I have been thinking about how in our time and place, many of us have given up on art and creativity. We have come to a point where the Age of Reason and its quest for answers to the deepest mysteries of this blue mother have in effect killed all fantasy, aside from those provided by said methodology. Scientific logic and his cold hard facts are the only truth. It isn't real unless I see it, it isn't valid unless I read it. These are the constricts placed on our capacity, entirely self-imposed; a pattern carried out in daily choices.
It is often hard to find the beauty in a world that seems so real. Our mythologies are dead, as we have executed them in our use of the scientific method.
Once upon a time, my father told me of my lineage. His parents never showed interest in me as a person, and so my father was the only source of information with regards to the history of my genetics. He said we were the descendants of Sir Francis Bacon, the father of the scientific method. I thought this was outstanding, until my father's word had lost some of it's value to me as a woman and as an individual. His actions became more false, and his authority was thus questionable in my eyes, and I stopped talking of Francis Bacon, because I thought it might be a lie.
Once I returned to college, I began to use the scientific method myself. I had been using it all along, but now it "counted," as I was in college, which seems to be a place that reaks of credibility and promise, but once one arrives, its depravity is left quite exposed. I remembered my alleged ancestry, and realized that even if it might be a falsehood fed to me to bolster the integrity of my father, Bacon was at the very least a father of my current thinking. His name is rarely mentioned, and yet his approach is used every day in the world of science.
Its odd to think that once upon a time, some man long ago shaped how science functions, probably with little thought to its purpose in the centuries after his death. I think about it, though. I think about how if we weren't so hung up on validating every aspect of reality with a proven/disproven/statistically significant hypothesis, we might spend more time in this reality enjoying it. Marveling in the, "What if I'm entirely wrong in my assumption? What if there is something I don't understand in my perceptions of reality?" and not so damned hung up on the Why?
As a lover of nature, my path has always intermingled with the factual and solid scientific grounding of the -ologies. I pursued a degree in microbiology because I wanted to look at the hidden world beyond my naked vision. Just to see and take in the beauty of such colorful things as Cyanobacteria, and to feel amazed - an explorer in an unknown realm - experiencing life that covers every surface, and to love it for simply being. To draw it, to paint it, to worship its complexity. Those were the reasons behind my decisions to become a scientist. It was such an idealistic hope, and not such a bad dream, but in a society constructed entirely upon Reason and Logic, these passions cannot thrive as they could.
I experience the actions of the scientists I have encountered, and the majority have forsaken their original ideals in the pursuit of the Why. They do not go outside, they do not see past the constructs of reality as depicted in the current Nature and Science, they only read the abstracts of the papers found in journals. They write grants for money to pursue the Why, knowingly competing against their peers, understanding the mass rejection that comes with grant proposals, understanding the isolation that is caused by their continued choices in compromise. They compete against their brothers and sisters for the scraps of money that once supported the marvel of scientific curiosity. They quibble amongst themselves (with all the social skill seen in a high school yearbook editor), and they kill and violate life without regard. The love of beauty has vanished from their pursuit, as they propagate a method of experiencing life based entirely on logical, factual explanation.
Ask or speak of scientific philosophy to these persons, and one discovers there is little background thought placed in their actions. Little thought as to how it will all end up after their tenure is spent and they retire. The drama of the ego is all I see in the world of academia, where the true thinkers and gems are left isolated, as they fail to compromise their ideals and dreams.
I cannot be like the scientific academia of today. I had hoped for so long this would be my niche, but I cannot sacrifice my love of life's mystery to the hypotheses grounded on the scientific "evidence" of organisms such as soulless trees and unfeeling caterpillars. Leading a life by this standard of reality, where fairies are only in my imagination and dragons never lived would be the death of my dreams, and the snuffing of my creativity. These are strengths in scientific arenas, and yet such strengths are executed as often as mice in the world of the scientific method.
I think it's time we all strive to change this way of thinking, especially all of the lovers of nature. Isn't it imbalanced to view the world from only one angle? Isn't it better to open minds and envision the possibility of myth, to experience a world of trees and rocks and animals and bacteria that just may have souls? Wouldn't it be a wonder to create a scientific methodology based on unity of all things and end the exclusion of so many brilliant possibilities? I can see such hope in the actions of my peers, who seek unity in scientific discovery and who long to change and set right such grievances laid upon our backs by so many dead men. Many people are tired of struggling to fit into the reality these dead men have made for us, we are ready for an evolution in consciousness. There is hope in this readiness for the liberation of our potential. We are not alone in this desire for fuel to feed the flames of our creativity.
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