Attempts at Accounting (my titles are so tacky)

            I propose a moment of silence in thanks to the powers that be (Atkins would credit chaotic energy) that insects have not “hit on a plan for driving air through their tissues instead of letting it soak in,” and “become as large as lobsters” (Haldane, 57).  Phew.  As if earwigs are not awful enough already.  Imagine a rabbit-sized earwig.  Oh, the shivers.  Additionally, I am consoled at learning the irrationality of beast-sized insects too often portrayed in science-fiction films.  Like, that’s not even realistic, guys.

            A favorite challenge of mine is to consider Downs’ thoughts behind the article assignments.  Probably, he opens our class books at random and decides the topic the way a spontaneous preacher feeling “led by the Spirit” would.  Nope, they are way too purposeful for that.  Then again, if we adhere to Atkins’ argument, that all “order” is truly randomized chaos, my hypothesis may not be too off mark.  In any case, I appreciated the simultaneous compatibility and confliction the three articles presented.

            All three explained natural phenomena using numbers.  I am tempted to leap into a discussion of the human need for reason and purpose, and the pervasiveness of this idea of “intelligent design.”  Atkins’ article seemed oddly ironic.  The content said, plainly: “what appears to us to be motive and purpose is in fact ultimately motiveless, purposeless decay” (Atkins, 13).  Yet the quality (dare I say purpose?) of his piece was, in fact, an explanation.  An explanation evoked by the truth that humans desire reason and purpose in life.  Why is it that humanity, compared to animals, has a need for a sense of purpose and order in life?  While Atkins may be able to argue that natural life is inherently chaotic and unorganized, he cannot go against the fact that his curiosity drove him to his research and writing.  One does not argue against something unless there is preexisting evidence or thought for it.  What precipitated or caused this desire?  Like I said before, I am tempted to explore these thoughts, but the length of a typical blog post falls short for the response needed to answer this question, if an answer can even be found.

Crichton and Socrates; never thought I'd put these two boys together.

            Instead, let’s discuss the quantitative nature of the pieces.  All three talk about vast ideas, nicely organized around the ideas of numbers.  Socrates argued that the human notion of numbers and quantities originated from the true number “forms:” perfect ideas or examples existing before humanity, and picked up by our souls as they traveled from the ethereal heavenly realms into our bodies.  While I cannot entirely agree with the great philosopher, I will not attempt to counteract his argument.  I have no idea why math is so inherent to the mind.  Michael Crichton, the great science-fiction writer, postulated in Sphere that were we to converse with intelligent life outside earth, math would likely be our common language, because it is found everywhere and is not dependent on ideologies or cultural mindsets.  It simply "is."  The forward to Atkins’ article contained a compelling quote: “When we have dealt with the values of the fundamental constants by seeing that they are unavoidably so, and have dismissed them as irrelevant, we shall have arrived at complete understanding” (Atkins, 12).  It seems careless to “dismiss” such vast concepts as “it’s just the way it is,” but it seems if research is to make any progress, it must do so.  Willful ignorance then, drives one of the greatest intellectual endeavors of mankind: science.  Puts an odd perspective on things.  My sister said this the other day: “Science describes reality, but it cannot define it.”  So perfectly put. 

            Well, this was going to be a style critique.  So much for that.

Here, have some condensed knowledge; it tastes just like the real thing!

            Adam has yet to blog.  Vince has not posted anything.  Neither has Sadie, nor Liam.  My go-to guys for inspiration and orientation.  I cannot believe you did this to me! Alright, so we are considering three texts.  If these authors were Tweeting their articles, the posts may look something like this:

Gross: “The substance and sustenance of science is rhetorical persuasion.”

Mishra: “The meaning of graphics is highly contextual, referential, and paradoxical.”

Lakoff and Johnson: “Metaphor in language is culturally and physically based, and structures action.”

            The synopses hardly do justice in representing that from each of these ideas stem countless branches of thought.  After reading the texts, I feel I have taken a ginormous bite of some rich food, and am now struggling to chew and swallow.  And thus, a truth about knowledge: it is deep, wide, variable, and contextual, and the manner by which we strive to understand is by forming bite-size pieces, by quantifying.  All three pieces posed excellent and thorough arguments, but it is apparent to me that humankind puts ideas into boxes by way of defining and analyzing.  There is an intrinsic need to know, which drives scientific endeavors.  It is not enough to write about a new genetic discovery.  After papers are published comes the second wave of wave of research, which is analyzing those texts to discover more.  Belong to this field are researchers such as Gross, Mishra, and Lakoff & Johnson.  Rather than exploring further the science presented within a given research paper, these writers analyze the conduit, the language.  

            Epistemology, our topic, seems to exist solely around the idea of rationalization.  It asks, to what extent can we explain this?  Is it plausible?  Can we logically quantify this information?  After reading the articles, my brain is in hyper-analyzation mode.  I am listening to conversations, and picking out the metaphorical assumptions in each illocutionary act.  I am reading journal articles with a lesser focus on the content, and more on the persuasive techniques.  I see the graphic in my Sociology textbook, and wonder how it specifically aids me in understanding the content. 

So, my thought is: can we know without understanding?  Is all the analyzing that these texts represent actual knowing, or is it the attempt of humankind to rationalize, to find ways to explain what we see happening?  Knowledge is infinite and interconnected, and we constantly strive to quantify and position it.  By using metaphorical speech, we connect our discourse to other previously defined meanings, assumptions, and understandings.  We speak in relation to the bites of knowledge we have previously chewed and swallowed, forever in an endless race to quantify reality.   

So, we use language to communicate, and then we analyze that language for its flaws, assumptions, and methods.  Is this truly the best way of knowing?  Are there any other ways?   In science, we try to consider neat little boxes of information: genes, atomic positivity and negativity, temperature, and so forth.  In actuality, the natural world is spontaneous, indefinable, and we have hardly scratched the surface.  Therefore, it seems that language, which strives to quantify, is an ill-suited tool for representing the non-numerical and abstract character of the natural world.      

Grrrrr.  This is one outcome of not having a stable orientation point in writing my post: I end up ranting and questioning this whole endeavor.  Sorry for the pessimism, guys.  I really do appreciate language, hence the English-writing major.  However, the question of language dictating cognition cannot go unattended.  If we are to be innovative, we must ask the hard questions, no?

  

           

Appealing to the Masses: the Fidelity/Publicity Struggle

Influenza strains, particle physics, under-funded scientific ventures, contagious ferrets, and stasis theory crowd my mind, and I need to write something along the lines of science accommodation.  Okay, I can do this.  But really, what about that H5N1 virus locked away in a vault?  Is that the sort of science that should not be widely publicized, for the sake of keeping potentially dangerous knowledge from the bioweapon-extremists?  But I diverge….

          Considering science accommodation, my initial thought is: does the science writer accommodate the science, or the public?  If accommodating is “fitting in with the wishes or needs of” (thanks, Merriam W), then it seems by Fahnestock’s analysis that the crossover from original science texts to articles for public consumption prioritizes the wishes of the community audience to comprehend, greater than it keeps fidelity to the original text.  Is this a bad approach?  I don’t think so.

Journalists know it’s poor practice to cite another journalist’s article.  Source material should be just that—from the original source.  Therefore, science writers’ reins are loosened and they are allowed more freedom for interpretation, on account of their work not being the pinnacle piece from which all others will stem.  Their purpose is to inform their audience, the general public, not to create a piece which the multitudes will cite.  In reading, we appreciate a balanced piece, compelling facts, and a semblance of closure.  The science writer has a difficult job then, to take a research paper which is highly-specialized, full of phrases such as , “our tests suggest” and “it is probable,” and without a clear-cut conclusion, and turn it into a well-balanced meal that the public can sit down and enjoy, all the while not greatly compromising truthfulness to the original text.  Now, onto stasis theory.  If we, as readers, look for these elements in a piece: “…to be convinced that a situation exists…what caused it…whether the situation is good or bad, and what should be done about it and by whom,” (Fahnestock, 290) then what is the journalist to do when the research does not lend itself to such clean argumentative rhetoric?  Poet’s license, it seems.  Perhaps the science writer sees the implicative questions, partial conclusions, and conjectures where the scientist’s caution and accountability to a higher audience (i.e., nature, rather than the public) prevented.  While I am not calling for gross misappropriations of research, I do believe that an element of accommodating the public is presenting a digestible article.   This includes, perhaps, the tangents of which the human mind is so fond.  Tangents and conjecture spur thought, which is the point of the article, no?  In the end, science writers create in a different genre than research writers, and are given license by that.

So, the challenge: how does one woo the public without cheating on the scientist?  Can faithfulness be maintained, as the science writer walks the fine line between providing intrigue for the masses without making enemies of scientists?  Saved by the bell; it’s the deadline to post.  We will talk more on this later, I’m sure.