I find no fit in abstract thought, learned labs or even among pixels ,but fit someplace on concrete

[gurdonark]

I took a nice walk on the Chisholm Trail in Plano, a concrete sidewalk running by a creek surrounded by tall trees. Around me on all sides were suburban brick homes, each festooned with its own blossoming crape myrtle tree or shrub. I saw myriads of everyday "backyard" birds, mockingbirds, bluejays, grackle, house sparrows, and red cardinal birds. I saw huge tiger swallowtail butterflies, and even larger giant swallowtail butterflies. I saw white cabbage butterflies as well as a few little yellow sulphur butterflies. Black eyed susan flowers had already gone past best bloom and turned into seed pods. Other flowers of red and pink and white struggled their last few bits of prime before the scorch of July hits. In a short walk, I suddenly felt connected to something more "real" than anything I do, and yet something that is not at all unique or outre.

I came home and began to re-read CP Snow's the Two Cultures.
Snow's premise in a 1959 (the year I was born) lecture was interesting. He felt that English "literary intellectuals" and scientific intellectuals used what amounted to a different language, which led to tremendous misunderstanding in public dialogue. Snow's lecture was tame enough, but
sparked massive public debate, including vitriolic attacks, in its time. One particularly spirited critic resorted to the ad hominem device of questioning Snow's authority, on the ground that he was not a major novelist and not a major portion of the scientific establishment. I am a big fan of Snow's novels, but he will never be considered a "major" novelist. He wrote novels to make points and tell stories, and was heavily influenced, as he acknowledged, by Trollope, who was no longer fashionable in his day.

I thought to myself how polymaths, like prophets, no longer got respect by the 1960s, whereas an earlier time loved the renaissance public intellectual. I then turned on the television and watched an old newsreel on cable about how new machinery was making people obsolete, but with safe use of the machines, the few remaining necessary workers could avoid cutting off their hands. Then I flipped the channel, where a very pregnant Arnold Schwarzenegger was about to give birth.

I thought to myself that I have never felt at home in the world of the scientists or the world of "literary intellectuals". I feel at home on concrete trails through tract home suburbs, when butterflies are flying. But that's okay. Really. That's okay.

Comments

me, too

[voodoukween.livejournal.com]

i like your new image

i like to watch the metamorphosis

and yes, it is hard to keep up with technolinguists and pseudointellectuals and the demise of the delicate creatures around us (me, you)

you are an incredibly sensitive and attuned man and surely a boon to your profession

a sense of wonder and perspective of reality are worth more than gold

Re: me, too

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

Thanks very much for the kind comment.
I was just spending my afternoon writing you something, so please watch your postal box for an incoming small package soon.

I want to focus my summer on hard work.
I like that you make the professional connection in your comment.

[laruth.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the lovely description of your walk!

Talking about intellectuals, I remembered reading a paper in my Honours year about the amount of "high flown" language used by many "intellectuals". The same point could be driven across using simple English, yet many people found the need to intimidate their readers into a false sense of the writer's intelligence and superiority.

high flown language

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I completely agree that folks use lots of high flown language and complex constructs, sometimes to express the simplest ideas. In law, we certainly do that, but I'm intrigued by how often someone wanting to explain a piece of literature will invent an analytical model more complex than the piece of literature itself. It's a form of addiction, like
chocolate, only less entertaining than a chocobar.

[gregwest98.livejournal.com]

I can't speak about literary intellectuals but I felt *so* at home amongst scientists. Heck, I was one! But underneath the science there was a strange political world that bore more resemblance to a playground of litte boys than an institution of higher learning. Weird. It's a world ripe for someone with both scientific skills and leadership skills to come in and clean up. Anyway...I went off the subject again.

Computer *scientist*

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

You're still a scientist, aren't you? Just a scientist who pushes a different set of buttons.
I have always felt neither fish nor fowl, and
if we add law, at which I am surprisingly good,
we could add that I'm not much of a mammal, either.
I suppose it's some playground hangover, that feeling of being slightly out of place in every setting, but it's certainly become part of my persona. I can speak enough of each language to
get through the average dinner party, but I am fluent in none.

Re: Computer *scientist*

[gregwest98.livejournal.com]

Computer scientists are much like blacksmiths were back in the 1870's. Very important and well respected but still pretty primitive. Of course, I've always been fascinated by blacksmithing, too. Just think of the cool things that are to come in the future!

Anyway, I like the idea of "some playground hangover, that feeling of being slightly out of place in every setting". Fascinating.

I know I didn't actually comment on your point; I'm still thinking about the point. I may be for some time yet.

Re: Computer *scientist*

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I think that computer guys and girls are on the outset of where the real action is....real processing speeds, AI, cyber takeover of the culture....it's hard to see that, though, when you're on ticketless travel...

of course, you could always become a CS prof...that PhD could go back into academic service, and you could study the dynamics of AI....