promise & uncertainty of science

A Pictorial Guide to the correlation between emotions and cloud formations

Shannon May is an illustrator living in Baltimore, MD. She writes that she is "fascinated by the promise and aesthetics of science and loves exploring, being uncomfortable, books, clouds, and geometry." Her intersection of art and science is up my alley. In fact, her portrait of Heisenberg reminds me of my own approach to portraits of scientists: combining their face with their work. At first I thought this was not that literal, that the dots were merely molecules. But, if you look closely, you can see that she is specifically trying to illustrate the nature of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle (no mean feet). One formulation,

Δx Δp ≥ ħ/2

appears at the bottom. This inequality means that the product of the uncertainty in the position of ANYTHING and the uncertainty in its momentum is greater or equal to a half h-bar (Planck's constant divided by 2π, or ħ=h/2π). This means we can never know the position and momentum (mass times velocity, or basically, the motion) of ANYTHING with absolute precision. It turns out that Planck's constant is very small, so this limit on the knowability of both location and motion is largely irrelevant to everyday life of things we can see (people, trees, planets, cars, mice, or even bacteria). But, in the quantum world of the very small, this limit has profound implications. The only way we can 'see' the very small, for instance, an electron (we'll call him Bob), involves hitting Bob with at least a single quantum of light (a photon). But if you hit Bob with a photon he'll go off running in all directions, since the photon will transfer some momentum to Bob - so, we might know exactly where Bob was, when he was hit with the photon, but we don't know his momentum at all. Conversely, we could measure Bob's collision with another particle or photon and know his momentum but we could no longer know where he was. Also we can know both position and momentum, but only with a certain fuzziness or lack of precision (dictated precisely by the inequality above). Thus, we can precisely describe behaviours of groups of small things in a statistical way, but it is inherently impossible to precisely predict the behaviour of individual quanta like Bob.



I think in this illusration, Shannon May is trying to show this with her filled and hollow circles, to denote positions (filled) and posible positions (hollow) of particles and their interactions shown by little red arrows.

Other illustrations like A Pictorial Guide to the correlation between emotions and cloud formations seem both humourous metaphor, with a wink and a tip of the hat to the science of cloud physics. Some are straightforward wonder at astronomy.


illustration for Italo Calvino's 'Cosmicomics'


Lunar Park, personal work


Illustration for article Contrarian Investor Sees Economic Crash in China


Music for Airports, illustration for article about the history of rock music

I love how that last one combines the sound waveform and airplane steam trail.

You can find her site, her blog and an etsy shop for craftier endeavours and check out the rest of her work.

{via both design sponge and the shallow end}

Leafy Pareidolia

Since we were just talking about pareidolia, you should check out the delightful wunderkammer of leaves and other tree parts, by children's illustrator Christopher Niemann from the NYT Abstract City Blog. We've got 'seeing things in clouds' and 'seeing the Hawaiian Island chain in other things' - it's a whole theme going.

Pareidolia Tamed

I strive to be a Renaissance woman, to straddle the art:science divide. I have some success in this. For instance, people actually pay me to work as a scientist, and other people pay me to make art. I also, make 'art about science' sometimes. In observing myself, I find that I come to art about science as a scientist - I might employ whimsy, but I respect accuracy. This tendency doesn't stop me from making art about myth. But the way my brain is wired, I don't have any tendency to use science decoratively, or twist it for humour. If there is humour, it is inherent (like the irony in scientists having imaginary friends such as Maxwell's Demon). This is not a judgment, merely an observation. I enjoy art which combines levity with science.

As a scientist, I am trained to be wary of 'apophenia' or the propensity to see patterns where there are none, and specifically 'pareidolia' or seeing images in random stimuli, like seeing a dragon in the clouds. Pareidolia can be very useful as a visual artist. To the scientist it is a hazard, unless it recognized and happens to inspire ideas (as it often does to the artist). I think this training is why, I recognize in Kevin Van Aelst an artist with similar interests to me, but a mind which works quite differently than my own. His photographs show things masquerading as other things, often with a scientific or mathematical bent. (His C.V. says his background is psychology- perhaps this explains the lens through which he views his subjects.)

Consider what appears at first glance to be a pile of laundry, but on closer examination reveals a lesson in anatomy, complete with colours to indicate the nature of the blood (blue, deoxygenated vs. oxygenated red) in cardiovascular circulation:

The Heart, 2009, digital c-print, 40 x 30"

Or the fractal egg (with yolks illustrating the Cantor set), as if he sensed that a yolk was simply the first in a set to be subdivided. A pattern, which is not really there...


Or the more straightforward, map of Hawaii.

Hawaii, 2007, digital C-print, 12 x 18

But to me, this seemingly simple case of pareidolia, seeing a map in a spilled drink, hides a deeper insight. As a geophysicist, I know that the man in the painting behind my shoulder, J. Tuzo Wilson explained that the Hawaiian islands were formed by upwelling molten rock at a fixed hotspot, as the Pacific tectonic plate moved northwest leaving a trail of volcanoes in its wake. Physics tells you inertial frames of reference are equivalent; we could sit on the hotspot for hundreds of million of years (ouch!) and watch the Pacific plate go by, or affix ourselves to the Pacific and watch the volcanoes appear in a line in the opposite direction. Suddenly, the spilled pop seems like a nice metaphor for island chain formation.

Some of his portfolio is just that: metaphors in unexpected media. Like cellular mitosis in doughnuts, complete with sprinkle chromosomes:

Cellular Mitosis (krispy kreme), 2005, series of 6 c-prints, each 16 x 20

Or clouds nomenclature in a coffee cup:

Common Clouds, 2007, Series of 9 digital C-prints and labels, each print: 16 x 20

But metaphor is also both a hazard (because it can lead to inaccuracy) and an invaluable tool (because it can lead to insight) to the scientist. Ultimately, the scientist and the artist share communication as a paramount goal. As such the place where they intersect is an area rife with possibility and creativity - and often humour.

clouds - from both sides now

I have long pondered this problem myself: how to make a better umbrella? It seems to me there are several design flaws with the umbrella. Consider this: they are large, cumbersome, are always being forgotten places, never there when you need them (because they are cumbersome you leave your bumbershoot at home), prone to turning inside-out in the wind, leave puddles everywhere, and can inadvertently be used as a weapon, what with the sharp wiry skeletons held near head-level on crowded rainy streets. Though, some of us are clumsier than others... but I digress.



This inflatable cloud umbrella by Holland-based Joons impresses me with its whimsical design. Consider this: it all fits in the tube, so it is easy to carry; it cannot be blown inside out; inside the tube, after use, it could hardly leave a puddle; it is next to impossible to use an inflatable cloud as a weapon; it looks pretty and clouds are hip (you heard it here). If someone on a crowded city street inadvertently bonked you on the head with their inflatable cloud, what could you do but laugh? The main draw-back I see is that it cannot be quickly deployed. I can envision a user cursing in the rain, while using the tube-pump to inflate their cloud. But overall, quite the clever and elegant design!

[via swissmiss]