Art, Science and Engenering

If you read this blog often you’ve probably picked up on the two core themes of posts: art and science. I focus on these because the are currently the two domains of my life.

Some of you may not know this but I an currently completing my Ph.D. in Neurobiology, in the laboratory of Bill Newsome at Stanford University. And when I’m not running experiments, discussing current science papers and analyzing my own data, I’m working on the art that is featured in this blog.

For the past year I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the relationship between art and science as I actively practice both. I recently had a chance to begin to crystallize my thoughts on the subject when posting to the Steampunk Treehouse mailing list and I’ve decided to repost my thoughts here.

The relationship between science and art came up while we were discussing the Phonautograph Machine of Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinvill. Several opinions were offered by CTP, Nathanial Taylor and Benna Currin and Don Hayler. Was the Phonautograph a work of conceptual art, a work of science or a work of pure engendering? Or something in between all three.

I’m not going to rehash all the arguments and comments here but I am going to transcribe an edited version of my final post on the subject:

Let me start by saying that I do think there is a difference between art, science, engineering.

Before I say how I think art and science differ let me say where I think they are similar. Both art and science are, principally, highly refined methods of communication. In this respect they differ from engineering which is not principally about communication.

What is science? Science is the practice of taking observable, material phenomena and abstracting or generalizing them so they can be communicated independent of the original phenomena. In doing this a scientist take the specific and the concrete and generates to the abstract. When it’s done well, this abstraction can then be used to understand another seemingly different phenomena.

In a classic,cartoon example of science, grumpy Newton was woken form a nap beneath a tree by a falling apple. Now Newton is almost exclusively known as a scientist (I think he did some finger painting to limited critical success), so I think he’ll be a good example for this. What did newton do in response to observing this apple fall — he began to generalize and abstract.

He saw that phenomena was not just about apples interacting with heads but all objects interacting with each other. He formulated the Law of Universal Graviton: Fg=G*((M1*M2)/r^2). This communicates the following: Every object in the universe attracts every other object with a force (Fg) directed along the line of centers for the two objects that is proportional (=) to the product of their masses (M1*M2) and inversely proportional (/) to the square(^2) of the separation between the two objects (r). (The G is a constant, discovered through experimentation, that makes all the math work out)

Now to produce this tasty bit of science Newton employed a hand full of sciences favorite tools: quantification, reductionism, experimentation, observation and mathematic. Importantly the use of these tools do not make what Newton did science. Nor did it make it good science. It is science because it abstracted a specific phenomena (the apple falling) and communicated it (via the law of universal graviton) so that it could be applied to other, seeming different, phenomena (like the orbits of planets.) Now, it’s considered good science because the abstraction is continually applicable to new situations. This is what scientist mean when they talk about proof.

Had Newton written a lengthly sonnet about the apple falling from the tree which communicated the joys and frustrations of have a ripe, young mind, hurtling towards greatness from the ancient tree of knowledge only to be rebuffed by the harsh terrestrial surface we would be comfortable describing this as a work of art.

So, what’s art? Art is the practice of communicating ideas, abstractions or internal mental states through specific material instantiation. Art begins with the abstract and the general that are difficult or impossible to communicate directly and the artist gives them a (sometimes literal) concrete existence. This instantiation, when successful, communicates the abstract, independent of artist.

Poetry is the example we’ll use here. One of my poets is T.S. Eliot, who, in The Hollow Men, wrote:

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar

Eliot was faced with the thoughts and feelings of dread, despair and desolation endemic to post WWI Europe that, to this day, are difficult to express by those who lived it. Eliot gave his internal abstractions specific form with the words he chose. When you read these words Eliot’s internal abstractions are communicated to you and are recreated within you. This poem, with it’s specific words, images and formating, exists beyond Eliot and post WWI Europe. It continues to communicate today which makes it at successful art (which is perhaps the best stand in for good art).

Now artists can employ some of the tools of science but this does not make what they do science. The photographer Chris Jordan uses quantification and statistics; Piett Mondrian employed reductionism; Bach used mathematics. They produced works of art, not science.

Scientists can use the methods of artists. I speak from experience when I tell you that scientists will fixate on the thickness and color of strokes on a chart like no artist I’ve ever seen. Compositional clarity is something the best scientists strive for when presenting their data. Edward Tuffte has written about this like no other. Carl Sagan wrote about the science of cosmology with great artistry and his books were successful for this very reason — as an artist, a writer, he was able to communicate his ineffable and the abstract feelings about the science of cosmology. His non-fiction books were art; his research papers science.

Now, finally, engineering is the practice of insuring that physical objects function properly within a specific range of conditions. There is no element of engineering that involves communicating (not that engineers do not need to communicate but communication is not fundamental to the act ). When a plane is engineered, the engineer need not worry about the science of how all objects move thought all air; or more generally how matter moves thought four dimensions. They need to insure that this 747 move though terrestrial air in a given slice of the atmosphere, with a given load for a give duration. Catapults were engineered long before Newton abstracted the attraction of objects to the earth with gravitation.

Please, do not take this to mean that I believe that it is always crystal clear what is science, what is art and what is engineering. The line between them can, at rare times, be blurred — but only because they can also exist separately. I like to think of the two as sides to a coin or linked together in a reaction that can run two directions:

Abstract -> Concrete (art)
Concrete -> Abstract (science)

This entire perspective does not come from any great scholarship but from my on practice of each. Whenever I cut or grind an arc I have a wonderfully experience where there is a sustained connection between my abstract, mathematical understanding of an arc as a line where no two successive sets of points are linear and the concrete experience of slowly and continuously rotating my hands and body. I try to inhabit the curve — or “be” the curve in a kung-fu kind of way — is very meditative and zen. It is what I love about fabrication specifically, and creation generally — moving form the abstract representations in your mind to the concrete representations in the world.