This was a long and complex piece that took me over 15 mins fast-skim
reading.
The whole thing seemed to be building up to a conclusion that - no,
one cannot mechanically reduce the whole of Art History to a matrix of
influence coefficients, and here's why... - but no, it died with a
whimper on the altar of reductionist positivism. Was the point to
"debunk or demystify Art"?
Reading deeper, for myself, I think this strays into the treacherous
waters of determinism versus "artistic will". There is no mention of
archetypes, synchronicity, metaphor, the transformative nature of art,
or that (socio-political function) "all art is propaganda". As you
say it tried to "de-psychologise" art.
> Expecting a professor of evolutionary biology to understand this is
like expecting Andy Warhol to be an expert on mRNA vaccine
design. It's pure Dunning-Kruger - someone out of their depth having
opinions about something they don't have the first clue about.
I am not sure that evolutionary biologists shouldn't get to speak on
art. This is a strange interregnum we are in, in which, for example:
economists presume to speak on all and every matter because in their
world "everything is economics". In a specialised world we all know
everything there is to know about nothing at all, and so feel
frustrated for the "whole and connected" life of mind that once
existed.
As a (well read and aging) computer
scientist I find myself straying into areas of "expertise" I really
have no claim to, but think insights from my field have something to
contribute.
The problem comes when claims are made that "evolutionary biology
_explains_ X", or that "systems theory _explains_ Y". No it doesn't.
It is one viewpoint in a multi-dimensional, multi-causal tapestry of
human life and enquiry.
The whole thing seemed to be building up to a conclusion that - no, one cannot mechanically reduce the whole of Art History to a matrix of influence coefficients, and here's why... - but no, it died with a whimper on the altar of reductionist positivism. Was the point to "debunk or demystify Art"?
Reading deeper, for myself, I think this strays into the treacherous waters of determinism versus "artistic will". There is no mention of archetypes, synchronicity, metaphor, the transformative nature of art, or that (socio-political function) "all art is propaganda". As you say it tried to "de-psychologise" art.
> Expecting a professor of evolutionary biology to understand this is like expecting Andy Warhol to be an expert on mRNA vaccine design. It's pure Dunning-Kruger - someone out of their depth having opinions about something they don't have the first clue about.
I am not sure that evolutionary biologists shouldn't get to speak on art. This is a strange interregnum we are in, in which, for example: economists presume to speak on all and every matter because in their world "everything is economics". In a specialised world we all know everything there is to know about nothing at all, and so feel frustrated for the "whole and connected" life of mind that once existed.
As a (well read and aging) computer scientist I find myself straying into areas of "expertise" I really have no claim to, but think insights from my field have something to contribute.
The problem comes when claims are made that "evolutionary biology _explains_ X", or that "systems theory _explains_ Y". No it doesn't. It is one viewpoint in a multi-dimensional, multi-causal tapestry of human life and enquiry.