe the finer details, opting to make them up itself. That itself is a marvel worth delving into. The humanistic imagination seeks to create its own reality, pushing aside theories it finds distasteful and assimilating aspects from other fantasies to make it all the more interesting. I suppose the base difference between the two is that a scientific imagination seeks to understand the reality given whereas the humanistic imagination seeks to create a reality it can understand. At this point it must be obvious that I favor the scientific imagination. I suppose I have an obsession not only with knowing how the world around me works, but also understanding it. There most certainly is a difference. Now, in regard to one personality being drawn to one type of imagination over the other, it cannot be definitively identified. A personality is a single thing composed of the cumulative experiences, principles, and ingrained instinct of an individual that is gained over the entire span of their lifetime. Personalities are ever changing, however minutely, and so an individual may start out with a love of the humanistic and shift tot he scientific, much like myself. As for our society, science has won over humanity. Science is thought to be proven fact and humanity is thought to be emotion and open interpretation, both regarding all that is. People want the definitive truth, the absolute fact, and tend to move towards that as opposed to the humanities that explain that not everything is what it seems. The humanities, in my opinion, are a way to reveal to us that we may think something has a particular meaning, but, when held in a different light, have new meaning. Science, on the other hand, seems more towards teaching that everything is a certain way all the time. Never changing until it changes. They both compliment one another and, though science may have won for now, I believe our society is a subtle mixture of the two however belittled the humanities may seem.
ReplyDelete-Cheyenne Cooley
You can take what is commonly thought of as a “scientific” approach to the humanities. In my experience, this is the kind of approach that is encouraged if you seek a graduate degree in the humanities.
ReplyDeleteI get the feeling that some students taking humanities classes believe that the purpose of those classes is to encourage them to marvel and wonder at the beauty and complexity of art and literature. I also believe that there are some humanities professors who have such an agenda in their classes. But I am resistant to the notion that the goal of a class should be to persuade a student to love something.
I believe that in a class it is useful to think about works of art and literature as specimens that tell us something about the people who value them. What do they consider important? Valuable? Beautiful? Normal?
As several commenters here have suggested, no matter what field of study or profession we may pursue, our thoughts and actions are shaped by our imaginations. Imaginations are worthwhile objects of study.
I wrote my dissertation on depictions of educators in popular fiction and film. Maybe it is because I have spent so much time analyzing such depictions that I find it difficult to enjoy them (in that domain, I've become a "wonderless killjoy"). But I do not value that enjoyment more than the knowledge I feel I have gained through my analysis.
I disagree with the suggestion that “a humanistic imagination takes things at face value. It sees, but does not observe the finer details, opting to make them up itself.” I believe that most successful writers of fiction are keen observers of minute detail and they find ways to describe them in their texts.
ReplyDeleteI also disagree with the suggestion that “the humanistic imagination seeks to create its own reality, pushing aside theories it finds distasteful and assimilating aspects from other fantasies to make it all the more interesting.” Many creative writers and artists are drawn towards describing experiences they find distasteful or mysterious.