I take it on faith that
there is such a thing as an objectively true reality. The universe is under no
compulsion to be so ordered, but most of the people I am aware of who have put
the notion to the test seem to be in agreement that their experiences do not
refute it.
There are several sorts
of people who have attempted to ferret out the true nature of reality. Among
them are scientists and artists. I might go so far as to propose that the
central goal of either science or art is precisely to illuminate some aspect of
the ultimate truth of reality. These people, of course, have had other goals:
to make a living, to create useful tools, to have fun, to entertain — in some
cases, to maim, kill, or destroy. But those goals, I think, are peripheral. The
scientist and the artist want to reveal truth.
During the brief period
when I was a practicing scientist, I never thought that I would discover the
complete nature of reality. I merely revealed a small bit about the
relationship between the moisture content of soils in the Great Plains and the
brightness temperature measured by a satellite-borne radiometer. In just the
same way, my poems, if they are any good, can reveal only very small bit of
reality. Both efforts, if they are to be successful, must be tightly focused.
Both endeavors must
proceed from the assumption — at minimum, a tentative assumption — that there
is a true reality that might be discoverable. These two pursuits use different
methods and seek different sorts of knowledge. Nevertheless, the mental habits
instilled by an extensive education in a science can transfer to the practice
of an art, and vice versa. The great scientists — Einstein, Newton, Feynman,
Hawking, etc. — have all been highly creative, in addition to being the
methodical sort that we associate with science. And the great artists, in
addition to their obvious creativity, must have had a healthy dose of method.
In short, both sorts are humans who are intensely interested and use all of the
human cognitive faculties at their disposal to scratch that itch.
But, you protest, isn’t
art about creating things of beauty? Of course! But what is beauty? To many
people, a thing of beauty is simply something with a pleasing appearance or
sound. That is a most shallow notion of beauty. I might refer you to a
dialogue, in Robert Heinlein’s Stranger
in a Strange Land, in which Jubal Harshaw explained that a Rodin statue
titled She Who Used to Be the Beautiful Heaulmière – which showed a very old woman with a time-ravaged body – was beautiful. Not
pretty, but beautiful. As another character then explained, “She has her own
face”, a face built by a lifetime of living out her own story. Beauty is not necessarily
about prettiness.
Theoretical physicists
sometimes use the phrase “truth and beauty”, in reference to this or that
elegant theoretical construct. To the uninitiated, such things may not seem
beautiful. To the physicist, truth is beauty. The same can be said of poets.
The title of this
little essay suggests that I’m not talking about only arts and sciences, but
faith as well. Perhaps you wonder when I will get to that. But I started there.
Neither science nor art can get anywhere without first accepting, solely on
faith, that there is a reality to be explored.
So, of course, the
scientist and the artist both can feel at home with holding and practicing a
faith. Not all, of course, will be comfortable with any of the recognized
religions. But those who claim that they totally eschew faith, in favor of
objective reality, are fooling themselves.
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