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Against Armchair Literature (pg. 2)
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| nefardec |
| quote: | Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On
I'm certain you can find some way to worm your way around it, but whatever you have to say, remember that you are synthesizing statements to prove your point. Not votes, but truths that faithfully (in faith) reflect your perspective.
//Wait, I can see how you might've misinterpreted what I said - Art is in essence prone to contribution as a democracy might be. I mean "A piece of art should never be subject to a democratic process" - as in, it should not be subject to majority direction, at odds with the discretion of the individual, a minority - the artist. I'm sure you can agree, here - I'm defending minorities, after all! |
if this means the production of art should not be inspired by a popularity contest, then yes, i agree.
but within collectives and minority communities i believe democratic processes make for great art.
i don't subscribe to the 'solitary genius' renaissance and enlightenment fairy tale.
also, i know you know there is a difference between individuals and minorities. |
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| Joss Weatherby |
What does it matter? If people derive pleasure from it then its not worth getting too worked up over.
That is the entire point of everything. Deriving pleasure somehow/sometime from an investment of our time and/or money is why we wake up in the morning.
People that analyze art are as bad as stock brokers and investment bankers. They apply tangible values to things of no real particular physical value, only perceived value (that is if you ignore the actual physical value of the material used, a golden statue is not worth anymore than a big block of gold the same weight). |
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| Halcyon+On+On |
| quote: | Originally posted by Joss Weatherby
What does it matter? If people derive pleasure from it then its not worth getting too worked up over.
That is the entire point of everything. Deriving pleasure somehow/sometime from an investment of our time and/or money is why we wake up in the morning.
People that analyze art are as bad as stock brokers and investment bankers. They apply tangible values to things of no real particular physical value, only perceived value (that is if you ignore the actual physical value of the material used, a golden statue is not worth anymore than a big block of gold the same weight). |
What if you derive pleasure from analyzing art? |
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| Halcyon+On+On |
| quote: | Originally posted by nefardec
but within collectives and minority communities i believe democratic processes make for great art. |
I am sure that you're right, but do you have any examples?
| quote: | | i don't subscribe to the 'solitary genius' renaissance and enlightenment fairy tale. |
Of course not. There is no such thing as 'solitary', especially when it comes to art.
| quote: | | also, i know you know there is a difference between individuals and minorities. |
Really? I think it was clear I was being intentionally obtuse. |
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| Joss Weatherby |
| quote: | Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On
What if you derive pleasure from analyzing art? |
Thats fine, but Lira seems like he is saying something like it should be expected of others to do the same, or that people should take the same critical view he does.
I didn't really read his post though. |
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| meriter |
Wow look at those boobs!
tl;dr |
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| EgosXII |
art is not science, and should be kept as far from it as possible IMO.
you can analyse art, but if you're going to the depths of giving it a scientific meaning its YOU providing the theory, not the original work.
also, Ayn Rand was an insane idiot. don't compare her to significant philosophical figures thanks. |
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| nefardec |
| quote: | Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On
I am sure that you're right, but do you have any examples?
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sure, but first we would need to define 'great', otherwise the examples are meaningless. if great is to mean 'well known' for example, then the point is moot.
| quote: | Originally posted by Halcyon+On+On
Really? I think it was clear I was being intentionally obtuse. |
Was not clear to me given how much gets said about me and minorities on this forum. |
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| Arbiter |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lira
Ayn Rand, however, did much more harm than the other people I mentioned precisely because she was a great story-teller and knew bugger all about the stuff she was talking about, which definitely made her all the more confident about the content of her writings. Her ideas have been challenged by academics, including otherwise logical allies, such as Nozick have turned against her ideas, but due to her influence outside these circles, these debates lack the influence to actually have an impact on these ideas. Such is the power of narrative: Feeling a story is more powerful than looking at numbers, for one, and that's why Jenny McCarthy's account of how her son got autism from a vaccine is so much more compelling than the dozens of studying proving that's impossible.
Ideas put forth by novelists may become quickly popular if the authors are charismatic writers, but that doesn't mean they're right. I've jestingly written about 1984 and how poor Orwell's take on the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis is (of course, this is far from being the main point of the book, but it renders the story as probable as Usain Bolt breaking more world records if we chop one of his legs off... and the butt-hurt fandom makes the criticism all the more amusing) and if you extrapolate the concept of story-telling to other media, you can clearly see that it can have a harmful (and unintended) impact on society. Such is the CSI Effect, for instance.
My first criticism to literature can be summarised thus: it's time we bridged the gap described by C.P Snow and treated literature as the hotbed of ideas it truly is. There are books such as "Batman and Philosophy", "House and Philosophy" and even "Simpsons and Philosophy", which bring academic topics to the attention of the public at large. However, that's not enough. That's not daring enough. It's about time scientists took literature more seriously and analysed some of the ideas proposed by the authors not as literature - but as scientific/philosophic hypotheses that need to be scrutinised. Likewise, authors should stop fooling themselves that beauty conveys truth. It doesn't. Depending on the work, there may well be the momentary suspension of disbelief that is typical of fiction. But, when an author intends to describe something that may well happen in the real world, Dan Browning the public has undesirable outcomes. And, when doing the research for a novel that purports to be realistic, the author should also link to the reference material he used, so the readers can have access to the same material. |
I think that you have misidentified the source of the problem and, as a result, have suggested a remedy that would be ineffective. For instance, you suggest that scientists “[take] literature more seriously and analyse[] some of the ideas proposed by the authors . . . as hypotheses that need to be scrutinised,” yet in the case of one of your examples—the works of Ayn Rand—the ideas have already been subjected to the type of academic scrutiny you propose. As you note, however, that scrutiny has largely failed to influence the reception of those ideas within the general population, and as a result it has done little to prevent the type of “harmful impact on society” which you appear to be primarily concerned with.
I suspect that similar engagement with other literary works by the academic community would likewise be unproductive. In nearly every case, such scrutiny would only reveal what we ought to already intuitively know: that the intellectual content of literary works is at best trivial, and frequently erroneous. And, predictably, the discovery and exposition of that conclusion would do little to influence the reception of the work, or the ideas it conveys, beyond academic circles.
Similarly, I find your suggestion that authors supply references to the source material that they used in constructing their narratives somewhat impractical. It seems to me that authors would have little incentive to do so. Since the persuasive power of their writing derives from the narrative itself, and not from any underlying evidence or reasoning, the inclusion of such references would only serve to make their writing more vulnerable to (generally unwelcome) criticism. Furthermore, there is no expectation among the vast majority of the intended audience that references will be provided, and only a small minority of readers would ever pay attention to the references even if they were included. |
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| Lira |
| quote: | Originally posted by Joss Weatherby
Thats fine, but Lira seems like he is saying something like it should be expected of others to do the same, or that people should take the same critical view he does.
I didn't really read his post though. |
That's really not the point :p
| quote: | Originally posted by EgosXII
art is not science, and should be kept as far from it as possible IMO. |
I disagree. Both are important sources of ideas and interpretations about the world and the difference between science, philosophy and literature is more of a continuum than anything firmly established.
| quote: | Originally posted by EgosXII
you can analyse art, but if you're going to the depths of giving it a scientific meaning its YOU providing the theory, not the original work. |
I don't understand what you're getting at here.
| quote: | Originally posted by EgosXII
also, Ayn Rand was an insane idiot. don't compare her to significant philosophical figures thanks. |
I'm not even taking her philosophy into consideration, because it is outrageous. More like the impact of her work: There's something to be said about the popularity of Sartre and Camus (who were both literary figures) compared to other existentialists who never ventured outside academia. This would make the post much longer, so I decided to focus on a more straightforward case.
| quote: | Originally posted by Arbiter
I think that you have misidentified the source of the problem and, as a result, have suggested a remedy that would be ineffective. |
Hmmm... fair enough. What would you say the source of the problem is? |
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| SYSTEM-J |
Lira, this won't solve a damn thing. Michael Crichton used to cite his academic sources in his novels - some of his novels had entire bibliographies in the back - and it didn't hinder his wanton butchery of the science he read about, nor did it inspire anyone to find these obscure academic papers and read through the undiluted science to find out exactly what liberties he'd been taking. If anything, a bibliography is more likely to engender trust in the author, which is not what you want. People only check up on the facts if they're skeptical, and if you've been won over by the author's charisma you won't be skeptical in the first place. If you are... well you either won't be influenced or you'll do your own research, regardless of whether or not the author gives you a handy starting point.
Also: a lot of idiots in this thread who clearly didn't bother reading the OP at all. |
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| Lira |
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Lira, this won't solve a damn thing. Michael Crichton used to cite his academic sources in his novels - some of his novels had entire bibliographies in the back - and it didn't hinder his wanton butchery of the science he read about, nor did it inspire anyone to find these obscure academic papers and read through the undiluted science to find out exactly what liberties he'd been taking. |
*does research on Crichton*
Indeed, this doesn't seem to be mentioned at all. However, wouldn't you say that his acquaintance with science (even if far from perfect) made Jurassic Park more credible and gave palaeontology a bit of a popularity boost?
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
If anything, a bibliography is more likely to engender trust in the author, which is not what you want. People only check up on the facts if they're skeptical, and if you've been won over by the author's charisma you won't be skeptical in the first place. |
Hmm... now that would be an interesting experiment.
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
If you are... well you either won't be influenced or you'll do your own research, regardless of whether or not the author gives you a handy starting point. |
There's some truth to this indeed.
Hhmmm.... |
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