Tag: science

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Nature of the Human Body: Art, Science, or Both?

Dr. Carin Berkowitz’s talk discussed the interdisciplinary nature of the human body as it pertains in art and the science of anatomy. She thoroughly analyzed Charles Bell’s work in an attempt to argue that the human body is a visual and experienced art form above all else. In doing so, Dr. Berkowitz gave elaborate examples of Bell’s historic artwork being compared to contemporary works to show how the human form has adapted in the ways it is shown through art. The human body presents a platform for, arguably the most authentic form, of what is known to be “Nature”. She discussed the ways in which the body is scientifically and critically manipulated to either support or refute this comparison. Due to its “inherent beauty” and normative symmetry (from the exterior), the body is loved by artists and scientists alike.

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Art and Science

I thought Carin Berkowitz’s lecture of “Anatomists and the Stolen Statues: Stories of Science, Art, and Religion” was very interesting and discussed two areas of study that I always separate into very different categories: art and science. When growing up, I was always told there were “sciency” people and “creative” people, and usually people stuck with that category. Obviously I knew there were exceptions to this, but still today you see most scientists sticking with math and numbers and most artists sticking with photography, drawing, painting, etc. This lecture was very interesting because in the history of anatomy, there was no division between the two fields. Both art and science were combined in everyday learning which is something I thought was particularly intriguing about this whole presentation.

I thought the Philosophy of Learning section Carin Berkowitz discussed was most interesting because she went into detail about how Bell would show his students the human body with visual displays and then have the students prepare their own learning. I question if this practice was beneficial, since I would imagine that not all people who were studying to be a doctor had artistic skills. It is clear that Bell was an incredible artist and was an incredible doctor, but what if his students weren’t as gifted? Did this type of learning deter students from entering the medical field? If students were only artistic or only interested in science did they then not enter the medical field because they didn’t have both aspects? That is something that I found very confusing, for I know that it is hard to be both incredible at art OR science let alone art AND science.

I always find that I learn better by actually participating in the work I am doing and learning via experience rather than just listening to a lecture. I agreed with Bell’s idea that there should be hands on learning spaces and hospital schools for students to understand the human body. I can’t imagine that the doctors knew what they were doing at all before this idea came to place, since it is very hard to transfer book knowledge into practical knowledge.

It is incredible that some of his artwork is still preserved today since it is not only accurate but truly a beautiful piece of art. Of course now our medical students learn off diagrams and photos, but this was the beginning of that creation. It is very unique that Bell didn’t have an artist creating these pieces for him but rather created them himself, replicating the exact features of the human body. It is also nice how instead of giving up with the idea of understanding the human body because it was difficult to get an actual anatomy to work with, he figured out a way to understand it in a different light. I thought this lecture was very relevant to the Presence of the Past lecture series because it provided an understanding of the past and how it effects our future, in the medical world and in the artistic world. It is important to preserve this knowledge and memory for our current society as well as our future societies.

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Competition Between Amoebas: A Fight for Evolution

On April 8th, Dr. Suegene Noh, Colby College’s own Assistant Professor of Biology, contributed to our Presence of The Past lecture series with a presentation titled “How current genomes are shaped by evolutionary pasts.” This lecture was extremely fascinating and certainly stood out from our previous lectures. We have heard a lot about the impact of the humanities, psychology and literature has on our present day interpretation of the past. However, Dr. Noh was the first presenter to introduce explicit science into one of our talks. Her ideas were unique and her presentation was very well articulated. She understood and adapted to the fact that most people in the room did not have extensive knowledge surrounding the concepts of “multicellular aggregated amoebas” – this I really appreciated. Yet, her ideas fully fit into the Presence of The Past series mold. She began the lecture by discussing the context of her profession. Dr. Noh is an evolutionary biologist and primarily discusses the parallel between genetics and social interactions amongst multicellular organisms.

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Emotion-less Science and Fact-less Literature

Dr. Wai Chee Dimok’s lecture has allowed me to consider the potential intersections that exist between science and literature. Dr. Dimok suggested that the potential failures of scientists in inspiring people to understand the impacts of climate change lies in their inability to express emotional significance. She suggested that the lack of emotion in science makes climate change unbelievable for the common member of society. Literature provides the platform for the unbelievable aspects of climate change to be portrayed with emotional relevance and impact. The role of the humanities in scientific development of knowledge lies in the ability to encourage scientists to further establish the humanistic qualities of thought in subjective fact. The scientific method from question and hypothesis to result and conclusion must in turn have elements of emotion and social quality to encourage valuable and necessary change in structured culture.

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Science and The Humanities: A Recipe for Success

On March 11th, Wai Chee Dimock, a english professor at Yale University, added to our series through a lecture titled, “William Blake and Elizabeth Bishop in the Anthropocene.” The speaker selected literary works by these two poets and really elaborated on how science and the humanities must merge in order to facilitate public understanding of highly relevant environmental  issues. My first impression of the lecture was how it was somewhat similar to a previous talk by Georgetown Professor Nathan K. Hensley regarding “Action After Nature: Climate Crisis & the Force of Literature.” Professor Hensley’s lecture highlighted the importance of the relationship between thought and action, and how it is influenced by past events. I found it fascinating how Professor Dimock drew parallels between the works of Bishop and Blake just how Professor Hensley connected Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland to a transitionary period. Having made this connection early on, I paired my previously formulated opinions about this field with Professor Dimock’s knowledge to further understand the parallels between science and the written word.

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Science of Race

Projit Bihari Mukharji’s “Collecting Bodies, Bodily Collectives” was very interesting and unique from our other presentations, being that he approached the topic of “presence of the past” differently. As opposed to our other presenters, Projit decided to start with the presence and work his way backwards to the past, which was an interesting approach compared to our other presentations who have started in the past and worked their way to the present.

This lecture provided a very interesting to view of racism, looking at it in a biological way that I am not familiar with. As an Education major and a Sociology minor, I constantly read about societies’ view of races and racism and how it is socially constructed. However, this view was different in the fact that science was involved. Isabella Scribano’s post was interesting, particularly in her example about the anthropology class she took and how intelligence was measured with head size. Since different races had different measurements, it was perceived that some races were overall smarter than other races. It is interesting in this example, and others, that genetics can be used in a society to marginalize a race, even though it could be completely unrelated.

One of Projit’s examples was that there was an advertisement for “BiDil”, a drug that targeted African American hearts and no other hearts…this was very interesting and absurd, since all hearts are the same. Also, what’s concerning about this is that it is very recent. This drug was created and advertised in 2005, making people believe that there are big differences between white hearts and black hearts, which are clearly not true. I thought “gohwil21’s” questions of “whose responsibility is it to stop (or at least inform the public about) questionable science like this- especially when it’s deeply entrenched in cultural norms? Do we have to perform racial experiments to disprove science like this?” was particularly interesting, since I also found myself asking those questions when I learned this information. Is racism just reinforced when drugs and ads like these are made because they have “scientific evidence” to back them up?

Projit’s discussions of the importance of ethics in data collection was very interesting, especially since my current classes are talking about ethics in research. Of course my research is sociology, a very different approach to research, but still ethics apply. The story of  the scientist who used lies and coercion to get bones from the graveyard was wild, because in my mind that was clearly unethical, but that information helped the future of genetics. Ethics is tricky because there is no correct answer, it really depends on who is looking at the situation. Since genetics is often studied after a person has passed, it is very hard to figure out what is ethical and what is not, when you can’t directly talk to the person being studied.

It is interesting that some of these data pools that Projit touched on were very small but lead to giant conclusions to be made. For all we know the information provided actually provides no applicable information for future generations and communities, however is still the current science we educate ourselves with. We have to look at science with a critical eye and not believe everything we read/we are told, just because it is “science”.  There are clearly errors in the past, through poor research studies and techniques, which are currently affecting the present.