Week 7: Neuroscience + Art

This week’s topic focused on neuroscience and the brain, an obvious connection with art as all creativity stems from the mind.  In the same way it was covered in my previous post on medicine and art, early art with respect to the mind focused on the anatomy of the brain.  Stemming off from anatomy has been the study of neural pathways through the usage of fluorescent proteins in the Brainbow process (Cai et. al).  These fluorescent proteins allow scientists to track “axons and dendrites over long distances”, allowing for much greater understanding of the intricate anatomy of the brains of several species (Harvard.edu).
 
Brainbow of Transgenic Mice

Also connecting neuroscience with art are many drugs that invoke “trips” that cause the user to hallucinate in various forms.  One example of such a drug is LSD, which was invented by Albert Hofmann in 1938 (Smith).  While creating the compound, Hofmann accidentally ingested it, recalling later that he "‘perceived an uninterrupted stream of fantastic pictures, extraordinary shapes with intense, kaleidoscopic play of colors" for about two hours’ (Biello).  Cocaine has similar effects on the mind, increasing the user’s sensitivity to sight, sound, and touch and causing erratic, violent behavior (DrugAbuse.gov).  Both of these drugs, while used in small dosages for medical purposes, are detrimental to the brain in large doses.  However, they are continually ingested due to these artistic hallucinations that individuals enjoy in the short term.
  
Albert Hofmann

Cocaine

References:
Biello, David. "Albert Hofmann, Inventor of LSD, Embarks on Final Trip." Scientific American. N.p., 30 Apr. 2008. Web. 20 May 2017.

“Brainbow.” Center for Brain Science, Harvard University, 2014, cbs.fas.harvard.edu/science/connectome-project/brainbow. Accessed 20 May 2017.

Cai, Dawen, Kimberly B. Cohen, Tuanlian Luo, Jeff W. Lichtman, and Joshua R. Sanes. "Improved Tools for the Brainbow Toolbox." Nature Methods 10.6 (2013): 540-47. Web. 20 May 2017.

“Cocaine.” National Institute on Drug Abuse, June 2016, www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/cocaine. Accessed 20 May 2017.

Smith, Craig S. "Albert Hofmann, the Father of LSD, Dies at 102." The New York Times. The New York Times, 29 Apr. 2008. Web. 20 May 2017.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 8: Nanotechnology + Art

Image
Newman's Microscopic Text This week’s lectures and readings focused on the history of nanotechnology and its recently increasing applications.  One of the more fascinating things that I thought we covered in the lectures was the two competitions offered by Richard Feynman for the advancement of nanotechnology in 1959.  The first was to build a miniature motor that could fit inside of a 1/64 inch cube and the second was to reduce the size of a page of a book to a 1/25,000 linear scale (CalTech.edu).  The first cash prize of $1,000 was awarded relatively quickly to William McLellan in 1960, while the second prize took 25 years until Tom Newman completed the task using an electron beam in 1985 (Kornei).  Such advancements in nanotechnology have obvious application in the artistic and literary world, with new art being created out of nanostructures. I also found the invention of the scanning tunneling microscope in the 1980s to be particularly interesting within...
Read more

Week 6: BioTech + Art

Image
This week’s topic, biotechnology and art, involves more recent and controversial art, as living organisms are used as an artistic medium.  I found one of the more fascinating works of art discussed this week to be that of Stelarc, the man with a “third ear” implanted into his arm.  While the implanted ear was made of material commonly used in plastic surgery, his own tissue has morphed with the ear so that it is now a fully living part of his body (McCafferty).  In the future, Stelarc wishes to have a small microphone inserted into his “third ear” so that the entire world can listen in, with this worldwide connection being the artistic value that Stelarc sees in his implanted “masterpiece” (DailyMail.co.uk). Stelarc's Third Ear The more controversial side of BioArt comes in the genetic modification of living species, such as Kathy High’s work with transgenic mice.  High was able to genetically modify certain mice by including foreign genetic material and w...
Read more

Week 1: Two Cultures

Image
This week’s reading focused on C.P. Snow’s The Two Cultures and Scientific Revolution , in which Snow defines two different types of people based on his own real-world observations—scientists and literary intellectuals/artists (Snow, 1961).  His work goes into detail describing how these two groups have no interdependence and have trouble interacting with members of the opposing group, as he recalls specific interactions with individuals of the two groups, even citing some of these individuals’ specific names.  Victoria Vesna’s article comes from a perspective of research and review of Snow’s writing, providing background and summarizing some of Snow’s key points.  She states that “the curricula of schools and universities are the source of this problem” and that “the first reported use of the (term) scientist…was proposed as an analogy to the term artist” (Vesna, 2001).     I do see strong evidence of the two cultures here at UCLA, particularly wit...
Read more