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digest 1997-03-06 #001
11:27 PM 3/5/97 -0800
From: "Society for Literature & Science"
Daily SLS Email Digest
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 06:45:57 -0800
From: richard nash
Subject: Re: Literature and Science?
Steve,
One of your comments prompts me to make a suggestion that I fear I may
live to regret.
On Tue, 4 Mar 1997, Stephen J Weininger wrote:
> For better or worse no such popularization of literary theory has
taken
> place; the James Gleick of "reinscription" and
"intertextuality" is still
> mute.
A name occurs to me, but he (being a literary type) is at least as
interested in parodying as popularizing: David Lodge. I especially
like
_Nice Work_; _Changing Places_ and _Small World_ are a bit dated, but
certainly on target. The prospect of discussing with scientists what I
do, based on our common reading of David Lodge, strikes me as both
comic
and terrifying, but it might not be a bad exercise.
Richard
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 08:13:49 -0800
From:
Subject: Re: Literature and Science?
It's great to see so many good folks respond to the current thread
about humanists and scientists at SLS. May I add one further thought?
From my experiences working both in a scientific field and a literary
field, it seems to me that there really are two cultures. I can
understand what Tom Weissert's colleague meant when he said,
"These
people don't think like we do." For me, those differences have
fascinating implications for how reliable knowledge is constructed in
different domains, how it is seen to count as knowledge, how
communities
are built and maintained, etc. Although there is inevitably friction
between the two cultures, from my point of view it is an extremely
productive friction, a frisson that can tell us much about contemporary
and historical constructions of knowledge in different domains, their
divergences and convergences, their understandings and
misunderstandings
of one another. SLS is one of the very few places I know where
scientists and literary scholars can really engage in productive
exchanges with one another.
To preserve and facilitate these exchanges, I think we need to be
sensitive to the fact that the scientists are a minority within our
group--about 10%, as I recall. I've spent several years as a woman in
heavily male-dominated departments and institutions, and I know from
first-hand experience that when one is in a small minority, free
exchange with the majority is inhibited. The minority person feels too
isolated, too exposed, too out of sync with the group to try
energetically to change the group dynamics. This begins to change when
the minority group reaches some "threshold" number--in my
experience,
about 25 or 30%. Then there are enough of the "minority"
around so that
one no longer feels one must speak as a member of the minority but
rather can simply express one's views as an individual. Certainly,
scientists are not an "oppressed minority" within society or
academia as
a whole. At present, however, they are a minority within SLS. I would
very much like us to be able to reach that threshold number, whatever
it
is, so that we can enhance the possibilities for productive and useful
exchanges. I thought Phoebe (sorry, I have forgotten her last
name--she
is a graduate student in the history of science) had wonderful advice
at
last year's SLS session with Pierre Lazlo on how to help make this
happen. I only regret that we didn't have the foresight to make her
one
of our plenary speakers!
Kate Hayles
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 08:49:30 -0800
From: "Wayne Miller"
Subject: RCPT: Re: Literature and Science?
Confirmation of reading: your message -
Date: 5 Mar 97 9:22
To: litsci-l@HUMnet.UCLA.EDU
Subject: Re: Literature and Science?
Was read at 8:42, 5 Mar 1997.
/-------------------------------------------------------/
Wayne Miller waynem@humnet.ucla.edu
Germanic Languages 2326 Murphy Hall, UCLA
Humanities Computing Facility 343 Kinsey Hall, UCLA
(310) 206-2004 FAX: (310) 825-7428
/-------------------------------------------------------/
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 10:01:21 -0800
From: amato@charlie.cns.iit.edu
Subject: secret handshakes, sacred cows...
following up here on steve's, kate's and richard's posts:
on the one hand, sls may be viewed as a professional organization
profoundly reverent of "science" and "literature"...
there are many in
attendance who, it seems to me, approach it this way... it may also be
viewed, with due regard for stanley fish's thoughts on
'interdisciplinarity,' as an organization profoundly *irreverent* of
the
disciplinary boundaries comprising "science" and
"literature"...
i've always thought that i quickly befriended many if not most of the
science-technology types at sls (most of them men) b/c we were of a
kind---like migrating to like b/c of some secret handshake, some shared
understanding of what it means to struggle with science and technology
on a
daily basis---to struggle with the how's of same, on the job, for a
living... steve is right here to point to language practices, including
the
ways we talk about what we do, have done... no doubt i'm full of
construction site talk, of how-to talk, and of four-letter words (full
of
mself, some would say!)...
at the same time, while i respect science and technology, respect its
workings, feel in my own work at times a real necessity for getting my
facts straight, i also have great regard for NOT respecting such an
orientation, or obligation, for NOT seeing science and technology as
sacred... same goes for english studies... and moreover, i don't equate
being irreverent of a discipline with being disrespectful of its
practitioners... any more than my contorting this language *as a poet*
is
meant to show anybody any disrespect... though such tactics (if you
will)
*may* have the effect, over time, of altering power structures toward
more
democratic ends (here's the utopian in me)...
BUT: it's all too easy, in a group that's 90% english phuds (if kate's
estimate is right) to get up in front of said group and go on about what
a
lotta hoo-ha science and technology is... to explore the nastier why's
of
science, say, w/o attending to one's *own* institutional site, w/o
attending to the way one's own discursive orientation participates, say,
in
the same broad sociocultural contours one is busy detailing... one ought
at
least be as irreverent of one's own practice, one own's agenda---or
give
some indication of same...
and again, just to make sure i'm understood here, nothing i say is meant
as
a "stipulation" or some such... i'm talking about general
tendencies...
respect and disrespect on "both" (or all) disciplinary fronts
can get you
something like a synthesis, perhaps something like michel serres'
writings,
which i greatly enjoy... and perhaps it can lead to a form of inquiry
that
isn't quite categorizable, not yet anyway...
best,
joe
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 11:59:06 -0800
From: Linda Bergmann
Subject: Re: Literature and Science?
For me, at least, Lodge's parodies of the litcrit establishment have
served
as a rich source of that disrespect that Joe Amato was also pointing
toward
in his recent post. While never inclined to worship at the feet of
science
and technology, neither do I respond very well to claims for the
greater
virtue (if not the greater truth) of the critical enterprise. However,
as
Kate Hayles observed, being a member of a minority makes one defensive
in
certain ways--aware of speaking for the group, rather than merely for
one's
own position. That's certainly been my experience, as a woman and as
an
English person in technological universities. I'm not sure I want the
guys
over in Engineering laughing at our excesses before they understand our
work in more basic ways.
At its best, SLS should let us start these conversations across
disciplines--but this is a difficult and dangerous venture. I'm glad,
at
least, that we're discussing it, instead of letting the list just lie
there, unused, as it had been for so many months.
Linda Bergmann
>A name occurs to me, but he (being a literary type) is at least as
>interested in parodying as popularizing: David Lodge. I especially
like
>_Nice Work_; _Changing Places_ and _Small World_ are a bit dated,
but
>certainly on target. The prospect of discussing with scientists
what I
>do, based on our common reading of David Lodge, strikes me as both
comic
>and terrifying, but it might not be a bad exercise.
>
>Richard
>
>
Linda S. Bergmann
Associate Professor of English and Director of Writing Across the
Curriculum
University of Missouri-Rolla
Rolla, MO 65409
(573) 341-4685
bergmann@umr.edu
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 13:17:06 -0800
From: Michael Vanden Heuvel
Subject: Re: Literature and Science?
Maybe it'd be worthwhile to consider who is invited to give the keynote
address (I wasn't there for what I gather was a fairly confrontational
address last time). While no one wants simply a door-greeter, why not
shoot
for 'humanist scientists' or 'scientitfic humanists'? I'd recommend
Norman
Dubie, but he wouldn't come: what about the poet (and former scientist)
A.R.
Ammons? Something to consider.
Mike Vanden Heuvel
At 09:22 AM 3/5/97 PST, you wrote:
> It's great to see so many good folks respond to the current
thread
>about humanists and scientists at SLS. May I add one further
thought?
>From my experiences working both in a scientific field and a
literary
>field, it seems to me that there really are two cultures. I can
>understand what Tom Weissert's colleague meant when he said,
"These
>people don't think like we do." For me, those differences
have
>fascinating implications for how reliable knowledge is constructed
in
>different domains, how it is seen to count as knowledge, how
communities
>are built and maintained, etc. Although there is inevitably
friction
>between the two cultures, from my point of view it is an extremely
>productive friction, a frisson that can tell us much about
contemporary
>and historical constructions of knowledge in different domains,
their
>divergences and convergences, their understandings and
misunderstandings
>of one another. SLS is one of the very few places I know where
>scientists and literary scholars can really engage in productive
>exchanges with one another.
>
> To preserve and facilitate these exchanges, I think we need to be
>sensitive to the fact that the scientists are a minority within our
>group--about 10%, as I recall. I've spent several years as a woman
in
>heavily male-dominated departments and institutions, and I know
from
>first-hand experience that when one is in a small minority, free
>exchange with the majority is inhibited. The minority person feels
too
>isolated, too exposed, too out of sync with the group to try
>energetically to change the group dynamics. This begins to change
when
>the minority group reaches some "threshold" number--in my
experience,
>about 25 or 30%. Then there are enough of the "minority"
around so that
>one no longer feels one must speak as a member of the minority but
>rather can simply express one's views as an individual. Certainly,
>scientists are not an "oppressed minority" within society
or academia as
>a whole. At present, however, they are a minority within SLS. I
would
>very much like us to be able to reach that threshold number,
whatever it
>is, so that we can enhance the possibilities for productive and
useful
>exchanges. I thought Phoebe (sorry, I have forgotten her last
name--she
>is a graduate student in the history of science) had wonderful
advice at
>last year's SLS session with Pierre Lazlo on how to help make this
>happen. I only regret that we didn't have the foresight to make her
one
>of our plenary speakers!
>Kate Hayles
>
>
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 21:38:55 -0800
From: Joseph Duemer
Subject: Re: science, theory, aesthetics
I'm impressed by Alex Brown's last post, though I'm assuming it comes
mostly out of the recent SLS discussions of the relations between
science and theory. One idea that seems to be forming out of this
dialectic is that the aesthetic realm synthesizes science & lit
theory.
I've long thought that poetry in the large sense was a discourse that
resolved and elided *religion* and science. Perhaps theory is only more
religion. Which puts one in mind of the Murdoch quote someone posted
earlier to the effect that science is a particular use of language. The
poet speaks: *everything* having to do with meaning is a special use of
language, and I don't think this contradicts the thought of either of
my
two favorite philosophers, Wm James and Wittgenstein.
- --
- --
Joseph Duemer
School of Liberal Arts
Clarkson University
Potsdam NY 13699
315-262-2466
"Poets are the only people to whom love is not only a crucial,
but an indispensable experience, which entitles them to
mistake it for a universal one."
-- Hannah Arendt
"People do not deserve to have good writing, they are so
pleased with bad."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 5 Mar 1997 21:42:35 -0800
From: Joseph Duemer
Subject: [Fwd: The other me]
SLSers:
We've been talking so much about cloning lately, I thought you might
want to see an example of what may be the first case of actual human
cloning, so I am forwarding this e-mail from a student in my freshman
Great Ideas class at Clarkson.
- --
- --
Joseph Duemer
School of Liberal Arts
Clarkson University
Potsdam NY 13699
315-262-2466
"Poets are the only people to whom love is not only a crucial,
but an indispensable experience, which entitles them to
mistake it for a universal one."
-- Hannah Arendt
"People do not deserve to have good writing, they are so
pleased with bad."
--Ralph Waldo Emerson
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From: "Scott Aaronson"
To:
Subject: The other me
Date: Wed, 5 Mar 1997 22:35:03 -0500
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Professor Duemer:
In class yesterday, a student who you perceived to be I promised to
drop
off his essay at your office, and gave you license to flunk him if he
did
not. That student, however, was not I. It was my genetic clone
Maurice,
created through in vitro fertilization of one of my pancreas cells.
Maurice superficially looks and acts like me; however, because of the
overriding effects of his distinct environmental and cultural
experiences,
he is far less prone to be tardy with schoolwork. Normally, I keep
Maurice
locked in my closet, releasing him only to attend sporting events and
physical education classes in my place. Over the past few weeks,
though,
he has been relieving me of my entire academic workload, so that I can
concentrate on my computer science research project. Maurice was
planning
to write my essay and turn it in on time; however, after I heard
President
Clinton's proclamation that human clones raise "serious ethical
questions,"
I had no choice but to deliver him (Maurice) to federal authorities so
that
those questions might be answered. With my industrious duplicate no
longer
at my disposal, I fell hopelessly behind in my coursework, and was
unable
to complete my essay on schedule. Please accept my sincerest
apologies.
You know, I'm beginning to hate science as well.
- --Scott Aaronson (the original)
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