Is Creativity Mathmatical?

[Countess]

I just read alot (not all) of the rules for writing a screenplay, and my head exploded.

After I grew another one (my mind was already out-of-order), I asked myself this question: Is creativity mathmatical?

I kind of waxed philosophical a bit on the Shop Talk Writers thread (www.imdb.com - not for promotion; only information) and I came up with the notion that screenwriting is decidedly quantitative. These aren't guidelines, but hard-and-fast play-by-the-book-if-you-ever-hope-your-writing-sees-the-light-of-day rules.

Literature appears to me to be more versatile - and is evaluated qualitatively, with guidelines, not strict rules.

But, with the transition of the written word into multimedia and the influx of "power-imagery" that we receive on TV, I wonder if creativity is now formulaic: ie; you plug in the proper numbers you get predictable results. It's an algorithm of artistry, and one that works on the masses.

Is creativity simply a different set of calculations with words in place of numbers, and plot instead of code, and so on? Is creativity mathmatical? Is it simply a matter of inserting names and verbs and wah-lah! You've made a Blockbuster!

How do you see literature when it is contrasted against this new media form? What do you think will happen? Will stage plays die a slow death or are they already dead? Will Nicholas Sparks rule the world with his 2.1 literacy level? (One of you was right; he's too stupid to be the anti-Christ. He must simply be the puppet in the chain).

I fear for our text-message teenage future.

Ciao

[RobinHood3000]

Hmm, interesting theory. I should tell you, though, that in my experience, computer programming can be just as much a creative experience as writing a screenplay.

[Unspar]

There's something to be said for the general rules of screenplay writing, like 3-act format and whatnot, but when it becomes rigid is when creativity is stifled. So it's not creativity that's formulaic; it's the products of stifled creativity that are. Remember that blockbusters are not art and are often not that creative.

The important thing about the technology critique you bring up is that we live in an age of imitation. Art means something different now than it did 100 or even 60 years ago, and here I reference "Agape Agape" by William Gaddis and "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" by Walter Benjamin. The former is a novella, the latter is an essay, but both present insightful and intriguing points on what it means to be an artist in this new age.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Fortunately, there is still room for genuine originality in screenplay writing. While there are director / writers such as Jim Jarmusch, David Lynch, Woody Allen out there (I was going to add the Coen brothers - but they've yet to redeem themselves after their last few attempts at mainstreamism!), there will always be room for true creativity, over and above any formula.

On a parallel strem though, mathematics (and by that I mean pure maths, not it's applications in engineering, accountancy and the like) is full of creativity. As someone said, (Einstein?) "If it [a mathematical theorem] isn't beautiful, it isn't right!" All of the great mathematicians (such as Descartes, Newton, Euler, Gauss, Ramanajan, etc.) wrote proofs and theorems of exquisite beauty - poetry in number.

Writing screenplays like they wrote maths is neither mechanical nor formulaic. Writing them like a school arithmetic book on the other hand, is empty (but profitable).

There will always be books, plays, screenplays, paintings, music, etc. that are created by numbers - because there will always be people that are happy with nothing more. Fortunately, there will always be something better too - because there will always be those of us happy with nothing less!

[Countess]

Interesting, although I flunked my poetry of mathmatics course. (--:

I do, however, have a great appreciation for Pascal's "Pensees" and Descartes "Meditations".

As soon as you start inserting numbers into theory, however, my mind (as I said before) explodes.

But very interesting responses so far.

[PeterL]

I hadn't thought of it as mathematical, but there is a great deal of formulaic writing around. Romances are required to fit a set of specifications, such that they are templates into which different sets of names, places, etc. have been plugged. I am not familiar with screenwriting as a process, but, considering the output from Hollywood, it is clear that they are built around formulae.

While it doesn't always appear to be so, language has a substantial underlying logic, that must be followed for language to be comprehensible, ao in one sense all language is mathematical. It also appears that human thought has a built in set of logical rules, so all creativity may be logical.

It is interesting that I had a conversation with a Chinese artist about this same matter earlier today. She agreed with me that all artistic expression has the same roots in the experiences of the artist being expressed in a way that other people can understand. But she started with the idea that people who use visual arts work from the heart, while writers work from the brain. When we got into detail, she immediately agreed that the two were different ways of expressing the same things.

[Countess]

>While it doesn't always appear to be so, language has a substantial underlying logic, that must be followed for language to be comprehensible, ao in one sense all language is mathematical.

I see this point and agree; thus, we have the diagramming of sentences and things like compound-complex sentence structure.

>It also appears that human thought has a built in set of logical rules, so all creativity may be logical.

Good use of the word "may". (--: I think of Lewis Carroll's "Jabberwocky" and realize nonsense can be brilliant too - just by the way it sounds from the mouth.

>It is interesting that I had a conversation with a Chinese artist about this same matter earlier today. She agreed with me that all artistic expression has the same roots in the experiences of the artist being expressed in a way that other people can understand.

I agree but with the caveat that these experiences can be interpretations of events or based in emotion/idealism/fantasy etc. I've never been gay but I've written a gay guy (actually bisexual) character. He was inspired by several personalities I've met along with my own - so perhaps an assilimilation of experience is viable too.

>But she started with the idea that people who use visual arts work from the heart, while writers work from the brain.

Now I have to go and think about this (LOL!). Actually, I'm a completely intuitive writer. My poems start with feeling and then transition into ideas. My book started with a daydream that came to life and expanded into a thousand facets. I "roll with it", whatever that means.

So, when people start dissecting and using academic terminology, I often haven't a clue what they're referencing - I've lost that knowledge.

The only theory I have is that I have read and written so much in my life, that it has been sublimated in my psyche. It's now a subconscious action rather than a conscious effort; ie stream-of-consciousness.

Countess

[Charles Darnay]

I have always treid to differentiate math and creativity (I use the fact that i am creative as my excuse for not doing well in math), but truly there are similarities. I blame high school - high school propels you to thinking that math is nothing but a set of formulas and cold logic, and creative writing is pure the opposite - no formulas, let your mind wander. But as was mentioned, there is beauty in math and structure in writing.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Inputting numbers into formulae is as far from true maths as tracing letters in kindergarten is from reading poetry.

The trouble with maths is that every aspect of it builds on what has gone before; miss one lesson and everything else is meaningless until you plug that gap. A lot of kids learn very quickly that they 'can't do' maths - once this is learnt, it is a bugger to unteach! I know, I tried (and failed) to be a maths teacher. By the time I got the kids, the damage was already done.

Most primary teachers (5-11yrs) (in fact, most adults!) are not mathemeticians and a lot of them hate the subject themselves. What chance has a child got of learning the subject from somebody like that. Think how easy it is for a bad teacher to convince a child that they 'hate' Shakespeare and multiply (that's 'times' for the innumerate) by a million. IMHO, there should be specialist primary maths teachers, able to instill a love of number and lay the foundations at an early age.

For those that really hate maths, I recommend "The Number Devil" by Hans Magnus Enzensberger. It is a wonderful childrens book, aimed at those that think they 'can't do' maths. It should be required reading at every school.

[Countess]

>Think how easy it is for a bad teacher to convince a child that they 'hate' Shakespeare and multiply (that's 'times' for the innumerate) by a million. IMHO, there should be specialist primary maths teachers, able to instill a love of number and lay the foundations at an early age.

I agree with you but the reason for this is obvious: math teachers are poor communicators. We literary types can communicate all day using all sorts of figures of speech and advanced vocabulary. In other words (hah-hah) we can say exactly what we mean.

Most of my math teachers stood in front of a chalk board working formulas, and then said "Do this".

"Do what? I don't know what the hell you just did. Care to explain it to us?"

The one great math teacher I had was my Trig teacher. He had the vocabulary to explain his concepts, and he used it. I got an A in that class and exempted out of the exam. I don't think I am especially great at Trig; I just had a really great teacher.

If math teachers would learn how to use words, I bet student scores would sky-rocket.

Countess

[Xamonas Chegwe]

I disagree Countess. Most maths teachers can use words - I would resent being called illiterate! The difficulty they have is that by the time they get to teach kids, those kids have already had 5+ years of being taught all subjects by a single teacher that neither likes, understands nor knows how to teach maths.

I was lucky. I had a teacher for a couple of years (6 to 8) that loved maths and was able to pass her enthusiasm on. That enthusiasm never left me.

I have since taught as a private tutor; teaching maths to 16-18 year olds that needed a pass grade for a job / college place, but couldn't even muster a decent fail grade. The lack of basic knowledge was astounding. Most saw maths as some kind of arcane magic that they 'couldn't' understand. Some could barely count! It's amazing to see somebody like that when they finally realise just how easy it actually is.

What I couldn't manage was teaching a class of 30+ 14 year olds, none of whom wanted to be there. That's why I waited till after school and got them on their own instead. ;)

[Virgil]

I think all forms of thought processes can be and are creative. I don't think it matters what the form of creativity. Certainly problem solving is creative. Some can think only "inside the box" and some have the ability to think "outside the box." How creative are these stock sit coms with the same plots and the same type of characters? And how creative was Einstein?

[bluevictim]

I agree with you but the reason for this is obvious: math teachers are poor communicators. We literary types can communicate all day using all sorts of figures of speech and advanced vocabulary. In other words (hah-hah) we can say exactly what we mean.


That's funny. You might find it interesting to think about the validity of the opposite statement:

"literary types communicate all day using all sorts of figures of speech and advanced vocabulary. In other words, they can't say exactly what they mean."

[Scheherazade]

I agree with you but the reason for this is obvious: math teachers are poor communicators. I am sorry that I have to quote this as well, Countess ;) but this is really an over-simplification, I believe.

Most students have trouble with Maths initially because their language skills are not good enough. I have many students who struggle with numbers (they usually want to improve only 'that' due to their jobs etc) but we recommend they take English classes too because as their understanding of the language increases so does their ability to deal with numbers simply because they understand the concepts and theories behind the numbers better.

Of course there are students with good language skills who still have problems with Maths but at basic levels the two abilities (langauge and numbers) usually go hand in hand.
The lack of basic knowledge was astounding. Most saw maths as some kind of arcane magic that they 'couldn't' understand. Some could barely count! It's amazing to see somebody like that when they finally realise just how easy it actually is. I hear ya! :D

[Taliesin]

For those that really hate maths, I recommend "The Number Devil" by Hans Magnus Enzensberger. It is a wonderful childrens book, aimed at those that think they 'can't do' maths. It should be required reading at every school.

Second that! We read it at the age of eleven (not that we hated maths or anything) and it was truly great.

We also suggest a play called "Proof" by David Auburn.

And mathematics is an art giving as much aesthetic pleasure as writing or reading.

[The Unnamable]

Former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara was referring to the obsession with ‘body count’ in the Vietnam War when he said something that I think might serve as an epitaph for today’s world:

”Because we can find no way of making what’s important measurable, we’ve decided to make what’s measurable important.”

I see it in every area of our lives; from schools and the obsession with examination league tables to hospital mortality rates league tables. It’s all part of what George Ritzer called ‘The McDonaldization of Society” and it’s truly something to be terrified about. It you want to see why, read the bit from Ritzer’s book that I have quoted on this thread:

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2717&page=2

[Virgil]

Former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara was referring to the obsession with ‘body count’ in the Vietnam War when he said something that I think might serve as an epitaph for today’s world:

”Because we can find no way of making what’s important measurable, we’ve decided to make what’s measurable important.”

I see it in every area of our lives; from schools and the obsession with examination league tables to hospital mortality rates league tables. It’s all part of what George Ritzer called ‘The McDonaldization of Society” and it’s truly something to be terrified about. It you want to see why, read the bit from Ritzer’s book that I have quoted on this thread:

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2717&page=2
What? Now wait a second. This is the fallacy of mixed arguments, or whatever it's called. Just because something is measuable doesn't make it important or non-important, it doesn't mean it violates values or doesn't violate values. Measurement is a tool. It has nothing to do with a value system. If you want to improve anything, measure adjust, and remeasure to assess the change. Even for those who don't measure and try to improve something, they are measuring in their head and informally assessing. If you don't measure you are living in ignorance. Are you saying we shouldn't improve our lives?

[rachel]

I have always since childhood seen mathematics in everything. I wish I would have had that book the Number Devil after I and others were taken from our regular math class and put in an 'experimental'class where basically all we had learned was taken away from us and replaced with wierd things that somehow we at first found bewildering. When we finally understood the concepts and such we found out the class had been nixed by the government and we were sent back to our class near the end of the year. suddenly I could not remember how to do the simplest mathematical equation the way I had known it and ever after was plain 'stupid' in math. Strangely enough before that happened I was good in my music theory(piano) and thereafter struggled with that as well. Phobia or mind block or something.
Cooking for instance is highly mathematical. once you learn the equations: cake-so many cups of flour, so much liquid, so much shortening etc. you can make any cake. the creativity then , how to make the frosting, what spices you use to make the cake spectacular tasting-is up to you. The same with writing.
Xamonas I think you have inspired me to go back to basics and start all over again. I have always wanted to be really good in math again, it was a beautiful language and I lost the ability to master it. It has hindered me in certain things and certainly made me feel impoverished.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Xamonas I think you have inspired me to go back to basics and start all over again. I have always wanted to be really good in math again, it was a beautiful language and I lost the ability to master it. It has hindered me in certain things and certainly made me feel impoverished.

(Bows) Then my work here is done. :nod:

[PeterL]

>It is interesting that I had a conversation with a Chinese artist about this same matter earlier today. She agreed with me that all artistic expression has the same roots in the experiences of the artist being expressed in a way that other people can understand.

I agree but with the caveat that these experiences can be interpretations of events or based in emotion/idealism/fantasy etc. I've never been gay but I've written a gay guy (actually bisexual) character. He was inspired by several personalities I've met along with my own - so perhaps an assilimilation of experience is viable too.

>But she started with the idea that people who use visual arts work from the heart, while writers work from the brain.

Now I have to go and think about this (LOL!). Actually, I'm a completely intuitive writer. My poems start with feeling and then transition into ideas. My book started with a daydream that came to life and expanded into a thousand facets. I "roll with it", whatever that means.

So, when people start dissecting and using academic terminology, I often haven't a clue what they're referencing - I've lost that knowledge.

The only theory I have is that I have read and written so much in my life, that it has been sublimated in my psyche. It's now a subconscious action rather than a conscious effort; ie stream-of-consciousness.

Countess

I don't see any significant difference between emotion and any other cognitive processes. Brains use neurotransmitters and electrolyitc reactions to process, store, and communicate everything that they handle. All experience is processed very similar ways. You say that you are "a completely intuitive writer," but all that that means is that you are not consciously aware of the cognition that you are using. All of your experiences, perceptions, etc. were received and stored in your brain in some way. The brain calls up old memories when those are appropriate. There is a lag time of at least .05 seconds for a person to be aware of any perception, and there is a similar lag time for cognition. When one's thoughts happen faster than that speed, there isn't translation into language, so you can't tell what the brain has done, what steps occurred in the thought process, and it looks like magic when you see the result.
The only difference between emotional reactions and rational reactions is that emotions use an additional group of neurotransmitters that produce physical responses. Actually, it's a little more complicated than that, because of limbic reactions, scent, etc., but it isn't much different.

One of these days I will have to write my great treatise on cognition.

[papayahed]

The trouble with maths is that every aspect of it builds on what has gone before; miss one lesson and everything else is meaningless until you plug that gap. A lot of kids learn very quickly that they 'can't do' maths - once this is learnt, it is a bugger to unteach! I know, I tried (and failed) to be a maths teacher. By the time I got the kids, the damage was already done.


There's so many people my age/around my age that are under the impression that they don't have a "math mind" and that drives me crazy. At one time or another I've tried to help my friends and family through math classes. It is so hard to explain things to have it make sense in a non mathmatical way.

I wish sometimes I could go back and take a "refresher" course or 2, now I have to be content with my Math Calender,at least I get a problem a day.

[Scheherazade]

Measurement is a tool. It has nothing to do with a value system. How you define and measure things (and how you interpret the results of these measurements) surely depend on the value system you are using. E.g. someone who is considered 'fat' (size 10/12+) today would have been easily considered malnourished, say, a century or two ago.

If I remember correctly from my Social Sciences courses, about 25 years ago, the government was not happy with the economic income indicators because they indicated that there were more people who fell under the group which was defined as 'poor'. So instead of trying to provide more job opportunities and increase personal income, they lowered the ceiling of poverty. And Voila! Overnight, there were less 'poor' people in the country!

[papayahed]

But the measurement is the same: a 10/12+ is still a 10/12+.

the economic indicators didn't change, but the poverty standard did. The measurements were still the same but the value assigned was changed.

[Virgil]

But the measurement is the same: a 10/12+ is still a 10/12+.

the economic indicators didn't change, but the poverty standard did. The measurements were still the same but the value assigned was changed.
I'm with you papaya. When I went to college I floated around in both the engineering world and the english lit world, and except for me, never the twains may meet. One of the discussions around at the time was how do you mix the engineering mentality with the liberal arts mentality. Well, I came to the conclusion that the reality of the debate was how do you tame engineers into accepting humanistic values. It had nothing to do with liberal arts people understanding the science world, in effect the modern world. In my twenty years as an engineer and still floating around with liberal arts people, I think the emphasis is all wrong. In my debates with my brother (who's a PhD in anthropology with emphasis in philosophy) and others here at lit net (Unnambale and others), I can see they are locked into into their own world view which is estranged from reality. Engineers are just as humanistic as anyone else; they have wives, children, friends, understand issues of justice and values. On the other hand, the liberal arts world don't seem to have a clue into the nuts and bolts workings of society, the economy, and basic science.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Never the twain?

3 words for you - Leonardo. Da. Vinci!

[Xamonas Chegwe]

PS - And twain is a singular noun describing duality - 'twains' refers to more than one pair of whatever (in your example, worlds).

Bloody engineers trying to use words. Who do they think they are? Renaissance men or something?

[Virgil]

PS - And twain is a singular noun describing duality - 'twains' refers to more than one pair of whatever (in your example, worlds).

Bloody engineers trying to use words. Who do they think they are? Renaissance men or something?
You're right! :lol:

[bluevictim]

It seems like the original post about screenplay writing and literature becoming mechanical and formulaic elicited a lot of responses defending the creativity of mathematical / technical endeavors. This seems a bit weak (or maybe just off-topic) to me. The beauty of literature is different from the elegance of mathematics. I don't think anyone here would want literature to become like mathematics, no matter how beautiful and creative he/she thinks proofs and algorithms to be.

[The Unnamable]

What? Now wait a second...Are you saying we shouldn't improve our lives?
CLEOPATRA
If it be love indeed, tell me how much.

MARK ANTONY
There's beggary in the love that can be reckon'd.

Perhaps Cordelia should have replied with that line to her father’s inane question “Which of you shall we say doth love us most?”

Virgil, I wasn’t issuing a diatribe against Mathematics, merely pointing out where our obsession with measurability leads – to inhuman bureaucracies, where administration is what matters most.

The context I referred to was education and medical care but I’ll stick with the former to explain further. How ‘good’ is Hamlet? How do we measure it? In the context of its appearing on an examination syllabus, how do we measure the quality of a student’s response? One of the things Ritzer noticed was an increase in the use of multiple-choice question formats for assessing attainment in Higher Education. This has a number of advantages from the point of view of those who subscribe to the idea of Literature as a commodity and universities as factories. It is easier and cheaper to administer – optical markers mean you don’t even have to pay ‘experts’ to mark it. Also, the fact that it is a quantifiable measurement means that it is, supposedly, less subjective and therefore less open to legal challenge from candidates who do badly. When a professor was marking their essay, they could claim that the final mark allocation was ‘just a matter of opinion’. So a literary text is reduced to a series of assessment objectives and responses judged according to how the answers meet these objectives.

The original poster seemed to me to be decrying the formulaic nature of script production. This is bound to happen when you make profit the main motivation for creation on such a scale in modern society. There is financial risk involved in deviating from the tried and tested.

I'll post some more Ritzer in a moment.

[The Unnamable]

Virgil, you might consider this as simply too long to bother with but it is about the American education system and should at least speak more directly to you.


Higher Education: Grades, Scores, Ratings, and Rankings
An increasing emphasis on quantifiable phenomena has developed in education. The focus seems to be on how many students (the "products") can be herded through the system and what grades they earn rather than the quality of what they have learned and of the educational experience. An entire high-school or college experience can be summed up in a single number, the grade-point average (GPA). Armed with their GPAs, students can take examinations with quantifiable results such as the PSAT, SAT, and GRE. Colleges, graduate schools, and professional schools can focus on three or four numbers in deciding whether or not to admit a student.

For their part, students may choose a university because of its rating. Is it one of the top ten universities in the country? Is its physics department in the top ten? Are its sports teams usually top ranked? Potential employers may decide whether or not to hire graduates on the basis of their scores, their class ranking, as well as the ranking of the university from which they graduated. To increase their job prospects, students may seek to amass a number of different degrees and credentials with the hope that prospective employers will believe that the longer the list of degrees, the higher the quality of the job candidate. Personal letters of reference, however important, are often replaced by standardized forms with quantifiable ratings (for example, "top 5 percent of the class," "ranks 5th in class of 25").

Most courses run for a standard number of weeks and hours per week. In the main, little attention is devoted to whether a given subject is best taught in a given number of weeks or hours per week. Even less attention is devoted to whether a student can actually learn the given material in the time period allotted.

The number of credentials a person possesses plays a role in situations other than obtaining a job. For example, people in various occupations increasingly use long lists of initials after their names to convince prospective clients of their competence. (My BA, MBA, and PhD are supposed to persuade the reader that I am competent to write this book, although a degree in "Hamburgerology" might be more relevant.) Said one insurance appraiser with ASA, FSVA, FAS, CRA, and CRE after his name, "the more you tend to put after your name, the more impressed they [potential clients] become." However, the sheer number of credentials tells little about the competence of the person sporting them. Furthermore, this emphasis on quantity of credentials has led people to make creative use of letters after their names. For example, one camp director put "ABD" after his name to impress parents of prospective campers. While these letters may appear impressive to many, all academics know this informal, and largely negative, label—"All But Dissertation"—for people who have completed their graduate courses and exams, but who have not written their dissertations. Also noteworthy here is the development of organizations whose sole reason for existence is to supply meaningless credentials, often through the mail.

The emphasis on quantifiable factors is common even among college professors (the "workers" if students are "products"). For example, more and more colleges and universities have students use evaluation forms and systems. The students evaluate each course by answering questions that have, for example, a one-to-five range with one being low and five being high. At the end of the semester, the professor receives what is in effect a report card with an overall teaching rating. There is little or no room for students to offer qualitative evaluations of their teachers. While student ratings are desirable in a number of ways, they also have some unfortunate consequences. For example, they tend to favor professors who are performers, who have a sense of humor, or who do not demand too much from students. The serious professor who places great demands on students is not likely to do well in such ratings systems, even though he or she may offer higher quality teaching (for example, more profound ideas) than the performer does.

Quantitative factors are important not only in teaching, but also in research and publication. The "publish or perish" pressure on academicians in many colleges and universities tends to lead to great attention to the quantity of their publications. In hiring and promotion decisions, a resume with a long list of articles and books is generally preferred to one with a shorter list. Thus, an award-winning teacher was recently turned down for tenure at Rutgers University because, in the words of his department's tenure committee, his stack of publications was "not as thick as the usual packet for tenure." This emphasis on quantity has unfortunate consequences such as causing a professor to publish less than high-quality works, rushing to publication before a work is fully developed, or publishing the same idea or finding several times with only minor variations.

The latter is one of the ways that professors, like those in charge of fast-food restaurants, create the illusion of quantity in their list of publications. Another is to include items such as self-published reports or books published by "vanity presses," which require payment from the author. Such books, often produced in very limited numbers, may reach few but the author's immediate family. Thus, what appears to be a lengthy list of publications may, on closer scrutiny, turn out to be very modest productivity.

Another quantitative factor in academia is the ranking of the place in which a work is published. In the hard sciences, articles in professional journals receive high marks; books are less valued. In the humanities, books are of much higher value and sometimes more prestigious than journal articles. Being published by some publishers (for example, university presses) yields more prestige than being published by others (for example, commercial presses).

There is an even more elaborate ratings system for professional journals. In sociology, for example, a formal ratings system assigns certain professional journals high ratings, others moderate ratings, and still others low ratings. Thus, a publication in the prestigious [i]American Sociological Review would receive ten points, the maximum in this system, and one in the far less prestigious (and in order not to hurt anyone's feelings, fictional) Antarctic Journal of Sociology would receive only one point. With such a system, it is hypothetically possible to give all sociologists in the world point scores for their journal publications. By this system, the professor whose journal publications yield 340 points is supposed to be twice as "good" as one who earns only 170 points.

However, as is usually the case, such an emphasis on quantity adversely affects quality in many ways. For one thing, it is highly unlikely that the quality of a professor's life work can be reduced to a single number. In fact, it seems impossible to quantify the quality of an idea, theory, or research finding. Second, this ratings system deals with quality only indirectly. That is, the rating is based on the quality of the journal in which an article was published, not the quality of the article itself. No effort is made to evaluate the quality of the article or its contribution to the field. Furthermore, poor articles can appear in the highest-ranking journals, with excellent ones in low-ranking journals. Third, the academician who writes only a few, high-, quality papers might not do well in this ratings system. In contrast, some-/ one who produces a lot of mediocre work could well receive a far higher score. Thus, this kind of system tends to reward a lot of published work whether or not it is really any good. It can lead ambitious sociologists (and those in most other academic fields) to conclude that they cannot afford to spend years honing a single work because it will not pay off much in their point score. Any system that places so much emphasis on quantity of publications will produce a great deal of mediocre work.”

[bluevictim]

The original poster seemed to me to be decrying the formulaic nature of script production. This is bound to happen when you make profit the main motivation for creation on such a scale in modern society. There is financial risk involved in deviating from the tried and tested.


Be that as it may, what's the great harm? What's to decry? By definition, most works of art must be mediocre. I don't get the feeling that the popularity of Nicholas Sparks prevents anyone from enjoying Faulkner. Now, more than ever, artists who are not motivated by profit can still create and even publish their work.

[The Unnamable]

Be that as it may, what's the great harm?
See http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2717&page=2

The bit about -
From Ritzer’s The McDonaldization of Society?
The Holocaust: The End-Product Was Death

Forgive me if I am not reassured by your perception that there's no harm.


What's to decry?
Possibly the reduction of human creativity to a set of tick boxes?


By definition, most works of art must be mediocre. I don't get the feeling that the popularity of Nicholas Sparks prevents anyone from enjoying Faulkner.
And that of course was my point. :brickwall


Now, more than ever, artists who are not motivated by profit can still create and even publish their work.
Of course – and each lowly one of us has the same power to disseminate our ideas as the multinational corporations.

[The Unnamable]

bluevictim, attitudes like yours depress me greatly. I was temporarily taken out of my despondency by Roth’s ‘The Human Stain’. Thank God there are still some Gullivers left to stamp on the Lilliputians. However, they are the modern hydras – more and more empty heads appear to replace the ones you thought had been squashed.

We live in the new, post-Cold War environment of Homo Consumerus, where people listen, but never hear. In the midst of such a world we try to forge some meaningful experience. It can never be easy, but at least there are a few fellow dwellers with enough solid reality to accompany me. It really is a war of attrition, with every day bringing forth another skirmish with the spirit-eroding forces of vacuousness, the rhinoceros-hide insensibility of the brutish many.

The technology that is enabling me to bring you face to face with my thoughts this fine afternoon is itself very ambiguous. It enables communication, but all that means, ultimately, is that we can exchange banalities and platitudes at a much higher level of technological development. I think the problem is that we live in a NOW culture. Everything is instantaneous, because of the move from Literature to journalism. Look at MTV, look at advertising images on television, look at anything: it is all characterised by the shallow immediacy of being brought face to face with the moment. We don't have to stop to think about anything because before we can reflect on one image, another flashes enticingly before our feed on demand gaze. The truth is we've had everything explained to us and we are bored. So, we alleviate the boredom with the stimuli of the moment.

No wonder that teachers have such an impossible job. We have become hawkers who must proffer our goods amidst the clamour of the market place. "How can we appreciate?" is no longer indicative of the impulse to know, to satisfy our curiosity; it now demonstrates our submission to the fetishism of money. And this is not the only example -'precious', 'value', 'tender', 'interest'. All are words whose meaning has been appropriated by the ubiquitous Babbitts. This shallow immediacy has given birth to the New Consumer - the middle-class reader, the Monet exhibition visitor, the concert-goer, whose gaze has been directed by the arbiters of taste to focus on the Market-sanctioned objects of perception and valuation. An appreciation of Shakespeare is now a widely disseminated attribute of suburbanite leisure.

So it matters to me.


Here I end this reel. Box--(pause)--three, spool--(pause)--five. (Pause. Perhaps my best years are gone. When there was a chance of happiness. But I wouldn't want them back. Not with the fire in me now. No, I wouldn't want them back.
Krapp motionless staring before him. The tape runs on in silence.
CURTAIN

[Xamonas Chegwe]

An excellent post unnamable - 43/50. ;)

If I may return to your previous posts - the Ritzer extracts.
What I think Ritzer is really railing against (and with perfect justification, in my opinion) is statistics and accountancy
- The idiot bastard sons of mathematics.
- Numbers used to compartmentalise and make some pen-pusher's life easier.
- Numbers used to cram complex systems onto A4 sheets.
Get thee behind me...

And all statistics are, are mathematics enslaved to bureaucracy, numbers used to justify the meaningless existence of petty men who live for filling in forms (or more usually, making others fill them in so that they can file them away). This is the real evil. It wasn't mathematics that allowed the holocaust. It was an army of petty men, each doing their bit, happily removed from the true horror of the results of their actions by layers of red-tape and forms. Fighting over a few inches of desk-space. It was Gilliam's "Brazil".

And these men exist in all walks of life. They burrow their way into everything, like woodworm, even into the arts. They are the ones that dictate how screenplays should be written. They decide what gets published. They decide who gets a record contract, or their new symphony performed. And they see nothing above the bottom line; above the gross (in all senses of the word) profit.

The only ray of light is that there are always those that insist on quality above quantity. And there are always a few that will rise to the top in spite of the red-tape and BS to provide that quality. There will always be a percentage of the population (1.373% to be precise) that will read Faulkner in preference to Grisham; that will listen to Stravinsky in preference to Lloyd-Webber; that will watch Bergman in preference to John Hughes. That percentage will always be a minority but it will always be there. It will always be a struggle to get quality work published / performed / screened, but it will always happen because there will always be those that want it to happen strongly enough.

In other words, there is a market for the great - it may be padded with the unnamable's despised, middle-class 'art consumers' - but there is a niche market and so it will be provided for.

(Did you see how I got on topic at the end there? - that deserves a 6.2 at least.)

[Virgil]

[QUOTE]Virgil, I wasn’t issuing a diatribe against Mathematics, merely pointing out where our obsession with measurability leads – to inhuman bureaucracies, where administration is what matters most.

My point is that measurement doesn't lead to or away from administration. It is irrelevant.


The context I referred to was education and medical care but I’ll stick with the former to explain further. How ‘good’ is Hamlet? How do we measure it?

I agree measuring how good Hamlet is foolish. Does that actually go on? There are lots of silly things that go on in education world; you've heard me rail against some of them. But I do think establishing a reading list for a particular school age group is worthwhile. Who decides that, you're going to ask? A large cross section of experienced teachers which every so years can be reviewed and allowed to evolve for contemporary changes.


In the context of its appearing on an examination syllabus, how do we measure the quality of a student’s response?
Granted, grading essays are not a science. In my life I may have disputed a few here or there, but generally speaking I think they've been fair. Of course there is always an odd ball teacher.


One of the things Ritzer noticed was an increase in the use of multiple-choice question formats for assessing attainment in Higher Education. This has a number of advantages from the point of view of those who subscribe to the idea of Literature as a commodity and universities as factories. It is easier and cheaper to administer – optical markers mean you don’t even have to pay ‘experts’ to mark it. Also, the fact that it is a quantifiable measurement means that it is, supposedly, less subjective and therefore less open to legal challenge from candidates who do badly. When a professor was marking their essay, they could claim that the final mark allocation was ‘just a matter of opinion’. So a literary text is reduced to a series of assessment objectives and responses judged according to how the answers meet these objectives.
Well, this is for debates within the teaching profession. I don't feel qualified to comment.

The original poster seemed to me to be decrying the formulaic nature of script production. This is bound to happen when you make profit the main motivation for creation on such a scale in modern society. There is financial risk involved in deviating from the tried and tested.
It's not just finacial risk. If a teaching method is wrong, you effect the lives of the kids. You've got to be sure when you deviate.

[Virgil]

Be that as it may, what's the great harm? What's to decry? By definition, most works of art must be mediocre. I don't get the feeling that the popularity of Nicholas Sparks prevents anyone from enjoying Faulkner. Now, more than ever, artists who are not motivated by profit can still create and even publish their work.
I agree with you, Blue. Statistics or mathematics are a tool. The Nazis were no more or less evil because they counted and measured. it is irrelavent. If people go to McDonalds it's because they choose too. There are high end restaurants, low end, medium end, medium-high, medium-low, and fast foods. The choices are plentiful. Depends on what one wants to spend or can spend or what one wants to read or not read. This is an old argument that Ezra Pound used to make about the modern world, that is about how vulgar the middle class is. As much as I like his poetry, Pound was a crackpot. He wants us to go back to the middle ages. In a free society people choose. I don't want to have some Lord or high brow person dictate to me what is good for me. We offer education, we articulate and preach a position, and then people will choose for themselves.

[The Unnamable]

An excellent post unnamable - 43/50. ;)

If I may return to your previous posts - the Ritzer extracts.
What I think Ritzer is really railing against (and with perfect justification, in my opinion) is statistics and accountancy
- The idiot bastard sons of mathematics.
- Numbers used to compartmentalise and make some pen-pusher's life easier.
- Numbers used to cram complex systems onto A4 sheets.
Get thee behind me...
First of all, that’s the lowest mark I’ve ever been awarded and Oxford has some tough markers, let me tell you. :D

Secondly, have you read the Ritzer book? I’m not having a go at you but I disagree that he is railing against statistics and accountancy. He is pointing out the pervasiveness and consequences of quantifiable measurability replacing qualitative assessments.


It wasn't mathematics that allowed the holocaust.
Do you really think I said that? Shame on you if you did. I have never said anything negative about Mathematics. I was fortunate enough to live with a couple of extremely talented and enthusiastic Maths graduates and was fascinated by their discussions. The point is the same as you yourself make – about the dehumanising effects of bureaucratic rationality. When someone is more concerned with the cost of using bullets to exterminate people than they are with whether or not it’s right or wrong, something is amiss. The obsession with measurability is dehumanising – it sees us in terms of units:

“For railway managers, the only meaningful articulation of their object is in terms of tonnes per kilometre. They do not deal with humans, sheep, or barbed wire; they only deal with cargo, and this means an entity consisting entirely of measurements and devoid of quality. For most bureaucrats, even such a category as cargo would mean too strict a quality-bound restriction. They deal only with the financial effects of their actions. Their object is money.”



but there is a niche market and so it will be provided for.
But I don’t want to be a niche market. :mad:

[The Unnamable]

My point is that measurement doesn't lead to or away from administration. It is irrelevant.
All I can say is that I find Ritzer’s book much more convincing than your statement that it is irrelevant. Ritzer is not attacking fast food restaurants per se (and neither was I) but the dehumanising effects of rationalisation in the pursuit of profit, which they embody.



I agree measuring how good Hamlet is foolish. Does that actually go on?
I didn’t mean that examination boards set essays asking candidates to assign a mark out of ten. I mean the kind of judgments most of us apply with regard to Literature. Have you never referred to an author as ‘a minor poet’? Isn’t that a form of measurement?


It's not just finacial risk. If a teaching method is wrong, you effect the lives of the kids. You've got to be sure when you deviate.
This point had nothing to do with teaching but, as I clearly stated above, “the formulaic nature of script production”. The point is that scripts will only be taken up if producers think that they can make money from them. Therefore we can expect ‘new’ scripts to be similar to the tried and tested scripts that have already generated profit. When Woody Allen won his Oscar, he said, "I know it sounds horrible, but winning that Oscar for Annie Hall didn't mean anything to me." He explained elsewhere that if the Academy were willing to bestow an award on him, then he must have been telling them only what they want to hear. Similarly, innovative or difficult scripts that suggest anything to us that we don’t want to hear are unlikely to be commissioned. I did think the stuff I posted was relevant to the issue of formulaic production. I just tried to point out that it is a conspicuous feature, in varying forms, of many aspects of life.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

First of all, that’s the lowest mark I’ve ever been awarded and Oxford has some tough markers, let me tell you. :D

But I don’t want to be a niche market. :mad:

I'm afraid that you were docked marks for your attack on the middle-classes. True, in many cases, 'appreciation' of the arts is an affectation amongst the chattering classes. But it is wrong to label all of them with the same brush. While most get their art fix from watching the South Bank Show and going to Monet retrospectives, there are some amongst them, that actively support young artists. It's not generally the working classes that buy original works and go to new theatre productions and the like.

I'm not middle class - far from it - and don't really aspire to become so. (I've no desire to view real life at second hand.) But those that grow up in that environment can help that no more than those that grow up in mining villages and sink estates can help their origins. In both cases, there are those that rise above their received ideologies and a majority that are happy to wallow in them.

I would actually love to agree with you on the middle classes, but tarring a whole swathe of people with the faults of an (admittedly large) minority is unfair. Once we generalise a group, any group, of people, we dehumanise them. That is the first step along a slippery road to exactly the kind of things that Ritzer is mentioning in the two extracts you presented (and no, I haven't read the book, but it is on my list).

And as for being a niche market. You can't be proud of your intellectual superiority one moment and lament that it excludes you the next. It's sad, but most people actually want books / art / films / music that does nothing to challenge them. It's not a point of view I can really understand either - the unexamined life, and all that. We just have to be grateful that there are enough of us asking for more to make it profitable for the powers that be to toss us a few crumbs once in a while. :mad:

[bluevictim]

To The Unnamable:

Ah, I see I missed your point. I originally thought you were merely saying that formulaic writing is an effect of the McDonaldization of society. It seems you're suggesting that it is not only an effect, but also, at least partially, a cause. I agree that the susceptibility of the masses to manipulation is something to be concerned about. You raised a good point about the greater ability of those in power to disseminate ideas. I had not fully considered the implications of this, especially with regard to propaganda, when I posted.

I guess my opinion is that the success of George Lucas and Nicholas Sparks does not contribute enough to a possible future holocaust to lose sleep over; there are probably bigger fish to fry.

I'm sorry I my attitude disappoints you so. I am still young, though, and perhaps I'll yet learn; hopefully I'm not as lost a cause as you have made me feel.

[XXdarkclarityXX]

I do not see creativity as mathematic because to describe something as mathematic requires it to fulfill a set of standards to succeed. In my opinion, creativity is a mixture of popularity and novelty. Usually, something that is creative is new and popular. Otherwise, it would just be a facsimile of another's work and therefore would be ignored. Mathematics requires strict standards that cannot change, and I think creativity requires change because what was considered creative yesterday may not be considered creative tomorow. Take, for example, a time when someone tells you a joke you've never heard before. If it's good, you'll laugh at it and enjoy it. If you don't like it, it's either because it wasn't funny or you've heard it already. Both of those reasons stem from lack of creativity. This doesn't mean someone else is going to hate the joke just because you do. Creativity is flexible and I think math is rather restrictive. Therefore, my stance is that creativity is not mathematical.

[The Unnamable]

You raised a good point about the greater ability of those in power to disseminate ideas. I had not fully considered the implications of this, especially with regard to propaganda, when I posted.
That last comment means you aren’t a lost cause. You admitted that further reflection about something you’d written had had an effect on your thinking. That’s not something we see a lot of on here (especially from me but then I’m seldom wrong). For what it’s worth, I respect you greatly for having the honesty and decency to do that.


I guess my opinion is that the success of George Lucas and Nicholas Sparks does not contribute enough to a possible future holocaust to lose sleep over; there are probably bigger fish to fry.
And when you put it like that, I’d agree with you. But it isn’t just one film or one book or one television programme or one anything. It’s the accumulated effect of the rampant stupidity that resides in the very fabric of our social lives.


I'm sorry I my attitude disappoints you so. I am still young, though, and perhaps I'll yet learn; hopefully I'm not as lost a cause as you have made me feel.
I apologise sincerely for making you feel like a lost cause. It really wasn’t my intention. I hope you don’t still feel so. Mind you, you would have been in good company - Jimmy Porter, Hamlet and of course, me.

[bluevictim]

We offer education, we articulate and preach a position, and then people will choose for themselves.

Virgil, thanks for the nod. True, it can be said that people choose for themselves, but it is also true that those in power have (and use) the means to sway those choices. I suppose one thing that troubles Unnamable and Xamonas (and myself) is how easily swayed the masses are, and how efficiently those in power sway them; The Unnamable seems to attribute this, at least in part, to a culture that is unable to see past easily measured quantities. I haven't thought about Unnamable's (or Ritzer's) argument on this general point enough to hazard an opinion. I don't think that, in particular, the enjoyment of mediocre movies is a significant cause (probably an effect, to be sure) of either a culture that overvalues measurability (if that is the case) or the susceptibility of the masses to being swayed.

I find it interesting that here people attack quantification and scientific thought for the flaws of hoi polloi, while technical types attack the lack of quantification and scientific thought, attributing the evils of the masses to the lack of rigorous thought.

[The Unnamable]

I'm afraid that you were docked marks for your attack on the middle-classes.
You see, that’s where I was hoping to pick up the bulk of them. You should have insisted on a multiple-choice assessment – now I’ll be consulting my solicitor.


But it is wrong to label all of them with the same brush.
Your labels must be really hard to read! :D


While most get their art fix from watching the South Bank Show and going to Monet retrospectives, there are some amongst them, that actively support young artists. It's not generally the working classes that buy original works and go to new theatre productions and the like.
I know – it’s the horrible ones I don’t like.


I'm not middle class - far from it - and don't really aspire to become so. (I've no desire to view real life at second hand.) But those that grow up in that environment can help that no more than those that grow up in mining villages and sink estates can help their origins. In both cases, there are those that rise above their received ideologies and a majority that are happy to wallow in them.
In all seriousness, this has nothing to do with it. It’s stupidity I have a problem with, regardless of class. And before you castigate me for that, I’ll post something I’ve posted before somewhere:

“Frailty of understanding is in itself no proper target for scorn and mockery. But the unintelligent forfeit their claim to compassion when they begin to indulge in self-complacent airs, and to call themselves sane critics, meaning that they are mechanics. And when, relying on their numbers, they pass from self-complacency to insolence, and reprove their betters for using the brains which God has not denied them, they dry up the fount of pity.”
A E Houseman

And they do rely on numbers.


That is the first step along a slippery road to exactly the kind of things that Ritzer is mentioning in the two extracts you presented (and no, I haven't read the book, but it is on my list).
I’ve been on the slippery slope for as long as I can remember.


You can't be proud of your intellectual superiority one moment and lament that it excludes you the next.
I’m not! I don’t want to be any kind of market. I want to be a citizen, not a consumer. I have remarkably few possessions for a western male of my age. Mind you, divorce doesn’t help. :lol:


It's sad, but most people actually want books / art / films / music that does nothing to challenge them. It's not a point of view I can really understand either - the unexamined life, and all that. We just have to be grateful that there are enough of us asking for more to make it profitable for the powers that be to toss us a few crumbs once in a while. :mad:
What a state to be in! And I thought I had a dark view of things. We’ve become a race of Uriah Heeps – “ever so ‘umble.”

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Unnamable,

On the subject of stupidity, I'm very much afraid that Schiller got it right!

"Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens." ("Against stupidity the very gods themselves contend in vain.")

It's up to us to shout louder, and for more crumbs. That's all we can do. :mad:

[Scheherazade]

But the measurement is the same: a 10/12+ is still a 10/12+.

the economic indicators didn't change, but the poverty standard did. The measurements were still the same but the value assigned was changed.Seemingly simple things such as clothes sizes change depending on the society they are used in? For example, the British size 10 is not same as the European or American equivalent owing to the differences in those societies.

But do measurements mean much without their interpretations? Isn't the very reason we measure to interpret them and reach certain conclusions? Why do they meticulously observe and predict how the weather is going to be and why do we listen to those carefully?

[Virgil]

The technology that is enabling me to bring you face to face with my thoughts this fine afternoon is itself very ambiguous. It enables communication, but all that means, ultimately, is that we can exchange banalities and platitudes at a much higher level of technological development. I think the problem is that we live in a NOW culture. Everything is instantaneous, because of the move from Literature to journalism. Look at MTV, look at advertising images on television, look at anything: it is all characterised by the shallow immediacy of being brought face to face with the moment. We don't have to stop to think about anything because before we can reflect on one image, another flashes enticingly before our feed on demand gaze. The truth is we've had everything explained to us and we are bored. So, we alleviate the boredom with the stimuli of the moment.


This reminded me of the Rolling Stones, "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction". I think quoting the lyrics might be appropriate:

I CAN'T GET NO) SATISFACTION
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)

I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no satisfaction
'Cause I try and I try and I try and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no

When I'm drivin' in my car
And that man comes on the radio
He's tellin' me more and more
About some useless information
Supposed to fire my imagination
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say

I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no satisfaction
'Cause I try and I try and I try and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no

When I'm watchin' my TV
And that man comes on to tell me
How white my shirts can be
But he can't be a man 'cause he doesn't smoke
The same cigarrettes as me
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say

I can't get no satisfaction
I can't get no girl reaction
'Cause I try and I try and I try and I try
I can't get no, I can't get no

When I'm ridin' round the world
And I'm doin' this and I'm signing that
And I'm tryin' to make some girl
Who tells me baby better come back later next week
'Cause you see I'm on losing streak
I can't get no, oh no no no
Hey hey hey, that's what I say

I can't get no, I can't get no
I can't get no satisfaction
No satisfaction, no satisfaction, no satisfaction

Hey, hey, hey, that's what I say...Any reason to quote the Stones is fine with me. I can't get no, oh no, no, no. :D

[Virgil]

but it is also true that those in power have (and use) the means to sway those choices. I suppose one thing that troubles Unnamable and Xamonas (and myself) is how easily swayed the masses are, and how efficiently those in power sway them;

Those in power? Who? Which of the plethora of (low brow, if I may add) conspiracy theories are you thinking? Who is plotting against you? And what did they force you to do that you didn't want to? PLEASE.


The Unnamable seems to attribute this, at least in part, to a culture that is unable to see past easily measured quantities.

At least he's not advocating a conspiracy theory. We do it to ourselves.

[bluevictim]

Virgil,

Oops. I took your last line out of context. You were talking about choices in what novels we read or what movies we watch. I had in mind choices of the populace in general (I still had that holocaust reference in my head from some other post -- shouldn't this thread die by Godwin's law because of that?).

My mistake.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Virgil,

I have not claimed that there is any kind of conspiracy at work in the 'dumbing down' of art.

I have merely stated that the willingness of the majority of the populace to consume unchallenging books, films, music, etc. that does their thinking for them, has led to the market producing a lot more of that than anything else.

I have also added that 'better' (however you want to define the word - that's not for here!) books, films, music, etc. will always get produced (if in far smaller quantities) for exactly the same reason - there is a market.

It is Bluevictim's contention that 'those in power' are swaying the populace to want bland, nicely-packaged art. Personally, I don't think that it is necessary to actively encourage people to be stupid, whether by overt or covert methods. Most seem to acheive this state of blissful ignorance with no interference whatsoever.

While I do agree that advertising and propaganda are powerful tools of governments and corporations alike, and that meetings on how best to influence public opinion do go on in smoke-filled rooms, I doubt that their purpose is to dumb down art. There are bigger fish to fry, like popularising wars, selling 5-year, extended warranties and the like. Fortunately, I find that a healthy dose of cynicism, taken regularly, acts as immunisation against most such attacks.

Now, how to popularise cynicism....

[Countess]

>I have merely stated that the willingness of the majority of the populace to consume unchallenging books, films, music, etc. that does their thinking for them, has led to the market producing a lot more of that than anything else.
******************************************
Thank-you Xamonas, which is why Jules says (must always quote from my own book)

“Well I’m not stupid,” retorted Jules with a smile. “I know they’re (TV Shows) really mindless drivel, but apparently people like mindless drivel so I give them what they want. But this show – this show is different. It has substance.”

Of course, that's why none of the stations will host his new show.

>I have also added that 'better' (however you want to define the word - that's not for here!) books, films, music, etc. will always get produced (if in far smaller quantities) for exactly the same reason - there is a market.
************************************
"Having elicited the help of his father, Sidney Cromwell, Julian hopes the reality-based show will herald in a new era in television he calls “Smart Programming”. “I think people to some extent are tired of jejune voyeuristic amusement. My theory is there are many unsatisfied viewers who are forgoing prime time in favor of the online experience. I want to reach that group, the intellectual artistic community and the corporate intelligencia, and give them something catered to their tastes.”

<Good luck Jules. People are dumber than you think.>

>It is Bluevictim's contention that 'those in power' are swaying the populace to want bland, nicely-packaged art.

No, people are stupid all on their own - and unfortunately, there are masses of them - everywhere. Doubt it? Look at Metastoph....I mean, Nicholas Sparks and his success.

>Personally, I don't think that it is necessary to actively encourage people to be stupid, whether by overt or covert methods. Most seem to acheive this state of blissful ignorance with no interference whatsoever.

Amen. I really think that with each generation the IQ is getting lower and lower. Soon we will revert back to cro-magnon days...

Sardonic and Cynical Countess

[Virgil]

Virgil,

I have not claimed that there is any kind of conspiracy at work in the 'dumbing down' of art.

I didn't say you did.


It is Bluevictim's contention that 'those in power' are swaying the populace to want bland, nicely-packaged art. Personally, I don't think that it is necessary to actively encourage people to be stupid, whether by overt or covert methods. Most seem to acheive this state of blissful ignorance with no interference whatsoever.



While I do agree that advertising and propaganda are powerful tools of governments and corporations alike, and that meetings on how best to influence public opinion do go on in smoke-filled rooms,
Meetings go on on what people want to buy and how to position their product against their competitor. No one puts a gun to anyone's head and are told to buy. Perhaps there are companies that put out crap. Those companies don't make it in the long run.

[The Unnamable]

Meetings go on on what people want to buy and how to position their product against their competitor. No one puts a gun to anyone's head and are told to buy. Perhaps there are companies that put out crap. Those companies don't make it in the long run.
This is a very simplistic view. Iago doesn’t hold a gun to Othello’s head, yet he still succeeds in convincing him that his wife has been unfaithful. Bill Gates doesn’t hold a gun to our heads but I bet most of us are using Windows. I presume that’s because the other products are crap, though. The public wants what the public gets. Why do people want to buy certain products? That is the question.

[Countess]

Bill Gates doesn’t hold a gun to our heads but I bet most of us are using Windows. I presume that’s because the other products are crap, though.

***

Actually IBM's OS/2 was superior but was never marketed and so died a tragic death. Then Bill created a monopoly by developing software products that only work with Windows.

But then LINUX came along, which is an open operating system, and will probably eventually save the day. Then the evil Gates Empire will die its tragic death.

Obviously, books, etc don't work this way.

>Why do people want to buy certain products? That is the question.

Because most people are idiots. Next question....

C

[The Unnamable]

Bill Gates doesn’t hold a gun to our heads but I bet most of us are using Windows. I presume that’s because the other products are crap, though.

***

Actually IBM's OS/2 was superior but was never marketed and so died a tragic death. Then Bill created a monopoly by developing software products that only work with Windows.

But then LINUX came along, which is an open operating system, and will probably eventually save the day. Then the evil Gates Empire will die its tragic death.

Obviously, books, etc don't work this way.

>Why do people want to buy certain products? That is the question.

Because most people are idiots. Next question....

C
Almost as simplistic as Virgil’s explanation. I was being sarcastic, or should that be ironic? Does anyone else smell irony?

[Mililalil XXIV]

Is creativity mathematical? There is a mathematical aspect to everything, but things with this aspect consist of much more (though this could be reckoned with mathematically as well - though there would be more than just math to this science).

[sundarramchand]

Actually, there is a thread of mine "Mathematics , a creative art" that seeks to answer the reverse / obverse question : "Is mathematics creative ?" and answers it in the affirmative (of course there are elements of discovery too).

I would think that going beyond numbers, mathematics deals with pattern and in my view at the highest level, it cannot be separated from philosophy, aesthetics etc

[Syd A]

Edgar Allan Poe, in his Philosophy of Composition, analyzed the creative process he used to compose The Raven:


It is my design to render it manifest that no one point in its composition is referable either to accident or intuition - that the work proceeded step by step, to its completion, with the precision and rigid consequence of a mathematical problem.

[sundarramchand]

I am reminded of classical music, especially "Indian" with its raga system where the artist improvises while still obeying the "rules" (including the implicit ones) (Reminds one of the idea of chaos in mathematics). This somehow reinforces the idea that filtering out (or in !!) the themes that are aesthetically "significant" from the possible combinations of themes (again links to formulaic compositions) is the essence of judgement / taste / "soul" in mathematics and all other forms of human endeavour.

[paulanderson114]

Mathematicians have always felt a strong creative aspect in their subject, but only in recent years has the flowering of connections between mathematics and the arts made this aspect apparent to the general public. The collection of three articles in the Notices, together with Aliyah's short introductory piece, explore some of the various ways in which art and beauty appear in mathematics.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

Actually, there is a thread of mine "Mathematics , a creative art" that seeks to answer the reverse / obverse question : "Is mathematics creative ?" and answers it in the affirmative (of course there are elements of discovery too).

I would think that going beyond numbers, mathematics deals with pattern and in my view at the highest level, it cannot be separated from philosophy, aesthetics etc


...but only in recent years has the flowering of connections between mathematics and the arts made this aspect apparent to the general public. The collection of three articles in the Notices, together with Aliyah's short introductory piece, explore some of the various ways in which art and beauty appear in mathematics.

Artists and Architect's have employed at least one aspect of mathematical proportioning for centuries, that being the Golden Section, aka "Golden Mean", "Golden Ratio, Golden Proportion".

Da Vinci immediately comes to mind, as well as Le Corbusier.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio

http://jwilson.coe.uga.edu/EMT668/EMAT6680.2000/Obara/Emat6690/Golden%20Ratio/golden.html

http://mathematicianspictures.com/LEONARDO_DA_VINCI_GOLDEN_RATIO_GOLDEN_MEAN/Leonardo_Da_Vinci_Golden_Ratio_Golden_Mean.htm


Recently, I used a corrupted version of the Golden Section, along with other geometric patterns to layout a painting. I call it the "Silver Section"

Early study sketch with overlays:

http://i963.photobucket.com/albums/ae114/tabuka1/Misc%20Album/IMGP2047.jpg

[cyberbob]

I don't think the "rules" of writing a screenplay indicate that creativity is mathematical, but that Hollywood just streamlines movies using the same interchangeable parts like some automated car plant.

You can also find the same formula of intro > build up > climax > come down > conclusion with lots of stock characters and what-not in lots of literature, particularly pulp. That's why the "great works" usually aren't adapted into movies; they don't generally follow this quick and digestible formula as closely as pulp fiction does.

This isn't surprising. It costs a lot more to make a movie than to write a book, and Hollywood is EXTREMELY competitive, so experimenting with films can be pricey and dangerous for a career. It's not that you CAN'T write an "unmathematical" screenplay, it's just that it probably won't be bought or turned into a film.

You also have to think of the audience. I won't put down movies as an art form, and there are definitely lots of dumb, barely-literate books out there, but in general movies are less intellectual and can be appreciated even by people who aren't so literate.

[Theunderground]

I think when your 'creativity' ends up mathematical or 'rule based' then its not really creative. Especially if you are actually trying to create things with previous formulas. You can create films,books, scientific theories even poetry based on 'old concepts' but i feel these 'creations' are somewhat second rate. Real poetry is intuitive,unique and comes from the feelings. As poe says,'there is a soul behind and before the words'. Feelings give birth to the words,not vice versa.