Mixing Art, Science and Social Science to Learn about a River

I've been reflecting back on an amazing experience that I had a few years ago when I worked on a project aimed at mixing art and science. Two artists, two scientists and two social scientists worked together over a year or two to learn about our different perspectives and to apply our learning to a project centred around the Motueka River and its associated community in New Zealand. Check out the information about the project at: the project website.

There were a number of outputs from the project. The most obvious was an installation that brought together stories and images from artists scientists and community members. There was also a book containing some of the conversations that the group had through the process of getting to know each other and an evaluation of the collaboration process that drew out the learning we all did about working with people from such radically different perspectives - all available from the website above.

For me personally, this project opened up some new ways of thinking and engaging with people and the environment. It also reinforced my interest in learning from those in other areas of endeavour and with different experiences, and helping them to do the same.

I'd like to be doing something more with this experience and I haven't quite worked out how but I am thinking that perhaps it cannot be done working from within the limitations of the New Zealand Science system and or perhaps within the organisational framework within which I work.

Interconnections and problem solving

I"ve been away to meet with a group of social scientists from around New Zealand to talk about social science in New Zealand and how to raise its profile. One of the things that we discussed was interconnection in science which at the time translated into working across boundaries - disciplinary, cultural, social and professional usually to 'solve' complex /wicked problems.

We assumed that this is quite a difficult thing to do, but many people I encounter assume this is easy. I suppose that to some extent it might be when two people, who like each other and have some overlap in their backgrounds, sit down to work together particularly if they are both interested in the perspective of the other and are willing to listen. It gets significantly more difficult when there are multiple people with different perspectives, particularly if those perspectives have a different philsophical, epistemological or ontological bases. In such a case the social learning that needs to happen is greatly multiplied, while the likelihood that every perpective will be met with respect is greatly reduced!

The thing that gets in the way is an assumption that in fact everyone has, and should have, the same basic idea of what is going on when in fact nothing may be further from the truth!

C

The wonders of modern science

Science is a pretty amazing thing, really and every now and again I'm struck by how fast things are moving. The machines that go 'ping', the wonders of modern medicine and dentistry which I have to say really do make our lives (in the west at least) a great deal more comfortable.

And yet it seems that we are a long way of being able to work collectively to manage many of the modern problems that face us. I suppose given the success of modern science and engineering, it is natural to think that the answer lies in a technical fix, but even then, what if the technical "fix" that we need has to come from a mixture of different knowledges and experiences?

Why also do we assume that mixing up these different ways of knowing should be easy? In our science system here in New Zealand there is the implicit assumption that 'solving' complex problems is all terribly straightforward despite masses of evidence to the contrary!

There's an interesting looking conference on just this topic at: http://www.runninghot.org.nz/

C