The magnificent intellectual achievement of neuroscience has a growing shadow: neuroscientism.

Its central thesis is that human consciousness is to be explained in terms of neural activity and that the path to a better understanding of our experiences, our motives, our motivations, and, indeed, our very selves, lies through ever more precise ways of observing the brain activity of conscious individuals.

An extreme expression of the faith of neuroscientism is the emergence of a so-called neuroaesthetics that looks to neuroscience to explain aesthetic experience. Neuroaesthetics has attracted adherents from many disciplines. Certain literary critics, musicologists, and art critics are excited by the idea that examination of the brain of a person enjoying a work of art will throw light on what art does, is, and means.

Artists, they believe, are unconscious manipulators of our nervous systems, awakening particular regions of the cortex, or particular types of neurons, singly or in combination.

Grappig, ook binnen een bijzonder vakgebied hier duidelijk de opmerking dat we kunst niet moeten proberen te verklaren vanuit de neuro-schakelingen. Misschien een analogie met dat we alternatieve geneeskunde ook wat kunstzinniger moeten leren opvatten... 

Een boek over dit thema:

John Onians, Neuroarthistory: From Aristotle and Pliny to Baxandall and Zeki, Yale University Press (2008) ISBN 978-0-30012-677-8 Pp 225. US$40·00.. 

Citaten Uit:

PerspectivesThe limitations of a neurological approach to artRaymond Tallis  The Lancet; Volume 372, Issue 9632, 5 July 2008-11 July 2008, Pages 19-20

Share |

Commentaar

Schrijf commentaar
Naam:
Onderwerp:

Powered by JoomlaCommentCopyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved.Homepage: http://cavo.co.nr/