Re: Creativity, genius and the science/faith interface

From: D. F. Siemens, Jr. (dfsiemensjr@juno.com)
Date: Sat Aug 23 2003 - 17:59:57 EDT

  • Next message: Iain Strachan: "Re: Creativity, genius and the science/faith interface"

    On Sat, 23 Aug 2003 21:13:32 +0100 "Iain Strachan"
    <iain.strachan.asa@ntlworld.com> writes:
    > (in part):
    >
    > I think this is the very point I'm trying to make. These "outliers"
    > have
    > the effect of enriching our lives, be it with beautiful music or
    > wonderful
    > inventions (e.g. would be be having this conversation over the
    > internet if
    > it were not for the brilliance of the tragic genius Alan Turing?)
    >
    > But their own lives and their own genes maybe don't have as good a
    > chance of
    > being propagated as someone who is ordinary and "dull" (which as
    > the Larkin
    > poem I cited suggests may be a key to happiness).
    >
    > So, back to the straight religious question; is "genius" a gift
    > from God?
    > Is it a curse? I regard Mozart's music as a gift for which I'm
    > grateful;
    > the way it resonates with ones mind (it has been said that Mozart
    > has
    > soothing and healing properties); and the extraordinary ability it
    > has to
    > carry you along in its flow - almost as if you were creating the
    > music
    > inside your own head. But was this "gift" a gift for Mozart
    > himself?

    The question is composite. Mozart's music is a gift to others, certainly.
    To himself? Apparently he enjoyed his facile improvisation, and the fact
    that it gave him entree to palaces. Did he enjoy the occasional
    obsessiveness? There must have been some positive feeling, unless we
    attribute it totally to obsessive compulsion, just more complex than
    hand-washing. If pleasurable, how intense vs. negative consequences?
    There is no easy answer, and probably great difficulty in trying, at this
    late date, to disentangle the many factors. Consider also whether Mozart
    would have developed as he did without his father's continual pressure.
    What endowments and environmental factors caused his development? To what
    extent was it pleasurable as opposed to avoidance of pain?

     Is
    > there an element here of suffering to bring happiness (salvation) to
    > others;
    > eg Elgar's music uplifting others, but not himself. Shostakovich
    > once said
    > that even if they cut off his hands he would continue to write
    > music, if
    > necessary holding the pen in his mouth. It was his mission; his
    > destiny in
    > life to compose music; and in doing so, many found temporary release
    > from
    > the appalling business of living under Stalin. I just wonder if
    > there isn't
    > something a bit Christ-like in all this.
    >
    > Iain

    As for Elgar, Beethoven was a gift to him, but I don't know if his music
    was a gift to himself. It is a gift to us, surely, but would he have
    suffered less by not being involved. Shostakovich indicates that he had
    to compose. Would trying to break the pattern have produced greater
    happiness for him, whatever it did for others? Getting away from Stalin
    is another matter.

    There are a host of different compulsions, to success in business
    (sometimes at all costs), to theft, to family (parents, wife, children,
    relatives--sometime mutually exclusive), to power, to self-abnegation,
    etc. To what extent can we ascribe Christlikeness to all these
    manifestations? What reflects loving a neighbor as oneself, perhaps. But
    is this adequate in failure to love God? Finding a similarity in one
    factor does not give much evidence for an identity, or even a broad
    similarity. However, a gifted writer might produce an analogy here that
    would be seen by gifted readers, as Flannery O'Connor did with her
    characters. But I have evidence that average readers don't get her point.
    Dave



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