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This paper is intended not to spoon feed you with each sentence but to challenge your way of thinking about what format a paper should be written in. I do not want to provide you a commonly accepted format…I want you to enjoy a different style that could be thought of as combining stream of consciousness with academic structure.
In a time where mainstream media perpetuates to us the dichotomies in the perceptual debates in science with intelligent design and Darwinian evolution and where a survey taken for whatever it’s worth that Americans can name only two or less living artists (depending on what your definition of artist is since musicians are artists and everyone has some love for music) shows an interesting background not for all of America but for much of what is presented in the mainstream media which does not present an attention span that is able to deal with much more than what I have just stated in this paragraph. We know there is more to these fields of work and play all too well whether media outlets express it or not.
A less hastened approach to this issue will have us seeing the shared essential role for the artist and scientist as engaging in the process of “VIVID STUDY” and to express or apply their results strategically. Both the scientist and artist need to go through the process of vivid study if they are to start having an effective impact in delivering a workable framework on the issue of warfare whether it’s the scientists (And funders!) producing a tried and true effective military technology or the artist attempting to thoroughly display, emphasize, or convince on-looking thinkers that their manifestations are worthy to be seriously considered or to remain as an engaging work that fits an attentive standard, becomes the standard, or raises the standard for future development.
Leonardo Davinci had the idea that the artist must know all the laws of nature, not merely perspective. A hybridization of scientist and artist into simultaneous mind and action, using the eye of vivid study to capture the understanding then artistically depict the outcomes of those laws.
And though he called war “beastly madness” he was employed briefly to design military devices most likely with the idea to protect that which he loved.
This role of the artist and scientist during times of war calls for a searching out of the forces that instigate and direct the warring and through vivid study and the eventual expressions thereafter, strategically provoking dialog causing influential circles to build a momentum that impacts larger circles and so on. A phrase for this may be a “networking of momentum into systems of dialog towards application” or just going for the all out strategy of spreading a wildfire.
Through vivid study the artist and scientist evaluates the context, gathers the elements, content, or materials, and thinks about the processes of how that content came to be and to compound and form all that is discovered from applied experiment for the public to use as food for thought, provoking dialog to shape and co-evolve the discoveries further into a new context.
Of course group association, concern, and volition are keys. The political cartoonist, the underground comic artist and the marvel and dc comic teams will expectedly have various intents and audiences to present the subject of warfare.
And the self-tormented will not have the same expressions on war, as do those who are happy and content or those who detach from the war issues as much as possible. And both can be constricted to the field they belong to and bound to the pressure of peers (even long after high school peer pressure seemed to have been a passing phase!) that can disrupt research outcomes if they are focused on strictly pleasing peers instead of presenting outcomes that are outgrowths from vivid study.
Military scientists working on new weaponry will not have the same relationship with society as the specialist in ecology working to develop new organic farming methods though each desire the protection of what they hold close unless they are self-destructive.
So more specifically is what ‘kind’ of artist and scientist has a significant role in expressing the significance of war?
The kind who sees the need to act and seizes the opportunity to push themselves into that storm of activity, realizing that war can effect all walks of life, all layers of society, and can forever shape society’s history in a bittersweet productive destruction and realizes that the public at large is usually duped into thinking that war is necessary by the governments that have pursued it or given hazy reasons as to why aggression is being pursued.
Those who know the reality of “only the dead shall see the end of war” yet pursue the ideal of a war-less society if the profit of peace is vivid enough in their vision to push through the “fog of war” and its relation to the other past-wise claims of “the truth is the first casualty of war” and “truth is stranger than fiction.” This hazy blockade can instigate within many people an intense pursuit to grasp these intriguing puzzles and to find the valuable knowledge that can only be discovered through that thorough passion, rigorous pursuit, and vivid study to find the truths in the fog, the truths in relation to war. Scientists and artists can help tremendously to the collective process, even democratic process of getting truths out as a public service during times of war.
Who hasn’t heard of the “art of war”? We can also add the tag line the “science of war” from the psyops to processes that manifested the arsenal stocks and deployments to the radiation tests in the post-war zones and medical treatments of soldiers and civilians, a kind of “post-war science.”
If there is any need for clarity it’s during the times of war. Extreme tension, extreme conflict, billions of dollars in resources and soldier and civilian lives at stake where millions and potentially billions of these lives will be intensely affected forever, the dead without a story to tell and the money never to be used for anything else, the opportunity for other possible futures never to be manifested and those in the present rummaging through the damage to salvage the origins and reasons for the loss of sanity, stability, prevention of progress, and the sources of this chaos induction.
Those who value the freedoms in life will express that value with more emphasis when war enters the sphere of life. That old saying of not knowing what you have until it’s gone, the need to re-visit that value after realizing the distaste, friction, and psychological struggle of living without that value and the need to figure ways to protect such value from becoming crushed.
Expressing the desire for a resurgence of a life where there is a lack of fear and a lack of having to ponder the death of innocents or the uncertainty in the reasons that war marches on and the wonder of what processes allowed war to burst the seams. The desire for obstacles and distractions of war to be absent or even become obsolete.
Most of us want to protect that which we love but we must know the true threats before mobilizing extreme force so worse chaos does not backfire on a wide scale from the soldiers to the reputation of a powerful nation and it’s allies.
Simply expressing what the true threats are after a vivid study of the overall scenario can be seen as the role of the concerned scientist and artist during such times where there is a need for extremely wise decision and intelligent practice in order to avoid multiple disasters of grand proportion. Providing more wisdom and intelligence to decision makers and the public at large creates the awareness that concerns and useable strategies are alive in society in various forms outside of the usual forms of government and that there is a free expression of this worthy of being circulated in an open source shared network methodology creating a healthy climate of social diagnosis as a collective movement, culminating unique perspectives into a mosaic that consists of a more multi-faceted lenses with more insight, exciting potential, and inspiration. A kind of art formed by the scientific process of effectively organizing focused and concerned people.
War will inevitably provoke more expressions due to the compressed, explosive, atomic, and the all-encompassing impacts that war has and a role for the artist and scientist can be seen as one who presents ideas with focus amidst the concerns, outrage, and social turmoil that can develop. Standing as one who presents a more stable series of relationships that have occurred, are occurring, and what may come.
Their role beyond vivid study should be of post-study mapping and engaging in an open collaborative of social planning with the public. This can provoke more participation from the public if it becomes aware that everyone will inevitably be affected by war and the socio-political climate will forever be reshaped and even those who desire to be only observers or those attempting to detach from direct interaction with the issues will be swept up in the process.
Despite the provoking effects war can have on those paying attention, it’s possible that indifference will persist and to work towards penetrating the thick membrane of this indifference may be seen as the role of the scientist and artist if they are not indifferent themselves, expressing the profits of war and the profits of peace.
Just as there is such a thing as a regional military occupation there can be an occupation of knowledge and creativity in the regions of the public mind to increase an awareness of the need for a development towards strategy and action more aligned with the accurate context of why warfare is occurring and how to effectively influence those making political decisions that will affect millions of lives forever.
Another aspect to all of this is for scientists and artists to network with and collaborate with quality investigative journalists for a greater net worth of value output to be spawned into society’s mindscapes forming and delivering a potent “social software” for people to plan and mobilize with more effectiveness. Which then brings to mind a need to then collaborate with software designers to breed an exciting outgrowth from the mixture between persons with knowledge, creativity, and application towards the direction of having a significant social impact.
Utilizing the various multi-media developments will extend the voices of the artist and scientists’ products of vivid study and enable a closer relation of their works with the public through familiar mediums of content and contact delivery both online and offline.
From Shakespeare to John Lennon, the creative multi-mediums of writing, theater, and music helped then and can help now deliver intriguing and engaging methods of social awareness.
And for the past 60 years, the Federation of American Scientists (www.fas.org) have pursued as stated on their website “..exemplary record of achieving meaningful results in strategic security, with research and education projects in nuclear arms control and global security; conventional arms transfers; proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; information technology for human health; and government information policy.”
They are influential and accessible and the Omidyar Network, founded by the founder of Ebay, has deemed their offshoot “Secrecy News” headed by Steve Aftergood worthy of being funded multiple thousands of dollars which is due to their vivid study, concern, and utilization of the Internet as their main means of delivery and accessibility.
There will be vastly differing opinions on the products of scientific study and artistry and this may be due to an element of isolation of the two. But more recently it is becoming a collaborative hybridization of expression such as the many such group efforts listed at http://www.artistinresidence.org.
Perhaps amongst all of this is the most important aspect which is the funders/funding for artists and scientists to reach a large-scale influence during an age when what is deemed science and art does not always hold as much relevance at the street level as it should. American society on a large scale is at peace but it is fragmented and not community driven. Calls for “think globally, act locally” seem to give an excessively expansive and mindless local rhythm to the movement if we can keep track of what is going on in a neighborhood three thousand miles away but are not aware of what’s going on one block away.
Exploring other countries and cultures is highly beneficial but for an efficient community influence to begin and for serious interest from funders to present itself, there must be a focus, a vivid study catalyzed by knowledgeable and creatively engaging persons who can prove that what they are focusing on has relevance at the most practical levels of social exchange whether it’s a more advanced civil defense system or more advanced practices for emotional health.
If it can be demonstrated that the output from introducing a collaborative hybridization rub-off between artists and scientists are having powerfully useful in-demand products and practices then more funding and therefore more development with the potential for more advancements will arrive.
Why not have more creatively engaging scientists and scientific minded artists expanding the interest and freshness of their fields that far too often seem too narrow minded or flaky, creating a sub-culture that alienates and provokes a fundamentalist adherence or dogmatic approach with exclusive membership or social membership ties that can become elitist.
What is the harm in having more knowledgeable works of art and more creatively engaging works of science to gain more respect from the populous since the power of knowledge and the skill and gracefulness of artwork combined, form a potent dose of provoking food for thought and aesthetic interest that can cover more territory than either on their own. Perhaps if the public is engaged in issues presented in powerfully creative methods, funding will follow and deep influence will gather momentum and perhaps the development of a more insightful direction as a whole will arise.
In order for scientists and artists during times of war to exercise their roles, the socio-political climate needs freedom of speech to be intact to allow artists and scientists to express their visions that have been birthed from the processes they have labored through no matter how optimistic or dark it is to the public or to those deemed authorities, authors of our movements.
Minds that have worked to freely explore the worlds of the intricate need to be provided with a social atmosphere that welcomes the free voice of the free mind not a climate that stifles it because of personal discomfort or economic fears. If there is wisdom beyond such fears, it must be cultivated, organized, and shared.
And if there continues to be war within the science, arts, and political communities, how does that affect the progress of the whole system of society? All the dichotomies and conflicts that are desired to remain segregated and that relation to the public at large seeking or debating the relevance of each to the series of communities that they are involved in, how can a democracy grow into the streets? Streets that consist of stores that offer scientifically made products and creatively driven expressions.
Or maybe by us engaging in war at these levels we will better understand the larger war outside our physical borders and maybe the mainstream media will broadcast what we have learned about our cultural wars and then we can begin to apply our new found learning into a larger context. That I think will take too long if it ever happens, so I would recommend that we utilize new media tools and outlets and form new ones that can handle the new discoveries that will arise from the partnerships of those in science and the arts who are fearless of the issue of confronting war and it’s power over society and how society can overpower the destructiveness of war.
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