The Profile Page of a Renaissance Thinker, circa 2017

STEM to STEAM--its historical connection and the current revitalization of that re-entanglement of methodologies--is perhaps my favorite topic of discussion these days. When I think of the Renaissance and contributors like Leonardo da Vinci and talk to people about what that means today, I often put the cultural bridge from the Middle Ages to modern history in context.  It was a time of amazing inventions, startling new ideas, and great explorations. The word Renaissance means to be revived—to be born.  During this era there was a dramatic transformation of world views and the ideal of human power and potentiality was reborn. This shift went hand in hand with a great number of innovations. The list is long, but to pick just a few: the printing press –made knowledge available to a vast number of people beyond the clergy and ruling elite. An increase in literacy soon followed; the pencil and inexpensive paper--made writing, note-taking, sketching and drawing, and therefore the recording of learning accessible; the magnetic compass and the large sailing ship—resulted in tremendous expansion (for better or worse), international trade, and exchange of information. And as we discovered the world was an oblate spheroid much of traditional wisdom was rendered flat! Then there was the mechanical clock which allowed people to experience time as a controllable outcome, or at least a known quantity. In the Middle Ages the vast majority of people didn’t know what year it was or even what century they lived in.

Today we use the term Renaissance woman or man to suggest a well-rounded, balanced person comfortable with both art and science. A polymath. Someone who moves comfortably between the right and left hemispheres of the brain, the scientist-musician, the engineer-painter, the physician-poet. Leonardo da Vinci may be one of our best known polymaths—he was a great scientist and artist, an engineer, a critical thinker, a creative visionary with a broad worldview. He was an inventor, a painter, a perpetual teacher, and a perpetual student, he was an independent thinker and he gathered up every detail he could from all his cognitive senses as he moved through his world. 

What would the modern da Vinci look like? She would need to be attuned to technological developments and information transfer. The modern da Vinci would be globally aware and in addition to appreciating global links in communication, economies, and ecosystems, she would have an appreciation of different cultures. Racism, sexism, religious persecution, homophobia are vestiges of medieval thinking.  The Renaissance thinker would have an insatiable curiosity and an unrelenting quest for continuous learning, with a commitment to test knowledge through experience, persistence, and a willingness to learn from mistakes. This person would continuously refine the experience and perception of all five (plus) of her senses; there would be a willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty. We would witness an active pursuit to develop balance between science and art, logic and imagination …or what some people call “whole-brain” thinking. There would be a recognition and appreciation for the interconnectedness of things and phenomena, or  “systems thinking.”   

As I write this I am reminded of the great American author Annie Dillard when she describes in her essay “Seeing” from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek that we often use sight to calculate what we expect, that definitions and preconceptions can shape what we record. I like using the metaphor of sight when I talk to people about STEAM. One afternoon along a walk near an open space near her home, Dillard runs into an excited group of boys pointing at the willows along the river bank. She asks them what they are looking at. They tell her it’s an enormous frog. She stares right at it, sees the reeds and the gentle movement of water, the angle of light and the tips of the grasses; finally it moves as she sees it is actually the color of brown bark. Because she was looking for the color green she could not really see the bullfrog.  

For the Renaissance thinker seeing is very much a matter of multi-modal exploration and verbalization. Dillard writes “Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes, I simply won’t see it. But there is another kind of seeing that involves letting go. When I see this way I sway transfixed and emptied. The difference between the two ways of seeing is the difference between walking with and without a camera. When I walk with a camera I walk from shot to shot, reading the light on a calibrated meter. When I walk without a camera, my own shutter opens, and the moment’s light prints on my own silver gut.” This is the story I would tell to skeptics who are concerned with re-entanglement of arts and sciences.  

The profile page for today’s Renaissance man or woman would illustrate a mental literacy—showing an appreciation for the vast potential of the brain and the multiplicity of intelligences (emotional intelligence at the forefront), to understand that creativity is the basis of any equation or symphony; creativity is on the other side of that Dixie cup string calling in reference to a theory of special relativity or great work of literature. Creativity in all its forms are necessary, to be celebrated, explored, and when our ideas seem flat again, it is creativity and creative risk that brings balance, fosters change and innovation, and our vision can be revived, born anew. To be a modern Renaissance thinker is about the way we perceive, how we look for interpretation and meaning, how we seek ways to find that intellectual balance not just in work and school, but life in general—in the things we choose to do and the ways we push ourselves to really see and think and create.