Arts Confessions: I am a Bio major. Science Confessions: I am an editor for this arts publication and I play in the orchestra. Phrasing these statements as confessions is a bit disconcerting, but they feel like confessions. Science and art, two of the most important things in my life, never seem to occupy the same space for me. There’s “science Ted:” that logical, rational thinker who reads journal papers and actually enjoys them. Then there’s “artistic Ted.” He plays the bassoon and is fond of mid-century architecture. SciTed makes bad puns and ArtsTed favors absurdist humor. If these two versions of myself could occupy different bodies, I’d imagine they would get in a lot of arguments.
My two minds function on fundamentally different paradigms. SciTed applies the techniques of scientific inquiry to whatever problem is at hand. He draws from his bank of knowledge to solve problems and is wary of the unknown, but his conservative thought process makes for a reliable, if predictable, decision. ArtsTed functions in another world. He does not consciously consider prior experience, and he does not seek to parse the landscape simply for the sake of parsing it. His reactions are instinctive and visceral, his decisions based only on feelings.
Why do I feel this distinction? Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that varying pursuits require separate frames of mind. Art and science are fundamentally different ways of parsing and exploring the world, each with their own shortcomings and advantages. Art is generally holistic, science generally dissective. There is a time to think artistically and a time to think scientifically. Right?
Four artists and scientists recently published a manifesto in Leonardo, the publication of the International Society for the Arts, Science and Technology. They opened with two statements:
1) Everything can be understood through art, but that understanding is incomplete.
2) Everything can be understood through science, but that understanding is incomplete.
When I read those first two points, I was blown away. According to their manifesto, nothing can be completely understood without the use of both art and science. They don’t place value or importance and instead set art as the yin to science’s yang. They’re telling me that ArtTed and SciTed need to put aside their differences if I am going to truly understand the world.
The authors of the aforementioned manifesto came up with an uncreative term for the intersection between art and science: ArtScience. They describe it as “synaesthetic experience integrated with analytical exploration.” I am a little concerned with their choice of titles (ArtScience is the best they could come up with?), but their sentiments are admirable. True innovation must come from an intimate internal collaboration between the artists and scientists in all of us. By not allowing ArtsTed and SciTed to brainstorm a problem together, I am severely limiting my potential for creativity and innovation.
When I look back on my experience at Duke, it is difficult to find instances where ArtsTed and SciTed sat down at the same table. My classroom learning has been binarily art or science. I have consciously pursued arts-related electives and extracurriculars—like Recess—to stimulate ArtsTed, but I have failed to effectively connect those concepts with my biology studies. Such connections wouldn’t have come easily: studying at any university, and especially one as traditional as Duke, makes intellectual cross-pollination very difficult. Bass Connections, a recently-unveiled $50 million initiative to create interdisciplinary classes, attempts to bring students and faculty from varying departments into the same intellectual realm. But concretely defining such thematic areas as “Brain & Society” and the cryptically titled “Energy” shoehorns thought in a way that goes against the essence of innovation. I applaud the effort, and their reasoning is sound, but top-down institutionalization of interdisciplinarity is not the way to garner innovative partnerships of minds.
True collaborative spirit must stem from individuals, not institutions. It isn’t up to Duke to dictate the collaborations of its students and faculty. It is up to Duke to set up a framework in which multi-disciplinary thought can happen organically. The individuals and the institution must (you guessed it) collaborate for the sake of collaborations. Like every college senior on the planet, I have been spending a lot of time lately thinking about my future. I am most enamored by jobs that would put me to work alongside specialists from varying fields. Imagine if Duke’s academic landscape functioned like a think-tank, where experts come together to think creatively. This is, of course, different from the internal cognitive cooperation outlined by ArtScience, but the same fundamental principles apply to individuals and groups. Meaningful team-thought leads us to places we couldn’t go alone. It’s exciting to consider that such intellectual partnerships could be just around the corner. I can only hope that ArtsTed and SciTed can also work together in the same way.
One scenario sticks out in my mind as the closest ArtsTed and SciTed have come to working in concert. I have spent a few of my summers at a summer camp in Western North Carolina. Luckily for me, my job description includes spending a lot of time wandering through the forest or taking in magnificent Appalachian vistas. As I am walking through the trees, ArtsTed notices the crepuscular rays filtering through the trees and wishes he had a good camera. SciTed marvels at the mighty oak, whose upper branches are fed completely by capillary action. ArtsTed notices how the mountainous landscape, when viewed from afar, looks like a toad’s back or a zoomed-in perspective of someone’s fingerprints. SciTed contemplates geology and plate tectonics. ArtsTed and SciTed play off each other, noting and relating the aesthetic and the analytic. Both are correct. Both are thinking valuable thoughts. Both need to be listened to.
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