Authors:

 Vesna, Victoria.

Title:

 Emergence of a Third Culture: Examining Strategies for Being in Between

Keywords:

 Art, Science, Technology, Two Cultures, Third Culture, Economics, Metaphors, Theory of Everything, Complexity.

Abstract:

 In the second edition of Two Cultures, C.P. Snow added a new essay, The Two Cultures: A Second Look, in which he suggested that a new, third culture would emerge and close the gap between the literary intellectual and the scientists. Snow originally named his lecture "The Rich and the Poor' and intended this to be the centre of his argument. Somehow the debate still focuses largely on the philosophical and academic aspects of the divide, and only scratches the surface of issues of research funding and economics.

It is astounding and sometimes discouraging to realise how deep the divide between humanities and sciences still is, and how fragile the bridge in Between is. This is evidenced in the Sokal incident and in books such as John Brockmans Third Culture, a compilation of writings by prominent scientists, in which he states that the new scientists are the Third Culture and that they dont need the humanist middlemen. Further, consider the very recent book by E.O. Wilson in which he proposes unity of all knowledge through science and it will become obvious that there is still much ground to be covered.

Artists working with technology occupy a space in Between, employ similar tools as the scientific community, and many have adopted philosophical outlooks of contemporary postmodern movements that frequently use scientific metaphors in their elaborations. Although relevant and perhaps revolutionary as philosophies, it is questionable how much metaphors used emerged out of real dialogue with the science community and how much in reflective isolation. When artists further reinterpret these reinterpretations, they enter a real problematic space that potentially alienates the scientific community, or worse, are in danger being dismissed simply as artists. There is much that artists with their freedom and visionary tendencies can offer in the trialogue of art, science and technology, but there are many dangers on the way.

In this paper I will identify various minefields one may encounter in
treading this trialogue, and examine different strategies to deal with the
possible dangers of being in the space in Between.
Vesna, Victoria. vesna@arts.ucsb.edu University of California, Santa Barbara Victoria Vesna is an artist working with electronic technology who has exhibited internationally at a number of shows. Her work has moved from performance and video installations, to experimental research that connects networked environments to physical public spaces. She is interested in questioning ways that constructions of physical and ephemeral spaces effect collectively embodied behaviour. Her ongoing project, 'Bodies INCorporated, is devised to facilitate exploration into the social psychology of group dynamics, actualised in corporate structure. Currently she is co-principal investigator on aResearch Across Disciplines initiative at UCSB to develop 'Online Public Spaces: Multidisciplinary Explorations of Multiuser Environments (OPS:MEME)'. This collaborative research project is focused on developing an online mobile agent, 'Information Personae' which she plans to utilise in her next piece, the '2YK project: Building Community of People With No Time'. She is the North American editor of AI & Society and is working on a special issue 'Database Aesthetics: Issues of Organisation and Category in Art' due out in February/March 1999. Victoria is an Associate Professor at UC Santa Barbara where she directs the EAT lab and teaches Electronic Intermedia, Computer Image and History of Art & Computing (HAC). Last year she completed production on 'Life in the Universe with Stephen Hawking CD-ROM', and currently is finishing production on a book/CD-ROM for Terminals, an online exhibition/conference distributed across seven of the UC campuses dealing with the cultural production of death. She is an artist fellow in an online Ph.D. program at the Centre for Advanced Inquiry in Interactive Arts (CAiiA) at the University of Wales.