arts... science, can they really complement each other?

[hard]

http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/print/600

"Science and art are two different approaches that complement each other, and [both] are needed to produce a balanced vision of the world," says physicist and science writer F David Peat. "They also have much in common. Science is very much directed by aesthetics and beauty - notions of what fits, economy of means, and ideas of form and order. The same issues surface, in different ways, in art." But there are differences. "Science boasts of being objective and value free," Peat says, "while art is concerned with value and human response."

[Ahmad]

There are actually many similarities between mathematics and art. By mathematics I do not mean the applied areas of maths or perhaps more precisely those areas of mathematics which are pursued for practical or applied use alone, but mathematics which flows in the direction of aesthetics and beauty.

To strike up an analogy we can think of the difference between literature and the study of english for its practical use in a similar way that we think of mathematics and its practical use. Sure literature might involve letters and grammar just as mathematics contains numbers and arithmetic, but those who have studied some amount of literature appreciate that the study of literature is very different to writing a letter or some other practical application of the english language.

I find it most unfortunate that many people don't understand what mathematicians do, they think they do something to do with large number crunching or something like that, rather than something closer to art, which I think it is.

[/0]

I find it most unfortunate that many people don't understand what mathematicians do, they think they do something to do with large number crunching or something like that, rather than something closer to art, which I think it is.

Lol you can thank VCE for that.

[Ahmad]

In a way that's disturbingly accurate.

For one thing, in my eyes the way schools teach the subject which they call mathematics is a surefire method of killing curiosity. Often schools both ask and answer questions they pose. For a case in point consider quadratic equations, more often than not teachers will answer the question (via the quadratic formula) before the students have time to contemplate and have an honest go at its solution for themselves! It does lead to motivation for a good trick - completing the square. I wouldn't be surprised if it occurred with other subjects either.

[hard]

There are actually many similarities between mathematics and art. By mathematics I do not mean the applied areas of maths or perhaps more precisely those areas of mathematics which are pursued for practical or applied use alone, but mathematics which flows in the direction of aesthetics and beauty.

To strike up an analogy we can think of the difference between literature and the study of english for its practical use in a similar way that we think of mathematics and its practical use. Sure literature might involve letters and grammar just as mathematics contains numbers and arithmetic, but those who have studied some amount of literature appreciate that the study of literature is very different to writing a letter or some other practical application of the english language.

I find it most unfortunate that many people don't understand what mathematicians do, they think they do something to do with large number crunching or something like that, rather than something closer to art, which I think it is.

well put imo. Many do not understand the different natures and abstract forms of mathematics.

[Eriny]

I think that mathematics is very philosophical. I would have never have thought that in high school though!

That proof that proves that there is an infinite amount of prime numbers is really awesome.


I'm not really sure about art and science, but arts and science are extremely compatible. Take bioethics for instance. Or the study of things like psychology/psychoanalysis and geography.