Brehm Blog
Aaron Raymond Feb 13, 2010
Over Christmas break I was introduced to the book entitled, A Whole New Mind: Why Right Brainers Will Rule The Future by Daniel H. Pink. Are you scared yet? You should be! Although the statistical data varies in terms of the demographic percentages of either hemisphere’s dominance within the American population, one thing is certain. We live in a Left-Brained society that rewards, from a very young age, such linear thinking. If you were educated in an American school system, starting in Kindergarten, or a similar system of education, this latter description (Left-Brained) likely applies to you. Yes, you!
In his book, Pink points out the six senses of the Right Brain: Design, Story, Symphony, Empathy, Play, & Meaning. All of these combine to provide a quintessentially right-brained employee of the future. Why, as the subtitle of his book suggests, will such people rule the future? Three reasons: Abundance, Asia, & Automation.
Pink’s understanding of Abundance is that it affects the consumerist drive to seek out novel and aesthetically pleasing products. Since functional capabilities of products are no longer as discernable (they’re all practically the same anyways) the only difference is one of Design.
The second reason is that Asia = Outsourcing. If someone else halfway around the world can do it just a good as you can but at a cheaper rate on the American dollar, you can bet that’s where the money will go. Therefore, the jobs in high demand will be those that cannot be outsourced. One component of living in a culture is being able to speak its contextual language. This is a key aspect of Design and a reason why Design cannot be outsourced as easily. It requires a more locally grown organic grass roots method of cultivation.
The third reason is likened to the second: Automation. If a robot can do the work cheaper than a person, regardless of it being outsourced, than a product will in fact be manufactured in such a way.
For most of the book, with these three reasons in mind, Pink goes through the six senses listed above, their measurable effects upon productivity in the workplace, and methods of cultivating these senses. The portfolio exercises at the end of each chapter are intriguing and enjoyable. They are quite fun!
Take for example the chapter on Play, which explains that one quality of Right-Brained thinking is Humor, which involves empathy, play, and symphony. Take a cartoon from The New Yorker (without reading the caption) and make an attempt to write your own caption. Any luck?
What is interesting to note about such activities is the brain’s ability to “cross-train,” like the curious ability of pianists to also be skilled mathematicians. This has led my own thoughts into a direction briefly touched upon in the chapter on Empathy. What would it take for the world to see, as Martin Luther King, Jr. once quoted from the book of Amos, “Justice roll down like waters in a mighty stream,” ?
As such understandings suggest, it would take the development of right-brained thinking by individuals and societies who are able to grasp issues holistically and in a non-linear fashion, by people who have been educated broadly and are able to synchronize seemingly disharmonic variables into a congruent whole without the compartmentalization of issues that inevitably lead to the cynical resolution of "Such is Life."
This is done, quite frankly, through the Arts. Not through passive appreciation, but through active participation. Through practices such as Painting, through Poetry, through Dancing, through Singing, and especially through Drama, the artist is not only honing the skills required in their own craft but, as Daniel Pink suggests, cultivating a new and richer world where the Right-Brained act of Empathy plays a key role.
“The M.F.A. is the new M.B.A.” says Pink. “A master of fine arts, an MFA, is now one of the hottest credentials in a world where even General Motors is in the art business.” Clearly, times have changed, and that linear Left-Brained education that was so highly valued a generation ago is no longer the only game in town. How will educational institutions change in response to a growing business world that demands highly creative thinkers? How will you change?
A Whole New Mind - Daniel H. Pink
Elijah Davidson Feb 11, 2010
Please excuse this post that will possibly wreak of consumerism. I don't write about purchases ever. So much of my identity is wrapped up in the things I own, and I don't think that's right, so I don't encourage that side of me. Still, we do live in a consumerist kingdom, and I think it's important for us to consider how to best live as citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven under the auspices of a tyrant.
That being said...
I love my Mac.
During my final year of college, I was steadily indoctrinated to the wonders of Apple by my friend and roommate Patrick. He effused about Macs daily and even threw a little party when he bought his first Macbook. When I purchased my first computer a half-year later, I never considered any other brand. I've never regretted it.
I am a oft-times too eager disciple of Apple. I have owned two iPods since converting, buying a second one after my first one broke. Now, that's loyalty. I think the company makes dependable products that are aesthetically pleasing. I don't ask for much else.
However, though I daily partake of the goodness of my Macbook and my iPod, I have yet to complete the holy trinity of Apple products - I do not own an iPhone, and I don't think I ever will. Allow me to explain why.
An iPhone is not simply a phone, as all the users will readily attest and as the advertisements affirm. An iPhone is a mobile connection device. An iPhone is an email-sending, Facebook-checking, Twittering, GPSing, video game-playing computer that fits in your pocket. And it makes phone calls.
It's kind of awesome. iPhones are the future come to the present.
In May, my friends Patrick, Jon, and I were driving through nowhere Wyoming, and Jon and I got into an argument about how to pronounce a word. After a few minutes of going back and forth, we decided to pull up an online dictionary on Jon's iPhone, pipe the audio through his truck speakers, and have the internet settle our argument. While driving 80 mph through the middle of nowhere, we had a computer correctly pronounce a word for us.
If that's not the future, I don't know what is. As my professor Barry Taylor said, with an iPhone, one has the collected knowledge of all humankind in the palm of one's hand.
That's crazy cool, but as awesome as the iPhone is, it's not enough. It's almost enough, but it's not quite there. Because an iPhone is so much more than a phone, I need it to do a little more than it does. I need my mobile connection device to allow me to write and upload to the internet at any time from practically anywhere (within reason). An iPhone is great for interacting with what has been created, but it's almost useless for creating.
The iPhone is a consumption device. It helps one consume media of all kinds (and it makes phone calls). It does not help one produce anything. Allowing me access to the internet is one thing; allowing me to alter it is another. Putting the collected knowledge of humankind in the palm of my hand changes my world; allowing me to add my knowledge to that of humankind changes the whole world.
When Apple builds that device, they'll likely get my money.
The iPad might be that device. I'm not really sure yet. I need to play with one first. We'll see. I think it's at least a step in the right direction.
In any case, the iPhone and its deficiencies exemplify a key component of our society. We truly live in a culture of consumption. Almost everything is oriented to encourage us to buy. Remember after 9/11 when President Bush gave his speech from Ground Zero? Remember how he suggested Americans should cope with the tragedy and fight back against the terrorists? He told us to go shopping. How does our government combat a recession? It mails us checks and asks us to spend, spend, spend. How do I cope with a particularly stressful week? I go to the Apple Store and look at all the things I could buy if I really wanted to.
Consuming equals peace-making. The iPhone is so popular in part because it is an excellent means of being a good citizen of the kingdom of Consumerism.
But the kingdom is evolving, and my problems with the iPhone are indicative of that evolution. As another of my professors, Ryan Bolger, points out, we are moving into an equal parts consumption-production culture. Photoshop, Garage Band, Final Cut Pro, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Wikipedia, Noisetrade, blogs, etc. - these are tools for production and outlets for what is being produced. The consumers of cultural artifacts are becoming the producers of those artifacts. Our society is morphing into one of both consumption and creation. We are defining ourselves both by what we consume and what we create.
As a student of worship, theology, and art, I must ask what that means for the church. Here are a few brief thoughts:
I think people will be less and less willing to simply sit and take from those in leadership. People are going to want to have input not just in big decisions but in definitions and dogmas as well. People are going to want to help form worship instead of just forming themselves to it. This will be challenging for church leadership because it will take a great deal of discernment to know when to insist on certain tenants and practices and when to bend. We must learn to better listen to God and to each other as more and more voices clamor to be heard.
I actually find this to be a very exciting time. When I read Jesus and the apostles' descriptions of the ideal church in the New Testament letters (by the way, none of the actual New Testament period churches were ideal), I see a nonhierarchical, highly interactive church where everyone is a valued part of the body bringing individual gifts and no one is left out.
Will we get there in our generation? No. Will we get closer? I hope so. I think the history of the Church is one of being conformed more and more to the likeness of Christ. I don't think the Church was closest to right in the first century and that we've just been getting more and more corrupted as time has gone by. I think God has been sanctifying His Son's Bride for two thousand years, and I think that one day we will be made perfect.
And if I have to get an iPhone or iPad to be better prepared to help us get there, so be it.
Trent Pettit Feb 05, 2010
Recently, a couple of friends and I attended LACMA’s screening of Andrei Tarkovsky’s cinematic masterpiece, Andrei Rublev. The film concerns the famous icon painter, Andrei Rublev. Set amidst the Russian wars of the 15th century, the biography of Rublev is largely Tarkovsky’s creation, however, the historical events surrounding him are real (at times, too real). While Rublev himself does not consistently assume the role of a typical protagonist, the historical scenery around him functions to demonstrate the force of Rublev’s paradoxical nature. It is a mystery how, despite Russia’s austere historical identity, that the country had the capacity to produce someone like Andrei. Andrei found himself in a world conflated by the odd intermingling of political ideology and mystic spirituality, thus providing him no glorified hue from which to transfix his images upon. Tarkovsky, intentionally filmed in black and white, emphasizing the setting’s barrenness and the fact that Andrei’s world was one of rare provision. But, somehow, he was able to release the sublime from the ambiguous grey confiscating the Russian soul, and indeed, its metaphoric extension to the world of the film’s viewers. Andrei discovered (not unaided) a way to expose God’s presence to a land grieved with a sense of absence perpetuated by the ruthless hands of those who thought they could capitalize on that seeming meaninglessness by assuming the role king and god.
In Andrei Rublev, we find the once cloistered monk-artist exposed to the horrors of the outside world’s ensuing battle: between state patronage and repression, Orthodox Christianity and pagan hedonism. Unlike the fictional character, Don Quixote , there is little comedy instigating sympathy for our supposed hero. Moving with an almost stoical impassivity, Andrei struggles to overcome revulsion. After giving up on painting, Andrei finally meets a boy who challenges the artist to look at the world again; emphasizing Tarkovsky’s ideal that art’s purest form culminates in unselfish acts. The film attributes a significant role to the artist, as if his powers have the ability to hold the whole of creation together as it bangs against itself, threatening to pull itself apart. It does, but through Andrei we are given the expectation of resurrection. After having massacred a village and burned the church, Vladamir’s new Czar assigns a young boy, the last living of the bell-makers, to the task of crafting a new bell. With the threat of beheading behind him, the boy assets to the mammoth task with a passionate sense of urgency.
The bell has functioned as an incredibly powerful symbol in Russian history. As Elif Batuman writes, concerning the return of the Danilov bells to the Danilov Monestary in Russia:
In Russian history and culture, church bells occupy a mysteriously important position. Their tolling, Father Roman said, has been known to bring hard-hearted people to repentance, and to dissuade would-be murderers and suicides. Whereas Western European bells are tuned to produce familiar major and minor chords, a Russian bell is prized for its individual, untuned voice, producing rhythmic layered peals. Russian bells are given names like Swan, Bear, or Sheep, and are considered to be capable of suffering. Mentions Konstantin Saradzhev, “Moscow’s most famous bell ringer.” Tells the story of Boris Godunov and one of Ivan the Terrible’s heirs, Dmitri. Under Stalin, bell ringing was prohibited by law, and thousands of tons of bells were destroyed. (The New Yorker, April 27, 2009)
In Andrei Rublev, the ringing of the bell triggers the film’s first relieving moments. The bell seems to represent the irony of a world founded on self-contradiction and the life lived “between the times.” This setting provides the material from which Andrei bears witness. From the purview of the bell’s authoritative presence and cathartic resonances the prophet beckons. Slowly, the first glimpses of color begin to overcome the screen, as if consuming all of the events that transpired before it. Burnt orange emanates from the screen as the camera pan’s closely across the surface of Andrei’s icons, seemingly representative of the baptismal fire (Matt. 3:11). A fire which consumes, cleanses and resurrects, indeed, presenting itself as a challenge to evil’s unrelenting adage– “Long live death!”. The film concludes with a view of The Old Testament Trinity, inviting the audience to gaze into the very face of God Himself. The icon provides a window into divine things, a deterrent from material idolatry, and the abuse of power. We are admonished to take up our proper residency under the authority of the true King, where judgment and beauty, ultimacy and grace, truth and love, exude from a single Countenance.
http://rtrentpettit.wordpress.com/
April Alkema Jan 30, 2010
Burj Al Arab, in English “The Arabian Tower,” is a Jumeirah hotel located in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Its architect, Tom Wright, designed the building with the specific goal of creating an iconic structure—recognized by the ability to draw it in only a few strokes and by its immediate identification with a specific place on earth. The building is meant to resemble the sail of a dhow. Burj Al Arab’s website boasts that it is “the world’s most luxurious hotel,” a statement supported by the fact that it is often popularly known as a “seven-star” hotel. With prices indicative of its luxury, the building is in fact set up to be not only an iconic structure but an iconic experience, associated particularly with Dubai, UAE.
A controversy developed as some viewers noticed that, viewed from the sea, the building makes the shape of the cross. People claimed that Tom Wright had a dream that he should be a Christian influence in the largely Muslim UAE. The level of controversy surrounding the building developed to such a degree that Tom Wright responds to it on his website with the following statement: “I can categorically state that the idea of designing the largest Christian cross in the world on the shores of Dubai never crossed my mind,” and specifically identifies himself as an agnostic.
As far as I can tell, some of the major news sources (i.e. The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times) have not taken the time to deal with the quibbling of the conspiracy theorists and gossipers on this issue; however, the fact that the issue has grown large enough to incite articles, blogs, and a personal response from Tom Wright points to its significance. Symbols are powerful, and this situation is one example of that. The simple presence, however unintentional, of the shape of the cross—infinitely more iconic than Wright’s towering sail—has caused a backlash that would not have arisen if its critics did not think that there were any power or import connected to the shape.
I am sure there are Christians that hear of this odd circumstance and feel a sense of pride in the fact that, in their opinion, God has brought about a small miracle in order to witness to Muslims. There are images circulating the web that highlight the cross on the building. This strange sense of “haha, we got you!” from Christians feels like a tagger from one gang crossing onto another gang’s turf. To some people, the presence of the image indicates the power of its group in the place it is located. The cross functions in many ways for Christians, but some of them include a reminder of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross and a reminder of God’s presence. But is the cross a reminder of God’s presence or does it actually mediate God’s presence? The criticism and bitterness on one side and exultation and encouragement on the other shows that, for many people, the presence of the symbol really does indicate or even mediate the presence of the church or God in that place, almost as if it were a sacrament through image.
I am convinced that it does not take the presence of a symbol or a member of the church to know where God is; God is everywhere. On the other hand, when people recognize a cross and connect it to Christianity, it offers a moment to remember God and/or the church. In some people’s thoughts during these moments, the memories—perhaps of bad experiences in church or of scorn for the idea of a higher being—may have the opposite effect of what some Christians view as the positive witness of the shape of the cross. For others it may be a reminder of God’s presence or Christ’s love. Still many more, including myself, may see the cross and experience a variety of these and other types of responses. Because of the nature of the human mind, it turns out that the shape does mediate something about God and the church, but not God’s Self. The symbol is too entangled with human experience for that. In the end, God does not need the symbol to be present. God is there already and humanity’s power-mongering is only detracting from the truth of love.
Tom Wright Design
Aaron Raymond Jan 29, 2010
So much depends upon the body. We come to believe in the inherent self worth of our own particular form because we have consciously, or not, contemplated upon it our whole lives. Our knowledge of the world is wrapped up in the boundaries of our own finite experience. From birth we witness the world from atop a desolate hill, laying down our foundations of learning from which we build upon. If we are wise we never stop building. We send out signals into the great void hoping to hear a response louder than our own subconscious echoes. We sound the horns, send out the messenger doves, and cast up smoke signals. And to our constant amazement we receive reply.
Our mothers bore us for 9 months, breastfed us for 2 years, bathed us for two more, and watched us grow and mature for the rest. They know the freckles on our nose, the mole behind our ear, the scar on our chin, and every ticklish corner of our skin. Yet every time a mother looks at her child, who by now has grown up with years stretched across his eyes, she sees with joyful surprise that same face she beheld in tears when she was a younger woman. She knows that body, which she bore, nursed, bathed, and clothed.
We all enter the world in the same fashion. We sense our bodies in much the same way. We learn to bathe ourselves. We learn to clothe ourselves. We look in the mirror at ourselves. We get haircuts. We step on the scale. We feel our heart race. We feel our chest rise and fall. We feel the tingle of a soft wind blow upon our neck and through our newly cut hair. We feel our teeth and our lips with our tongue. We feel our fingers press and our toes wiggle back and forth. We feel our bodies in motion in much the same way.
Yet we come to experience another person’s body in varying degrees and contexts. From a look, or a handshake, to the most intimate of human interactions, we learn of the other. And in that most intimate of human interactions we surrender what for so long we had always assumed was so uniquely our own yet bears the signature of a proud mother and the trademark name of a father. In this moment we learn more fully that our bodies are not our own, but one variant manifestation aforementioned.
I raise my eyes from the charcoal lightly held in my right hand, pressed in sweeping gestures upon a blank white sheet of paper. What must it have felt like the moment right before the Big. Bang. occurred? Right before The Word rolled off His tongue. A thousand violins poised in expectant, bottled furry waiting for the down-stroke of the conductor’s baton. And then… Creation pours forth. From my hand as if from the very source of Life itself! It feels like teenage trestle jumping off the train tracks at night into a pitch-black lake. It’s that moment right before your first kiss.
I look to see what my hands have in vain tried to recreate. Out of the corner of my eye I behold the soft toned symmetry of curvilinear shapes that merge together in V-like perplexity and force a drafted echo of a figure upon the empty space of two dimensions. I don’t know this young woman, not even her name. But right now I feel as intimate with her figure as though I were her love. And in every blemish and imperfection I fall more deeply in love as such mistakes become nuanced moments of intentioned observation wrought from charcoal. Every wrinkle, every scar, and every sag I behold in my mind as a testament to time. How perfect is imperfection? My own skin once smelled like butter. Now it smells and looks like a man’s.
