1.3. Science and aesthetics - two ways of knowing

Understanding our very stringent biological limits is only a first step in recognizing that we do not see the world as it is. We can only imagine some aspects of what it really is like through science and aesthetics. Science gives us some hints on how we would see the world if we could see it as it really is. The image does not fit in our brains of course, it encompasses billions of years, and we would have to see all those billions of years with a resolution better than a nanosecond; it encompasses billions of galaxies, and we would have to see all that with a resolution better than a nanometer. It is something completely unimaginable to beings with tiny brains such as ourselves. But perhaps the history of evolution is precisely the story of how conscious beings improve their cognitive powers in such a way as to gain a better understanding of the reality surrounding them. In that respect we are like a bug trying to imagine a human being. We can imagine how those intelligent beings may be, in some millions of years, or perhaps less. But we can only imagine their superficial characteristics. Not the inner details of their minds. Not even close.

In any case that is the world: an unimaginable complex and vast entity, of which we are a very small part. We, of course, do not know the particular history, the sequence of events that gave rise to each of us. For me or you to understand exactly what made us appear in this world, we would have to investigate a chain of events that would have to be so precise as to explain why exactly that particular spermatozoon reached the egg that would give rise to you. Of course, to explain that, you would have to engage in a chain of events that goes well into the beginning of the planet, and, further than that, to the beginning of space and time. Of course we don't think about it in those terms. We just think, father was excited and mother was, well, we don't know how she was, and then it all happened. This, of course, does not explain in detail why me, why you. But that is the closest we can get with our present brains and the culture that runs in them.

The other way of seeing the world is through what I called aesthetics, although that is not a good word for it. What I mean is that we do not need only a computationally correct description of the world, we need to feel it, to experience it. Nobody really knows how to explain consciousness and the relation there is between our bodies and our conscious lives. We have some bets placed, but not a real understanding. Since we don't know this relation we cannot really know if an experience is a true picture of the world. Let's say you see a coconut crab, you might think «this is a horrid piece of life», some other person may actually see some beauty in it. I for instance don't like most bears, while many other people ostensible enjoy them. So, in this perspective, it would seem that what makes our lives so pleasurable, the rich feelings that give life its richness and value, are perhaps delusions, or at least illusions. In this perspective it seems that all we can truly see about the world is what can be described mechanically, mathematically, determined by adequate measurement instruments and so on. All the rest is just the personal perspective, the subjective, the way I feel about something. I might like roses, but other people might hate them, and roses are not beautiful in themselves, they just appear beautiful to some of us and to bees, but nothing else.

However, there is no incoherence in thinking that there might be an objective quantity of beauty in some objects. Just like there a precise mass for each object, although some people will feel a gallon of water as heavy and others will experience it as light. Yes, my body will make me feel a ton as incredibly heavy and a gram as incredibly light, and, yes, for an ant a gram is somewhat heavy, and for a whale a ton might be a reasonable weight. But this is just the way in which my particular body deals with a precise quantity, that can be determined obejctively and without error. So I don't think there is contradiction in thinking that a Mozart's concert has some objective measure of beauty, although many of us will find it ugly and boring, just as water has a precise temperature, although it might feel cold to a warm hand and hot to a cold hand.

Having no way to decide between these two theories I will have nevertheless to go with the second. Why?

Well, because in my personal experience of the world, I am usually well guided by aesthetical considerations. Beauty guides me in conversations, places to go, ways to dance, to talk, to behave. It generally does not disappoint me, it inspires me. It would be very strange that something disconnected from reality, an illusion or even a delusion would have the ability to guide me through the unknown. Just as I learned to believe in my senses because they usually don't deceive me, so I believe in my aesthetical experience of the world as some connection with real aesthetical properties of the world, because it usually does not deceive me. By the contrary. I find the same on other people. Even scientists are inspired by beauty, but many writers would be unable to write without the help of this mysterious muse. Where does the inspiration come from if not from this mysterious place where dreams are born?

Once again, I am speculating, but I am also speculating when I say that the world that I see with my senses is real.