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176 Books the building of the first Gothic cathedral that produced Gothicpiety. The situationis far more subtle than that. On the other hand,theinsightthat the book offers into art’s possible biological function and basis is extremely useful. We are normally much more inclinedtothink of its significanceaspurelycultural. The idea that it is closely linked with physical structures in the brain and the sense organs is important. So is the propositionthat the practice of art, or contact with it over a long period, can cause changes in these organs. Mandel is undoubtedly right when he says that this is an area of research that ought to be pursued and that might yield dramatic results. Sucha developmentwould be of a piece with the general upheaval now going on in biology and could also provide an objective basis to approachesin art criticismand education. But a modest perspectiveof this kind is eschewed. Instead, there is a passionate energy that must spring directly from the author’s own experience ofartandhisconcernforthebettermentofhumanity. The book is alive with it. Sometimes this is encouragingand stimulating;at other timesit amounts to little more than mystification. Perhaps the basic difficulty in the book is that the author’s faith in a possible and longed-for future is too often used to balance out the rather small amount of evidence that is available about the evolutionaryrole of art. Arts v. Science. Alan S. C. Ross, ed. Methuen, London, 1970. Paperback. 150 pp., S0.80. (First published in 1967.) Reviewed by: Frank J. Malina* This collection of seven essays on the relations, or rather lack of them in Britain, between the arts and science should be studied by everyoneinterestedin thisimportantsubjectof ourtime. Five of the essays are by authorswith an arts background:T. R. Henn (EnglishLiterature); R. G. Lunt (head of a secondary school); R. Pascal (professor of German); W. K. Richmond (Education) and J. H. Whitfield (professor of Italian). The other two authors are P. Hilton (Mathematics)and D. Hubble (Medicine). The arts or humanitiesare taken to includeprose, poetry and the visual fine arts; history and philosophy (including religion);and languages, anthropology , archaelogy, sociology, economics and psychology. Visual fine art is barely touched upon and nowhere did I find mention of the fact that the arts, whether verbal or visual, are basically fiction; that history and traditional philosophy are mixtures of fact and fancy; and that the last abovementioned disciplineshave become or are becoming members of the science family. A lack of understanding of the crucial differences between the arts and the sciencesis evidentin a number of the essays. Theauthorswith an arts background,whom C. P. Snow calls ‘literary intellectuals’, attack him for forcefullyre-drawingattention in 1959to the gravity * 17 rue Emile Dunois, 92100-Boulognesur Seine, France. of the ‘two cultures’ syndrome and then blithely proceed to recognize it by discussing it with the hope that something can be done to alleviate it. One ‘literary intellectual’ is an exception-whitfield . His essay‘Humanismv. ScientificHumanism’ is a shockingdemonstration of the confusion in the minds of those who, though they work in the world of letters, feel that they are qualified to pontificate on applied scienceand society. He does not tell the reader that the Futurist Manifesto, with its declamation of war as the ideal state of society and its recommendation that libraries should be set afire, originatedin the world of art. These ‘literary intellectuals’ firmly believe that the arts can show the way for human beings to lead ‘thegood life’for they fear that it is not enough for the arts to give emotional satisfaction and glimpses of reality. One must remember that they have been in charge of education for the past 300 years, since modern science began, and that the leaders they have produced have done but little to reduceman’sinhumanityto man and the misusesof scienceand technology. What means do the authors propose to bring the arts and science closer together? Henn would ‘inculcate, by every means possible, a thoroughgoingrespect for the other side’sdiscipline,methods and values’(p. 16)and ‘try to ensure that each side knows as much as possible of the other’s language and techniques’ (p. 16). Pascal shares ‘the widespread dissatisfaction with early specialization at secondary school...

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