Reconnecting Science to the Humanities

The field of architecture is often simplified into creativity an individual is born with and skills learned through practice. What role could science play in broadening this perspective to make us more holistic designers with a deeper sense of purpose about the enduring aspects of our work?

Preeminent biologist, Pulitzer Prize winning author and professor emeritus at Harvard University, Edward O. Wilson’s recent book “The Origins of Creativity” addresses questions on how the humanities became divorced from science and what that means for the collective culture of people. He states early on, “the ancestor of our species developed the brain power to connect with other minds and to conceive unlimited time, distance, and potential outcomes. This infinite reach of imagination, put quite simply, is what made us great.”

Anyone engaged in practicing architecture is uniquely focused on the factors of time, distance and potential outcomes. Wilson continues his discussion with an analysis of language and its relationship to storytelling as a means of expressing creativity. Language is necessary as both a written and oral medium in creating narratives and for architects, the stories we tell are of the users of buildings. Design is a combination of drawings, documents and conversations that shape our communities. Everything from the specs and drawings to the photographs and post-occupancy reports define our moment in history. Wilson notes, in his accessible writing, that the importance of language is akin to the vital organs of our bodies, implying that the ability to function is both separate but intrinsically linked to the foundation of society. “By any measures of liberation and empowerment, language is not just a creation of humanity, it is humanity.” The book supports its assertions through vignettes from his illustrious career allowing himself as an author and scientist to play a significant role in how the reader understands the subject.

To bring this back to architecture, books such as “The Origins of Creativity” offer insight into how we can approach design. By moving beyond the usual debate over style, trend and their love affair with technology the field of architecture can embrace scientific history, methodology and understanding to tell more innovative stories through the built environment. In his chapter entitled, Bedrock, Wilson plainly states, “Science (with technology) tells us whatever is needed in order to go wherever we choose, and the humanities tell us where to go with whatever is produced by science.” If architecture blindly embraces the immediate needs of both client (ie: society) and environment (ie: current technologies) are we not simply reactionary actors? Creativity, separate from innovation, allows the former to be balanced with our goals for the future. 

Who could forget the abandoned apartments described in Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? or the sprawling space resort of Villa Straylight in William Gibson’s Neuromancer? Science fiction has a profound influence on architecture precisely because of its ability to imagine design, unencumbered by the rules of available science. It is this marriage that Wilson identifies as the heart of what can make art lasting. “Overall, technical knowledge and fictive genius combined can provide unlimited enduring material for a blend of science and the creative arts.”

This book successfully ponders the place of the humanities alongside science and their stunted growth beside technology. More specifically for architects straddling the line between both, it brings a fresh perspective to the subject of how we can reconnect our work to the larger goals of science and the broader dreams of artists.