The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
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The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
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Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#2[flagged]
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#3This is starting to trend in the opposite direction, however I find the problem is more along these lines: https://massivesci.com/articles/chaos-in-the-brickyard-comic...
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#4Since the Industrial Revolution, scientific progress has far outstripped progress in the humanities. We've gotten very good at answering the how, but not the why (or why not).
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#5> So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had.
This is a very nice way to try and explain Dilbert-style Pointy Haired Bosses.
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#6> Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's?
But that's not quite true, is it. In the one case, he's asking someone to explain a very specific thing (one particular physical law), and in the other you're asking if they have been exposed to any example from a large set of things (any of Shakespeare's plays). If he'd asked "how many of you have heard of the Second Law of Thermodynamics", or if he'd asked "how many of you can describe the plot of Coriolanus" the questions would be closer to equivalent.
Nitpicky, but relevant in the sense that it's not a fair example as originally stated.
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#7> So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had. This is a very nice way to try and explain Dilbert-style Pointy Haired Bosses.
[flagged]
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#8> Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's? But that's not quite true, is it. In the one case, he's asking someone to explain a very specific thing (one particular physical law), and i…
I don't think that's nitpicky, I think that's a very clear flaw.
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#9Since the Industrial Revolution, scientific progress has far outstripped progress in the humanities. We've gotten very good at answering the how, but not the why (or why not).
I guess that depends on your POV: I’m pretty much a reductionist, so I find the various hypotheses re where the universe and life come from to be quite compelling.
There is no why, really.
The more interesting question revolves around should, from an ethical/moral perspective. The analytic tradition so favoured in the UK since Hume has been shown to be cracked (read, e.g., The Women Are Up To Something). Since WWII, progress has been made on that question, but Hume’s acolytes still cling dearly to mind, perhaps because of that same reductionism.
Re: The Two Cultures (1959) [pdf]
#10> Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's? But that's not quite true, is it. In the one case, he's asking someone to explain a very specific thing (one particular physical law), and i…
I think Snow is assuming that given that audience (academics educated in the traditional humanities) that if someone affirms they have ‘read’ something they can be assumed to also know what that thing was about.