From a follow up post to the one I just blogged:
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The arts are so important to our psyches. They should not be discounted as being unimportant to being human. That is why I am insistent that creating a life style in the post-peak oil era that preserves artistic impulses is an essential element. What good is it to preserve human societies that cannot devote some time to reveling in artistic production? It is painful to read the news stories about schools that are cutting the humanities in these tough budget times. Instead they think it is essential to force everyone to become mathematicians, scientists, and engineers. So we’ll go that route and make humanity miserable. That is far from wise.
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I have developed this conviction. Wisdom isn’t just great logic and knowledge in the ordinary, and very common, sense. It includes the emotions. We have to, first and foremost, love. And love starts with appreciation of beauty in all its forms. I love understanding how the world works. But I also love Brandi’s songs and Tiité’s pieces (thank you Tiité). I love Queen and Wagner. I love Michael Angelo. I love Shakespeare. I will fight to preserve what can be saved. I will fight to assure the place of humanities in our humanity.
