We are blessed with a magnificent and miraculous world ocean on this planet. But we are also stressing it in ways that we are not even close to bringing under control.
A painting is nothing more than light reflected from the surface of a pigment-covered canvas. But a great painter can make you see the depth, make you feel the underlying emotion, make you sense the larger world. That, too, is the power of science: to sense and convey the depth and dimensionality of nature, to glance at the surface and to divine the shape of the universe around us.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the ability of great artists and science to reveal deeper truths beneath the surface of reality.
Carl Safina's quote reflects on the relationship between art and science, suggesting that both possess the capacity to transform mere appearances into profound experiences. While a painting might initially seem like just colors on a canvas, a skilled painter can evoke deep emotions and insights, much like science can unveil the complexities of the universe. This highlights the intrinsic value of creativity and analytical thought in comprehending and experiencing the world more fully.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used during an art exhibition to provoke thought about the role of perception in art.
More from Carl Safina
All quotes →Whether on'e special emphasis is global warming or child welfare, the cause is the same cause. And justice comes from the same place being human comes from: compassion.
[About reading Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, age 14, in the back seat of his parents' sedan. I almost threw up. I got physically ill when I learned that ospreys and peregrine falcons weren't raising chicks because of what people were spraying on bugs at their farms and lawns. This was the first time I learned that humans could impact the environment with chemicals. [That a corporation would create a product that didn't operate as advertised] was shocking in a way we weren't inured to.
Maybe we’ll live to see sharks recover. Right now, that seems as improbable as seeing all these falcons. Hope is the ability to see how things could be better. The world of human affairs has long been a shadowy place, but always backlit by the light of hope. Each person can add hope to the world. A resigned person subtracts hope. The more people strive, the more change becomes likely.
The compass of compassion asks not what is good for me? but what is good? Not what is best for me but what is best. Not what is right for me but what is right. Not how much can we take? but How much ought we leave? and how much might we give? Not what is easy but what is worthy. Not what is practical but what is moral.
Economists don't seem to have noticed that the economy sits entirely within the ecology.
Similar quotes
Art offers sanctuary to everyone willing to open their Hearts as well as their Eyes.
Art is not like other culture because its success is not made by its audience. The public fill concert halls and cinemas every day, we read novels by the millions, and buy records by the billions. 'We the people' affect the making and quality of most of our culture, but not our art.
The meaning of a theater event is that none of us could see something so clearly as with the new energy that is brought with the meeting of a theme, actors living it, and an audience gradually entering it to live it with them. At that moment, a certain light appears, revealing what we would never have thought of on our own.
In all the creative work that I have done, what has come first is a problem, a puzzle involving discomfort.
Blues is the bedrock of everything I do. All the characters in my plays, their ideas and attitudes, the stance they adopt in the world, are all ideas and attitudes that are expressed in the blues.
Every artist, every scientist, every writer must decide now where he stands. The artist must take sides. He must elect to fight for freedom or for slavery. I have made my choice. I had no alternative.