Standing on the world’s summit we launch once again our insolent challenge to the stars!
~ F.T. Marinetti, Italian Futurist poet, The Futurist Manifesto

I think when I find the code that generates our world, it will be about six lines.
~ Stephen Wolfram, British-American computer scientist, mathematician, and entrepreneur

Global Problems

We are acutely aware of the problems facing our world today: environmental degradation, poverty, repression, ethnic conflicts. At the same time, if we follow cutting edge advances in computers, information, biotech, materials, and methods of fabrication, we are aware that we are on the verge—even in the midst of—startling developments. What are we to make of these conflicting trends? The first thing that comes to mind has to be Charles Dickens’, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Let’s look at the entire first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities: Read the rest of this entry »

Recently the President made a remark critical of art history education, like you might get a better job in manufacturing.

So then critics piled on. Hey, the teaching of liberal arts is a massive industry that receives massive federal subsidies. Go gore somebody else’s ox.

People speak up for the study of art history in particular, and the liberal arts in general, but few say why we should study these things.  Indeed, the liberal arts are under question in American education, and the defenses of it I have found over the past few years say little that is meaningful.

So here is an explanation of what an art history education should provide. This explanation is a model of what I expect from other defenses of the liberation arts, but I am not holding my breath. Read the rest of this entry »