Blog Post #10

1. Lehrer’s main argument is that science needs the arts. Science needs the arts because it enables researchers to expend their understand of whatever they’re studying beyond the scientific process of objectivity, experiments, and facts. None of the information gained from these methods is our actual reality, meaning that the researchers will never have all of the information.
2. Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle- (wikipedia def) In quantum mechanics, the uncertainty principle, is any of a variety of mathematical inequalities asserting a fundamental limit to the precision with which certain pairs of physical properties of a particle, known as complimentary variables, such as position x and momentum p, can be known.

“The bridging principle”- “These were biological processes that supposedly turned the water of the brain into the wine of the mind.”

Reductionism- (Googled def.) the practice of analyzing and describing a complex phenomenon in terms of phenomena that are held to represent a simpler or more fundamental level, especially when this is said to provide a sufficient explanation.

Synapse- (Googled def) a junction between two nerve cells, consisting of a minute gap across which impulses pass by diffusion of a neurotransmitter.

Epiphenomenon- (Googled def) a secondary effect or byproduct that arises from but does not causally influence a process, in particular.

Holistic perspective-  (Googled def) means that we are interested in engaging and developing the whole person. You can think of this as different levels, physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. It’s the concept that the human being is multi-dimensional. We have conscious and unconscious aspects, rational and irrational aspects.

Metaphor-  (Googled def) a figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable.

Qualia- (Googled def) the internal and subjective component of sense perceptions, arising from stimulation of the senses by phenomena.

Soliloquies- (Googled def) an act of speaking one’s thoughts aloud when by oneself or regardless of any hearers, especially by a character in a play.

Paradigm- (Googled def) a typical example or pattern of something; a model.

3. Scientist- William James- He was an American philosopher and psychologist. He wrote the textbook called ‘The principles of Psychology,’ where in the ninth chapter called “The Stream of Thought,” he wrote a warning: “We now begin our study of the mind from within.” This is helpful to the argument of this essay because James argued that such a reductionist view is the opposite of science, since it ignores our actual reality.

Artist- Virginia Woolf was an English writer who is considered one of the foremost modernist authors of the 20th century. She plays a role in Lehrer’s essay when he quotes her, “… examine for a moment an ordinary mind on an ordinary day…[tracing] the pattern, however disconnected and incoherent in appearance, which each sight of incident score upon unconsciousness.” He uses her quote because she tried to describe the mind from the inside, which supports his argument.