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PAGE B14 - FEBRUARY 16, 2017 - LA JOLLA LIGHT
Timken Museum of Art presents ‘Witness to War.’
Four Art Displays ■ Opening Feb. 17, “Sum of the Parts,” a curated selection of artists working in collage, and “17 Collages from the Athenaeum’s Permanent Collection,” will be on view through March 25 at Athenaeum Music & Arts Library, 1008 Wall St. The opening reception is 6:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 17. Free. (858) 454-5872. ljathenaeum.org
Two collage exhibits are on view at Athenaeum Music & Arts Library starting Feb. 17.
■ Timken Museum of Art presents “Witness to War,” an extensive collection of more than 100 etchings and lithographs, cataloguing the brutality and fatal consequences of war in a stark, confrontational and unflinching manner, on view through May 28, 1500 El Prado in Balboa Park, San Diego.Exhibit features the works of Jacques Callot, Francisco Goya and George Bellows, documenting the Thirty Years War, Napoleonic War and First World War. See it during museum hours 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday; noon to 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Free. (619) 239-5548. timkenmuseum.org ■ The title of Donald Martiny’s second solo exhibition,
Work by Donald Martiny “Pittura A Macchia,” refers to the disparagement of Italian Renaissance Master Titian’s late career works as “patchy pictures” or pittura a macchia. His interpretations of this concept will be on view through April 2, with an opening reception 6 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 18 at Madison Gallery, 1055 Wall St. Free. (858) 459-0836. madisongalleries.com ■ Celebrating 45 years of wildlife carving and art, the California Open Wildlife Art Festival runs 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Feb. 18-19 at Liberty Station, 2875 Dewey St., Point Loma with more than 100 carvers from the United States, Canada, Europe and Japan and premier wildlife painters and photographers from throughout California. Free. pswa.net
UCSD Concerts ■ Camera Lucida — a San Diego-based, chamber-music collaboration between various musicians — presents a concert of three composers 7:30 p.m. Feb. 20. Program
SPONSORED COLUMNS STEPHEN PFEIFFER, PH.D. Clinical Psychologist 858.784.1960
Shedding Light on the Age of Endarkenment In January of 2017, over a thousand psychologists convened at the Society for Personality and Social Psychology’s annual conference to discuss the recent uptick in the public’s rejection of scientific data, especially regarding man-made climate change, vaccine safety, and even Darwin’s 150-year-old theory of evolution. Despite the years, decades, and even centuries of research and data and the almost universal scientific backing, so many people are denying the validity of scientific discovery at rates so extreme that the psychologists have termed this the “Anti-
Enlightenment Era.” Psychologists are only beginning to study this phenomenon that leads otherwise intelligent people to reject data that is specifically data-driven or scientific in origin and predates the recent presidential campaign and election. Psychologists want to know why people are resisting science, although it is recognized that fear and anxiety are factors that lead people to react emotionally rather than rationally. The new administration, which boasts high-ranking members who have openly rejected scientific data, can’t be solely to blame. Under the previous administration, which was known to heavily weigh and promote scientific data, public skepticism of science reached the same kind of fervor that led Galileo to publicly recant his findings, which had confirmed the earlier theories of Copernicus that the earth revolved around the sun. It seems preposterous to us now that Galileo was tried by the Inquisition for heresy and forced to renounce his scientific findings since science has helped us to chart the solar system and beyond, unequivocally
validating Galileo’s 17th century findings. But that may be central to how we view this question of whether we’re in a post-fact, antienlightenment era. For one thing, people will hold to what they believe is true even in the face of evidence that proves those beliefs to be wrong. They pick and choose facts that reinforce their place in the group with which they identify. Dan Kahan calls this cultural cognition, a protective mechanism that comes into play and which gives people an emotional predisposition to reject a claim that, if they accepted it, would drive a wedge between them and their group of peers. The current problem is twofold: people don’t want their beliefs challenged and will actively seek out sources—reputable or not—that confirm their beliefs. The second problem is the recent proliferation of lies as part of mainstream culture, so mainstream, in fact, that we have a sitting president who was elected despite masses of provable evidence that he regularly lies. He has even employed the term throughout his career, created by his ghostwriter—“truthful hyperbole,”
which sounds awfully close to the phrase “alternative facts.” Lies play tricks on the brain, because when processing a lie, the brain must first accept what it hears as true, or possible, before being able to refute it. But that’s where the problem lies, so to speak: refuting the lie is a choice, and one that can be easily disrupted. Some people want to believe the lie if the truth disrupts the familiarity and comfort of their worldview. There is another problem with lies and the human brain: the brain isn’t well equipped to process lie after lie, especially one that gets repeated in the force and frequency of a machine-gun barrage. The brain can grow weary and give up processing the lie from the fact, accepting the lie as true in what’s known as illusory truth. Hence the effectiveness of fake news. Column continued at http://www.lajollalight.com/ourcolumns/sponsored-columnists/ sd-shedding-light-on-age-ofendarkenment-20170206-story.html
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