Throughout English 239 I have returned to my More than Nice: and Analysis of the Tenth Dimension post, in order to better understand not just what I had to say, but why I wanted to say it. Why did I choose imagining the 10th Dimension?
I did not feel I had an opportunity to finish that analysis and looking back, I don’t think that I was fully prepared to do so early in the semester. In fact, I think it is something that I would prefer to write at greater length about, which I simply do not have time for this late in the semester. In my free time, I began reading The Way We Think and The Artful Mind which explore the way creative thought works. I think I need to finish reading those from cover to cover and take time to ruminate on the ideas they present.
After working on the group project I think that can begin to answer Dr. Ball’s question (posted as a comment on More Than Nice) about the connections between the creativity and the “mathsy-schmathsy” issue I brought up.
Imagining the 10th Dimension takes a creative approach to presenting scientific information. It seems that our culture separates what we regard as non-liner and creative thinking from linear thinking, when in fact the two modes of thought are intertwined; innovation requires creative thinking in linear thought and it takes linear thought to clarify a creative thinking.
By presenting the complex concepts in physics in a creative manner that utilizes the visual, auditory, and the physical act of streamlined, exploratory navigation through information that is normally very difficult to understand, the work reaches an audience that would potentially turn away otherwise. I realize now that I appreciate Imagining the 10th Dimension because it does just that, but also because I see a need for a multiple disciplinary utilization of multiple modes of communication. If more information that is thought to be the realm of linear thinkers can be adapted to incorporate creative elements the scope of a conversation is expanded. Instead of continuing to believe that a divide separates art and science as our culture often does, we need to focus on how both types of thinking rely on and even blend with each other. If our culture begins to value works like Imagining the 10th Dimension, perhaps making the connection between the power of creative work to present linear thought, our culture will begin to value its potential in ways that often seem dismissed and taken for granted.
I am still only scratching the surface here, yet I think my summer reading will inform my ideas.
