Here’s musician and music critic Samuel Lipman on the inner life of the artist:
This life is a constant–and constantly losing–battle to keep at bay, on one side, the permanent shortfall of physical and mental abilities in the context of the perfection that art strives to be, and, on the other side, the inevitable arrival of silence and death.
Well put. I feel this every day, torn between my artistic goals and living my life. There’s the further complication that much of “living my life” involves attaining the means to achieve my artistic goals, and also of course the creation of art is part of living a life. But I can definitely resonate with the frustrations arising from lack of focus, along with constraints of time and ability.
There’s also the difference that I’m doing science, which is (a) collaborative and (b) cumulative. My main goal is not to create unique works of art (even though, yes, I try to make each article and book and even blog post as beautiful and perfect as I can) but rather to advance our understanding. That feeling of being part of a continuous and social process takes some of the individual pressure off me. Still, I know that constant battle of which Lipman speaks.
I wonder if you can see art as “collaborative” (and perhaps even “cumulative”) as well in a way. If I am not mistaken, you can sometimes hear dinstinct musical styles in popular music during a certain particular time period, or where certain instruments seem to be used relatively frequently by different musicians. If that is indeed the case, and you add to that the ways in which hearing music from other musicians can influence other music, couldn’t that in some way also be seen as “collaborative” in a way?
Anyway, I always wondered about tenured professors and if their writing and publishing goals might change as they grow older and reveived tenure. I can’t help but think that such things might give one a “carte blanche” in some sort of way, or make one think a bit more about what one wants to write, and how, and where to publish, etc. And if that is indeed the case, I reason this might pave the way for writing something that might be more “artistic” or “creative” than this tenured person might have ever written or created thus far.
If that makes any sense, and might indeed sometimes be the case, I wonder if it might be interesting to think about whether this option, or mindset, or whatever word is more appropriate, might also be available for those without tenure. Perhaps it’s something that one can make time for in some way, for instance by planning two months during the summer vacation and consciously and explicitly imagine one is tenured (perhaps even for a decade or so) and think about what one wants to write, and in which way, and where it might be published, etc. Or some sort of experiment like that.
‘Well put.’
I disagree! I do not think this is ‘well put’. The sentence is convoluted and violates the principle of ‘one idea per sentence’. Frankly, I do not understand what Lipman is saying at all. Writing in a way that is easy to understand is actually not that hard. There are a few rules, and you can improve your writing by applying one rule at a time to the text. This is an arduous process. It is unlikely to lead to perfection — really good writing takes many things into account, so following a checklist might not be enough to achieve perfection. However, improving one’s text even slightly helps the reader to understand it much better. In academia, you sometimes find papers that are a mumbo-jumbo of words that tax the reader unnecessarily. I can think of a few reasons why that might be the case:
1. The author does not know any better. They never spent time learning to communicate well.
2. The author thinks it is unnecessary. Why?
2a. They believe that writing is an innate ability that cannot be improved.
2b. They think they are so capable that what they have already done is enough.
3. The author is running out of time. Fair enough. However, this should be a conscious decision rather than a result of poor time management. When Andrew publishes a blog post with a typo, it is surely not due to incompetence or feelings of writing superiority, but a conscious decision to ration his time.
4. The author has spent a lot of time preparing the written piece and has little motivation to spend more time on it.
5. Poor communication is a social norm; good writing is a deviation from the socially acceptable way to communicate.
It is just sad to see people giving their all to a research project, but the rest of the world will never appreciate it because it is too hard to understand.
The link to this post on Mastodon truncated the quotation so it said, “… and, on the other side, the inevitable arrival of statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu.”
Is the inner life of an “artist” or of a “scientist” different from that of the guy who trudges down to the abattoir in the dead of winter to earn enough to pay the rent and buy potatoes for his family?
A:
I’d say that just about everyone is an artist in some aspect of their life, a scientist in other aspects, also a friend, a caregiver, etc. Maybe the difference is that in art and science there are immediate goals (to pay the bills, to make the boss happy, etc.) and also more distant or theoretical goals regarding some ideal art and some scientific progress. The job at the abattoir is probably more about the immediate goals. And then there must be lots of artists and scientists who are just living day to day, like your abattoir guy, without thinking much about more distant goals.
Quote from above: “Maybe the difference is that in art and science there are immediate goals (to pay the bills, to make the boss happy, etc.) and also more distant or theoretical goals regarding some ideal art and some scientific progress.”
Perhaps some more distant, or even theoretical, goals are also explicitly or implicitly at play in the abattoir case. The guy might want to provide for his family so they can have a good, or een better, life in the future.Or perhaps that man thinks about his role in society at large, and might feel his job relates and connects to the entire society, and its direction, and future, and possible optimal state, etc. as well.
One might do a lot of thinking, and pondering, working in an abbatoir…
Anon:
Of course the abattoir guy can have lots of ideas and plans and so forth. When I wrote, “The job at the abattoir is probably more about the immediate goals,” I was referring to the job at the abattoir that the guy was trudging to, not all aspects of that guy’s life.
When I wrote what I wrote, I was referring to what I quoted which in my interpretation was something written about the possible differences between being a scientist or artist and some other job like working in an abbatoir.
In my interpretation of the quote, it seemed that a possible difference may lie in the (presence of) more distant or theoretical goals regarding some ideal or progress. In my reply I was focusing in on that, and tried to make clear how more distant and theoretical goals might also be (implicitly) present with other jobs aside from doing art of science.
What I wrote had to do with that, and not the possible thinking or pondering concerning other aspects of a person’s life. To repeat that main point I was trying to make, a person working in an abbatoir or a plumber may see their job or work or whatever it produces as something related to more distant goals or some ideal or some progress, just like a scientist might do. So, not just to pay the bills, but perhaps because they want to provide a better life for their kids (which might be seen as a more distant goal), or perhaps they might view their job as being an important part of society and how it could or should work and from that perspective might be aware of more distant or theoretical goals regarding some ideal or progress.
Anon:
Yes, agreed.
Yes. Many people don’t care how good their work is as long as they get paid and they don’t embarrass themselves in front of their peers. Scientists always want their work to be better, and the more they improve, the more ways to improve they can see. Its exactly the same as the difference between someone who opens a fast food joint rather than a shoe store because the retiring fast-food executive offered a better price, and Albrecht Dürer abandoning his goldsmithing apprenticeship to start an apprenticeship as a painter.
I reason both scientists and people with other jobs may or may not care about how good their work is. I reason some plumbers take more pride in their work, of have more of a sense of responsibility to do things correctly for their customers, than others. And some scientists want to just publish as many papers in top-journals, and some want to write and publish just one single paper that may change a lot of things for the better in some way, shape, or form.
I noticed in my own writing that several papers I liked, and subsequently cited, weren’t being cited that much in general. This stood out to me in comparison to other papers that seemed much less interesting or useful or whatever but were cited a lot more. At one point in time I realized I kind of enjoyed citing those less-well-cited-but-interesting-or-useful-or-whatever-to-me-papers, because I reasoned it may lead to someone else coming across the paper and reading it (just like I likely did when someone else cited it and I came across it).
Maybe those kinds of papers are little signs on a trail (with or without a stuffed polar bear plush toy on top of it) that points one in the right direction, or provides a clue or something to ponder, on the path to truth and wisdom and stuff like that. They differ from a paved road where many people drive and it’s often loud and noisy.
From a certain perspective, I can view people using and citing papers as some sort of curation, or quality control, or highlighting process which may be very useful if done by someone who can assess or judge (or whatever word is most appropriate here) well.
Quality over quantity seems to be relevant here as well. Perhaps just like with plumbers, you may want to take some time assessing and judging scientists before you hire or cite them, because sh!t may hit the fan sooner or later otherwise…
I find Lipman’s framing compelling not because of its precision, but because it captures a shared tension many people experience—whether in art, science, or other forms of purposeful work. The struggle between aspiration and limitation seems less about the specific domain and more about caring deeply while knowing one’s efforts are finite.
In that sense, the distinction between artist, scientist, or laborer may matter less than how individuals make sense of that tension over time. I’ve found some thoughtful reflections on balancing long-term creative goals with everyday constraints discussed in this context: here
.