viernes, 30 de septiembre de 2016

Science and art. Synergy to communicate ideas.

To communicate important ideas, create synergy between science and art.


Difficulty for Communication

Light or inconsequential ideas are easily communicate through various means since people who are directed not have any problem to understand and accept them even if they are not reasonable and beneficial. When a political candidate lies, employs fallacies and discover what people need, communicate his ideas, is heard and supported because he appealed to the most primitive emotions and aspects of the person.

In the case of ideas from the natural or social sciences, which are transcendental, complex and of general application, the matter is more difficult because now it is to convince people to use reason and intellectual qualities superior to capture, analyze, understand the message and decide on the appropriate response actions. It's hard because people do not want to make the effort to think or leave the "mental comfort zone" that is provided by ignorance or acceptance of knowledge generally available even if they are wrong.

Synergy, science and art.

The use of innovative ideas for communication can facilitate communication forms. A scientist is understood by other scientists or people very interested in what he does, but art is universal and the use of its possibilities will allow  you to send the message to more people.

Overall, the Synergy comes from a Greek word meaning "cooperation". The concept is used to designate the action of two or more causes that generate a superior effect that would be achieved with the sum of the individual effects (definicion.de).

Synergy is the joint effort of many different scientists and artists as people, provided that both understand the same, agree on the purpose of the message and be consistent with it. You may not have scientific artistic abilities but the artist can explain the focus and details of your particular view of the subject; just as the scientist must explain the general content or the essence of scientific matter for the artist to move it to a presentation or visual format.

In some cases, the scientific and artist may coincide, ie when the scientist is artist at once. It is known to scientists that extend their creative abilities practicing disciplines like music. Examples of a contemporary scientist, is Shigeyoshi Osaki, Japanese chemist who discovered that spider silk violin strings can produce, with excellent properties.


                                                        Shigeyoshi Osaki (Fuente: http://estaticos.elmundo.es/)

It is also classic the example of Einstein playing the violin. It is possible that the musical practice serve him in his mind to come to the surface more easily the ideas that shaped his theories of relativity. Einstein used to say that mental imagery used to address the problem and its solutions; that view is typical of the great painters or sculptors.


                                                  Albert Einstein (Fuente:  http://www.clasesviolinpiano.com/)

The truth is that the minds of scientists and artists is closer than it seems, because both share in common attributes; the creation and joy in the discovery of new things; the need to create and search is ongoing basis.

There are examples of people who gather at the same time the qualities of scientist and artist like Leonardo da Vinci, summum of this happy conjunction of talents. There are other great scientists and artists like Goethe, Samuel Morse, and someone like Brian May, guitarist of Queen, with a doctorate in astrophysics.


                                                                                            Leonardo da Vinci

Communication of critical ideas

What happens when the scientist has no artistic talent? He can go to the artists and if both agree on the assessment of a case and its relevances for society, decide to work together. The scientist presented his theory in scientific usual format, the artist will create visual or graphical attributes that make this theory into something accessible to ordinary people. The equations and numerical results that define a galaxy in the scientific format only scientists understand; beautiful artwork of artists make it possible for all can easily see.

Fischetti (2016) speaks of a powerful team: atmospheric scientist Michael Mann and political cartoonist Tom Toles. Both are outstanding in their fields; both have been warning the world of the threat of climate change; both are attacked by politicians and business leaders. And both recently realized that if they combined talents could find a way to break what they see as a concerted effort to deceive the public. So they created a concise and illustrated book called The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving us crazy.


                                                                         Fuente: http://www.scientificamerican.com/

Mann and Toles added that the public and politicians in America "are so divided that it is difficult to speak of issues including climate change," for they decided to lower barriers presenting ideas with humor and satire.

Satire is a literary and artistic genre, which allows lead to end the vices, follies, abuses and deficiencies to shame individuals, corporations, government, or society itself whipping for improvement. However, the main purpose is constructive social criticism, using wit to draw attention to major individual and social problems.

An organization may also exist geniuses like Leonardo or Goethe with professional and personal skills that enable them to address any matter of organization without difficulty, but they can be inefficient because time and resources are scarce. If the leader of the company identifies and promotes the formation of groups whose members have related skills, what can be achieved through synergy multiplication of efforts and get in less time and with enormous resources are organizational goals. In this case, besides documents with illustrations and computer graphics and other graphics products that help improve understanding and acceptance of the contents, you can also appealed to humor or irony. It all depends on the circumstances and of course, the level of tolerance. A company is a limited company closed which prevents use irony, smoke or satire at its most intense.
Science, business must be accompanied art. See Dr. Brian May (astrophysicist), who will remind Queen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OCOrDnJBaU

References

Satire

Fischetti Mark (2016) 8 Cartoons That Expose Climate Denial
September 30, 2016

Sinergia

5 científicos que también se destacaron como artistas