Chris: That would be Lehrer's claim. My little knowledge of logic suggests
that it is an argument by authority and I'm not clear that Lehrer is an
authority that I would necessarily respect and the argument requires other
grounds for proof in any case.
If the debate is whether artists of earlier times contributed less than
modern artists to science, a conclusion might be reached on one or the other
side being most heuristic but it wouldn't be concluded on scientific
grounds. The conclusion might be about science, the method wouldn't be
scientific.
I don't know anything about the subjection of the humanities to the
sciences, as a social scientist. In fact, in my discipline at least one
prominent colleague has argued that no one should enter clinical psychology
specialization without an undergraduate education in the liberal arts
(literature, e.g. rather than psychology).
It does not follow for me that, were a contribution to have been made, that
it follows that all must honour that contribution and view it as more
important than some other contribution. Is the Salk vaccine less important
than gene splicing or a poem by Robert Frost? Further, to the extent that
popular appeal means something/anything, it's art of the past that is
appreciated/liked/understood
by more people. (I'm struggling to understand a comment that I heard
recently that modern art subverts art.)
What you refer to as pathetic is the conclusion advocated by a journalist
(or person(s) ). His/their opinion(s) may be lamentable, but your own is not
negated.
Geoff C
From: "Chris Miller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Scientific View
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2008 14:15:05 GMT
"I just don't see how a methodology which is supposedly value-free can
pronounce on the value of artifacts."
Some artifacts serve as better scientific evidence than others -- that's
how.
So an archaic torso of Apollo might be worthless to an archaeologist, even
if
it inspires a poet to write "You must change your life"
The subjugation of the humanities to the sciences is an old story of the
20th
Century -- and yet it continues full-steam -- as we find a new, popular
journalist, like Lehrer, proclaiming that the canonical artists of
modernism
really did make important contributions to science. (so now we can admire
them
even more!)
It's so pathetic.
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