Le Roi 2 Cylinder Engine
Le Roi 2 Cylinder
Avalon Airshow 2007 - Part 13 - Jim LeRoy, Bulldog Pitts
This footage was taken by me, on Saturday March 24th. I know that was ages ago, but the footage that I uploaded onto the computer took up a lot of ...
Jim LeRoy Bulldog Pitts St. Petersburg Airfest 2006
Jim, a former Marine Corps Scout/Sniper, holds a BS degree in Aeronautical/Aerospace engineering as well as an Airframe and Powerplant ... all ...
The poetry of science
An interview with Booker-prize winning novelist Ian McEwan caught my eye the other day. He spoke to Nature about the gulf between science and the humanities. The classification of this boundary throws up some interesting areas of contention, especially when looking at those who attempt to stride the gap between the two giants of academia – taking their preconceptions with them.
Romanticism aside, McEwan raised some interesting points. He noted the wall between the two trains of thought, saying it was ’intellectual madness’ for the humanities not to be interested. By the gulf between the archetypal scientist and literary scholar, he refers to differing philosophies. which can lead hostility.
McEwan said: ”There’s something very warm and human about rationality. I think we are all both emotional and rational creatures and many of our conflicts or interactions with each other are mediated through our sense of a natural justice, logic, and rationality. Somewhere along the line in Western culture, probably about the time that Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, an idea grew up that Science was an unruly beast, both cold, abstracted and antithetical to the deep, warm-blooded human nature.
“I think that needs to be unpicked. There is great warmth, to be had, a great cross fertilisation, if you take the time to think, reflectively on what your emotional state is and how this might be changing your decisions.”
How to go about unpicking this perception? McEwan refers to the separation of mind and body imbued in the characters novelists portray – and cites this as an antidote to the embodiment promoted by scientists. Is this part of the greater problem in the public’s perception of the scientific community? Does the notion of science as an inaccessible, dusty discipline trickle down subconciously from those providing our well-thumbed method of escapism? If the two cultures were at peace – what would this acheive?
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