Luc: Yes I have allowed my impatience to lead me to, or close to, sarcasm.
However, my desire to learn of someone's understanding of a contribution
from science to aesthetics is sincere (however skeptical I might be).
I'm surely in the running for the person on the list with the least
credentials in creativity and knowledge of the making or history of art. I
assert very modest credentials as someone trained in social science. I don't
perceive the many people to whom you referred as neuroscientists or
neuroaestheticians. If their writings and discoveries are helpful and
interesting to you, I hope that nothing that I would write would deter you
in the slightest. I don't understand science as you (and others) do.
Neuroscientists as poets: In their life they may be, but that wouldn't have
to do with their scientific achievements and efforts. Others may find
meaning in their publications that I don't. Again, for example, if infants
spend more time gazing at a symmetrical arrangement than non-symmetrical
arrangements, tells me something about infant vision. If any artist decided
from that information that his/her works should all be symmetrical I would
view that as a perversion of the science and their art and would feel quite
disheartened. William has described his creative process well. The creating
does not have to do with science information (although I acknowledge that
discovery of the laws of perspective has an important place in the
development of painting). Reflecting on neuroscience might be productive of
understanding the physical aspect of sensing and perceiving and creating but
I will still need to be shown how that will influence how persons value
"art".
Geoff C
----- Original Message -----
From: "Luc Delannoy" <[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2008 12:46 PM
Subject: Geoff, Neurology and "Art"
Geoff, is hostility in the air ? or patronizing ?
Geoff to WC:
"When you learn something about aesthetics from brain imaging and
neurosurgery let me know what it is."
Luc to Geoff:
Where have you been in the last 20 years?
Geoff to WC
"...infer poetically.."
Luc to Geoff
You mean neuroscientists are poets ?
Neuroscience + aesthetics = neuroaesthetics is not about understanding
expressionism or impressionism per se but about studying and understanding
the nature of the human creative process (both from the creator and
receptor perspectives.) That includes coming up with a theory of
perception.
It seems you are confusing the process and the outcome or result of the
process.
Neuroaesthetics could help understand how the artist got there and how/why
the public feels what/how/when it feels. It is not about the "artwork" per
se but about processes (auditive, visual for example). It combines
principles from evolutionary biology, functional brain anatomy, perceptual
and cognitive psychology, musicology, philosophy, cognitive archaelogy,
anthropology.
Since we know that a brain could see an object simultaneously under
different perspectives we understand how an artist got to cubism. A
stressed brain with aesthetic fatigue could explain Magritte's works.
As far as the public taste you are mentioning, you might investigate the
invariants in functional brain anatomy - they might explain the reasons
why people from different cultures at different times enjoy Don Gionnavi
for example, or Vermeer...
Understanding the auditive and visual brains can help us design proposals
for the education system and talk straight in the eye to members of
departments of education.
Neuroscience and neuroaesthetics in particular is not about me in front of
a painting trying to understand the meaning of the concept of
impressionism; it is about the well being of society at large
About reading: some of the seeds of neuroaesthetics are in De Anima by
Aristotle (see also Theophrast). Then we could jump to Montaigne and John
Dewey to read about human experience. Then jump to Ramachandran and Amy
Ione for example, but also to the philosophers working on the relations
between art, brain and human consciousness. But then also: Alcmeon,
Galeno, Thomas Willis, Da Vinci, Galvani, Broca, Wiernicke, Brodmann I
just simply cannot drop names... I myself investigate musical
consciousness.
I currently work in Mexico with a group of patients with cerebral palsy
(working on neuroplasticity to better their condition). They couldn't care
less about sarcams about the validity of neurosciences. They couldn't care
less if some people have existential anxiety when viewing voxels on a
computer screen, voxels that "translate" their aesthetics experience of
a painting.
We paint and make music and we do that because we have learned about
neurological deficits and functional brain anatomy and because we have
learned about the human creative processes and how music and art (with its
subcategories) could bring well being to our society.
And by the way, the falsity of mind-body split is so evident with such
patients that it amazes me to meet people who still believe that the mind
is somewhere out there...
And that it's up to me.
My apologies to the group for this long post.
Luc
www.lucdelannoy.com
----- Original Message ----
From: Geoff <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 11:40:51 AM
Subject: Re: Neurology and "Art"
William: Fine with me. Neuroscience doesn't scare me. When you learn
something about aesthetics from brain imaging and neurosurgery let me know
what it is.
I have a suspicion that what you will learn about is brain imaging and
neurosurgery. Now, if you want to infer poetically from your new
knowledge, that would be up to you. Just let me know what you've learned
about hard edge realism or expressionism or public (or private) taste in
any field of artistic endeavour. Infants' direction of gaze or length of
gaze won't cut it with me.
Geoff C
----- Original Message ----- From: "William Conger"
<[email protected]>
To: <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 11:00 AM
Subject: Re: Neurology and "Art"
You don't get it because you're not trying at all. You cite no experts.
You begin with a judgment, based on a preconceived idea, faulty at the
first level of logic, and hold to that. It's not about science vs the
humanities. It's about the substance of the physical world and how we
function in it as physical beings. Our beliefs are a product of that
physicality and they are themselves symbolized networks of biological
life. As a noted biochemist said,"biology does not stop at the neck".
Obviously, measuring is more than placing a ruler next to something. It
means analysis of data, deductive and inductive reasoning, testing
hypothesis, and the like. If it's physical, it's measurable; that is,
belief with evidence. And what is not physical is merely belief without
evidence. So if we are confined to belief, why not try to gather as much
evidence for beliefs as we can? What is the history of mankind if not
the gathering of evidence for beliefs? What is so taboo about wanting to
do that? Why is it good to have beliefs without evidence. As I said
earlier, this refusal to even examine the issue (brain=mind) is a redux
of the prelate refusing to look through Galileo's telescope.
I think you are just resisting the falsity of the mind-body split.
I'll say that neuroscience is the most promising route of inquiry for new
perspectives on aesthetic judgment, just as it is for all cognition. If
science can show us how we think it can lead us to why we think.
Tell me again why this is such a dangerous and censored idea. Is it the
Bible? Some religious dogma?
Finally, why do you and others here use gossipy anecdotes to illustrate
your arguments? Doing that is a ruse, an effort to make complicated,
nuanced concepts simple and everyday. Your dentist and his painless
patient: My dentist has a very high speed drill, enabling many people to
forego a local anesthetic. What's the point of these anecdotes?
Everybody knows that a general principle is not proven or falsified by
