Discussion: Does Explanation Kill Wonder?
Details
Does understanding the world make it richer or does it drain something essential from it?
In this first session of Marginal Thoughts, we’ll explore that question through three short and very different works:
- A short story by Italo Calvino: "The Distance of the Moon" (~40 min read)
- An animated clip of Richard Feynman's "Ode To A Flower" (~1 min)
- A poem by Walt Whitman: "When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer" (~1 min)
Along the way, we'll see Calvino anticipate the dating trend of 'orbiting' and take it very literally, Feynman may or may not ruin flowers for us, and Whitman will demonstrate that rage-quitting an astronomy lecture can still produce poetry.
How to prepare
Please read/watch the materials in advance. As you do, try to identify at least one point of curiosity, confusion, or uncertainty - these will be natural starting points for our discussion.
What to expect
This is an in-person, conversational meetup. The goal isn't to debate, lecture, or "confess" - it’s to explore ideas and leave with better questions than we arrived with.
Optional context for the extra curious
Calvino's story opens his collection Cosmicomics. The Feynman clip comes from the BBC interview "The Pleasure of Finding Things Out". And here's an honorable mention to Borges' poem "The Moon" which narrowly lost out to Whitman's.