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Thanks for your analysis.
I must give the impression that I put the arts on a
one up position but I intended to indicate that they were the roots of all
disciplines as they are the developers of the perceptions. So rather
than the top of the tree they are the base.
At the same time the advanced arts share equality
with all of the other disciplines.
Ray
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2003 2:18
AM
Subject: Re: [Futurework] Critical
Assumptions
Ray,
At 14:47 19/11/2003 -0500, you
wrote:
What is
the purpose of the Arts?
I agree with many of your
Assumptions and will make some brief comments below. Before I do this,
however, let me very quickly describe my position in contrast to yours. I
believe that we should not put the Arts on a pedestal -- as you give the
impression that you do. I believe that the Arts, Sciences and Trade are all
inter-related, and all are at their peak during particularly vigorous periods
of human accomplishment.
Fifty
Assumptions by Ray Evans Harrell.
First let me say that I
assume that all structures are based in the human body.
That we get our intelligence, imagination, and creativity etc. from the way
in which the human body has been developed from childhood through old
age. And as someone getting older I now realize that Hardwiring
does exist and that refusal to develop it or societal deprivation is the
root of most of our problems with intelligent solutions.
Agree
Assumption 1: That being my first assumption that it is from the
body.
Agree
Assumption 2: I then assume that consciousness is possible and
potential is developable.
Agree, though the educational
process (very much dependent on others) must start in the earliest days of
life and continue unabated to puberty. After then, potentiation is very much
up to the individual.
Assumption 3: It follows that the tools for that development
are primally located in the perceptions and that the development of the
perceptual hardwiring in the brain has a great deal to do with the
environment.
Agree. This takes place in the rear cortex
where the advanced processing of perceptions takes place. The rear cortex is
over-endowed with brain cells at birth which then thin out very considerably
according to teh features environment which are present or (more importantly)
not present around the individual. The rear cortex grows in size because the
brain cells that are retained by the features of the environment develop
increasingly denser networks between them.
Assumption 4: My next assumption is that as we get older we can
choose the environment that will create our hardwiring and that wisdom has a
great deal to do with how and what you choose.
Whereas
as a vast thinning-out of brain cells takes place in the rear cortex before
puberty, the frontal cortex is able to grow new brain cells and develop
brand-new unique networks after puberty according to consciously directed
decisions by the individual.
Assumption 5: I assume that aesthetics and the arts are the
primal builders of the perceptual instrument through the biological device
of pleasure.
Roughly true, but the latest brain
research is showing that what we call "pleasure" involves, largely, two
entirely different circuits in the brain, with different brain transmitter
chemicals and hormones involved. One involves the instinctual satisfaction of
the primal urges and this is a function of the rear cortex (mainly) together
with the evolutionary older parts of the brain, and the hormonal system of the
body. This is something that the individual can hardly control -- it is a
conseqeunce of the genetic inheritance of the individual together with the
precise characteristics of the enironment in which the individual was raised
before puberty.
The more exquisite feelings of pleasure that we gain
from the practice and contemplation of the arts and sciences and the
cultivation of selective social networks (which includes the trading functions
and what we buy in order to show our status and allegiances) belong to an
additional elaboration of basic instincts that takes place in the frontal
cortex and this is very much in the control of the individual from puberty
onwards, tailing off fairly steeply by about the age of 25 but still
continuing for the rest of life according to the principle of "to those that
hath shall be given". The talent of an individual with well-developed rear and
frontal cortices hardly changes at all throughout life -- IQ scores mainly
declining due to a thining out of brain cells generally due to the normal
processes of old age. The talent of an individual with poorly developed rear
and frontal cortices declines very steeply indeed from 25 years and onwards.
IQ scores decline far more steeply than the normal ageing of brain cells.
And this is when shortage of time intervenes, I'm afraid.
I've tried to summarise my own assumptions above and much of what I've written
would apply as observations to what you;ve written below.
Keith
Hudson
Assumption 6: I assume that all concurrent expertise activities
of the human species flow from the quality of the instrument that has been
developed by perception and the practice of the Arts. You
might say that in the beginning everything is built on the Arts.
Eating, toilet training, walking, sounding, smelling, hearing, talking,
touching, moving, etc.
Assumption 7: I assume that
talents (potential) and opportunity interact at various times and places in
the individual's life to direct the Artistic Hardwiring into either further
artistic development e.g. taste and technique or the development of skills
in the flowering of human endeavor.
Assumption 8: I assume
that at certain times in life the brain wiring becomes more rigid and the
likelihood of change becomes more difficult.
Assumption 9: I assume
that perceptual practice in the arts keeps the mind flexible and slows down
the pulse of aging and keeps change more available.
Assumption 10: I
assume that every profession has an artistic side to it and that side is
what does the same thing using other skills. But the primal
skill is based in the arts themselves.
Assumption 11: I assume that
the professions of a modern society are the same to that society as systems
in the body.
Assumption 12: I assume that a complete look at the
intelligence and health of the society requires not only artistic thought
but also an examination from the viewpoint of each system.
Assumption
13. I assume that humans cannot exist without other humans input and that at
its heart the primal activity is sexual just as the perceptual activity is
Aesthetic. In short we could say that all ensemble or team
learning has sexual pleasure as the original motivating factor for the first
communication.
Assumption 14: I assume that it is good to go beyond
that primal motivation and find further purposes in human interaction.
Assumption
15: I make the same assumption about the arts.
Assumption 16: I
assume that the physical pleasure of sexuality and the physical pleasure of
aesthetic are not the same biological purposes and therefore are a balancing
factor in nature. Friendship is based in the balance of the
senses while procreation is based in competition for best mate.
Assumption
17: I assume that nature calls up the evolving systems of the body.
Assumption
18: I assume that group dynamics calls up the evolving systems of the
society based on the systems of the body.
Assumption 19: I
assume that the symmetry of parallel structures in the body are mirrored in
the necessity for symmetry in societal structures as well.
Assumption 20: I
assume therefore that all societal structures are architectural and exist in
time and space.
Assumption 21: I assume that we choose to develop societal
structures in the same way that we choose to develop the body. A
lot of nature and unconsciousness and some choice.
Assumption 22: I
assume that a mature, intelligent society begins to take responsibility for
the development of its tools and systems.
Assumption 23: I
assume that the sustenance and development of the primal root systems are
necessary for the activities of life both individually and societally.
Assumption
24: I assume that the root systems in American life are severely
dysfunctional.
Assumption 25: I assume that there are social structures in
place to protect that dysfunction based upon cultural pathologies.
Assumption
26: I assume that the balancing of systems in a symmetrical fashion is
desirable and necessary for the return to health of the American system.
Assumption
27: I assume the necessity of leadership in achieving that balance.
Assumption
28: I assume that every system in society has both growth and cycles
as well as a beginning and an end.
Assumption 29: I
assume that research, exploration, practice and mastery are necessary to
make sure that societies grow symmetrically and that the growth cycles don't
become cancerous.
Assumption 30: I assume that the intelligence gained through
the practice of Music and the Arts are essential to both individual and
societal symmetricallity.
Assumption 31: I
assume that it is possible to find a societal symmetricallity that balances
the systems of society.
Assumption 32: I assume that business or trade
economics is the central system of choice of the American culture.
Assumption
33: I assume that America has chosen to have a society of economic
classes rather than an egalitarian society.
Assumption 34: I
assume that this choice is more recent than the founding of the Republic.
Assumption
35: I assume that argument about it is not an artistic issue but a political
one and therefore not relevant to this discussion of the Arts.
Assumption
36: I assume that the choice was made for the government to fund the arts
and other "not for profits" through subsidy of the wealthy class (tax
exemption).
Assumption 37: I assume that the choice was made because of the
ongoing culture war and not because they wished to completely "social
engineer" the society.
Assumption 38: I assume that
the belief that trade economics is the only engine that can run an economy
is erroneus.
Assumption 39: I assume that most jobs in the trade economy are
not ultimately necessary except as a form of "make work" that redistributes
income.
Assumption 40: I assume that is the reason that downsizing
doesn't effect companies negatively but only workers. Saving
money but not loosing product or labor productivity.
Assumption 41: I assume that
Artistic jobs that develop intelligence and perceptions are good for the
society.
Assumption 42: I assume that the most complex contemporary artistic
jobs can never exist in the world solely as trade items.
Assumption 43: I
assume that the values of society determine the health of the society.
Assumption
44: I assume that values must always be developed in negotiation with
the society's structures allowing each structure to do its job and serve the
health of the whole society.
Assumption 45: I assume that starving the average
artist does nothing for society or for the creativity of the artist inspite
of local myths.
Assumption 46: I assume that there are several systems at work
trying to serve the primal needs of the Artistic function and that none of
them work very well since the artists are starving and excellence in art
can't cover costs of producing them.
Assumption 47: I assume that
this can be solved short of declaring war.
Assumption 48: I assume that
every member of the Florentine Symposium has crucial information necessary
to the solving of the problem of the societal dysfunction in the arts.
Assumption
49: I assume that the Interactive Management Team that we have
assembled is as world class and capable of facilitating the flow of
knowledge in the search for a solution to the societal dysfunction in the
arts as can be found.
Assumption 50: I assume that there is an answer.
Keith Hudson, Bath,
England, <www.evolutionary-economics.org>
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