
Is an Engineer an Artist? - katiey
http://nautil.us/blog/is-an-engineer-an-artist
======
jamesrcole
I feel that most discussions about whether somebody/something qualifies as an
artist or art end up being pretty meaningless because people don't have a
clear notion of what "artist" or "art" mean.

Most notions of those terms seem to be based on a picture of exemplars or
prototypes of those kinds of things, and most determinations of whether
somebody/something is an artist/art seem to be based on intuitive similarity
comparisons with those exemplars/prototypes.

[EDIT: just thinking out loud, "art" seems commonly, though implicitly, seen
as having defining characteristics of ineffability and high cultural status,
so people's views about whether X is art often really come down to whether
they think it seems sufficiently ineffable and of sufficient cultural status,
though they wouldn't say that's the basis for their view]

~~~
smallnamespace
> pretty meaningless because people don't have a clear notion of what "artist"
> or "art" mean

Maybe meaningless purely in terms of getting to a concrete answer, but IMO
collaboratively grappling with and exploring our intuitive ideas is useful,
especially when people have different starting perspectives. E.g. this entire
thread.

The world is not math, we can't always build our definitions from axioms.
Sometimes analogical reasoning is the most accessible way to explore a
concept.

~~~
jamesrcole
> but IMO collaboratively grappling with and exploring our intuitive ideas is
> useful

I fully agree.

I'd like to see more discussion about what those terms mean when "is X art/an-
artist" questions come up.

I do think, though, that the meaning of those terms is often not discussed --
or perhaps, not honestly discussed, in a way that isn't simply serving
people's prior judgement on the question -- at the times those questions come
up.

------
formula1
No. Engineers are house builders or railroad workers or car mechanics. Except
they have deeper knowledge in their subject often to the point that nobody
else can do sonething as well.

There is no "uniqueness" in engineering, there is only a balancing of time,
money, reliability, reusability and other purely mathematical concepts. If
something is unique then it is often better than alternatives or worse than
alternatives. Engineering can be considered a sport much easier that an art.

Art can have seperate equivelents. Like a paintng of a beautiful landscape or
a painting depicting pain. Both may have the same price but both are unique.
Even two portraits of the same person will be different simply because two
individuals did it or how style changes with time.

~~~
collyw
Looking at some code I see beauty, other code causes me pain.

~~~
formula1
That can arguably be attributed to experience and cleanliness.

If you walk into a garage it can be dirty, greasy and disorganized. It can
also be labeled, clean and organized. Hardly considered art

~~~
ythl
Code or art?

[http://www.ioccc.org/2013/birken/birken.c](http://www.ioccc.org/2013/birken/birken.c)

~~~
formula1
Ok. Yes its asthetically pleasing. I feel comfortable looking at it. But...

its completely unreasable because all the variable names have been mangled and
there is no whire space to organize the blocks. At this point it looks like a
puzzle.

If you consider the algorithm an art, I disagree. Algorithms are either more
efficient them their predecessors or are efficient for a niche.

------
biztos
This seems to be a recurring question among us "software engineers" in
particular. I don't think the people who work on, say, aircraft parts today
are much bothered by it.

In the Art World though it's been a raging argument for practically the whole
of modernity: who's an artist and who isn't?

Marcel Duchamp proposed that anyone who says they're an artist is an artist,
because intent is what makes something art. Likewise anything made as art, is
art. (This says nothing about good, bad, or other judgements of the artwork or
even the artist.)

Joseph Beuys proposed that every human being is by definition an artist,
because the inherent creativity in all human thought and social activity is
what makes the difference. He also thought of social systems as inherently
artistic -- even your boring old office. Thus the artwork (or brick wall,
insurance claim, whatever) can be a more or less interesting artefact but the
art itself happens elsewhere.

The Duchampian idea is pretty radical in that it removes authority to confer
artist-ness. This is similar in a way to how the software revolution has
removed the authority to define an engineer.

The Beuysian idea is of course much more radical, because if you accept it
then the question itself becomes nonsense.

I think it's worth noting here that the Art World, as embodied by galleries
and museums and professorships and all the trappings of payment and
recognition, has mostly come around to Duchamp's point of view about who and
what is an artist or art; but demands for itself the power to decide who is a
serious artist, and who is a good one. The rich seem to be cool with this; the
poor maybe less so.

(I did read TFA/watch TFvideo, and I think the point would be the same but the
attention different if Mr. Gallagher had said "poet" instead of "artist.")

------
dasil003
In college I did a double-major with of Studio Arts and Computer Science. To
me engineering (particularly software engineering which is the kind I
practice) is a craft, not an art. For something to qualify as art in my mind
it must define and serve its own purpose.

Of course anything can be an artistic medium, a lot of the work in the demo
scene or from _why I believe qualifies as art, but not the bulk of
programming. I say the same thing for graphic design, or wood-working, or even
photography.

It's by no means easy to draw this line. It's at the core of the concept of
"selling out", and it's fraught on both sides. Many accusations of selling out
are due to envy, many defenses of selling out are due to self-justification.
Nevertheless, there is a core concept underneath it all that's important: art
can derive a lot of meaning from being non-essential and non-utilitarian.

------
fenomas
Never really got why people debate questions this. It boils down to asking,
"what are the definitions of the words 'engineer' and 'artist'?". And being
that words are hopelessly overloaded, it's impossible to answer such questions
without saying "Yes, if by 'engineer' you mean....".

The question to ask oneself is, what would be observably different about the
world if engineers are artists, vs. if they aren't? Are we asking whether
engineers should be eligible for the Turner Prize? Whether colleges should put
an engineering professor on the Arts faculty? Or if there's no particular
observable difference, then why not pick any old answer that pleases you?

------
TheGRS
Is code art? Well certainly I've seen some good-looking, clever code before,
but do my class names inspire the next engineer to change their lives?
Probably not.

I think that's where these discussions really fall apart. Sure algorithms or
equations or schematics could be very artistic. What "art" is is highly
subjective, but you should never forget that art often inspires people and
leads them to new places. Its not the only lens to view art, certainly, but
its one I like to pull out when these discussions happen. After all, if we
call everything art, then nothing is art.

------
echelon
By itself, I would say engineering is not art. The tools of the engineering
discipline can be used to create art, though. Video games, interactive
displays, generative media, etc.--as outputs rather than processes--can
definitely qualify as artistic in nature.

Using engineering skills and tools for artistic purpose is one of my biggest
hobbies.

\- [http://lasers.io](http://lasers.io)

\- [http://jungle.horse](http://jungle.horse)

Please don't hammer the latter one too hard. It's Rust, but not load tested
(also on a shared sever). I'm also working on an improved speech algorithm
that I hope to finish this weekend. So yeah, please don't kill it or share
beyond HN. (Comments and criticism welcome.)

------
MrZongle2
Is a barista who adds a clever design to the foam of your coffee an artist?

For most engineers, I think the answer is "no": we focus on functionality and
efficiency and while some of that may go towards the happiness of the end-
user, what we build is generally not consumed directly by that end-user but
rather the byproduct.

But...there are cases where you observe a mechanism or piece of code that is
not only efficient but _beautiful_ in its simplicity. Perhaps laymen don't
appreciate it, but fellow engineers can.

I think that in such cases where the creator goes beyond "good enough" and
makes an effort to elevate their creation to a point where peers can point to
it and go "Yes! _That_ is how to do it!", engineering can be art.

~~~
formula1
The barista is in this case since she is allowed and chooses to add a personal
touch. By not adding the personal touch its also a form of expression. Either
way, the personal touch will have a direct effect on the enjoyability of the
coffee.

Personal touches in programming are rare and often bad. Going past "good
enough" is rarely considered art as its done for code cleanliness or
efficiency.

I would never hire a programmer for funny comments. I might hire a battista
for her art

------
nickbauman
An artist is a person who presents something by putting a frame around it. Not
necessarily a literal frame, either. A definition so broad as to be applicable
almost anywhere. So broad that is risks being all but meaningless.

But I think we can agree that an engineer has different goals than an artist
even in the broadest definition of both.

An engineer is someone who uses well understood solutions and techniques to
solving problems that involve the physical world. This is distinct from
science, which tries to discover new ways to solve problems or learn new
things about the physical world. Often you need to use engineering to do
science. So often that the scientists spend a lot of time _waiting around for
the engineers to move them along._ (See: LHC).

------
ChristianGeek
Some engineers are artists, just as some members of any profession are
artists. Those who are have a unique ability to use their craft to create
something that goes beyond utility to touch people on an emotional level.

The vast majority of engineers, however, are definitely not artists.

------
delinka
"Wilson seems to have thought the engineers of this accelerator, and the
scientists using it to study nature, were like—or as important as—artists."

This implies, to me, that the author seems to have an almost-classist regard
for artists (however he may define the term.) We certainly need visionaries in
a variety of disciplines. Encouraging visionaries is one thing that "makes
[our country] worth defending." Why unnecessarily burden visionaries with
pigeonholes not of their choosing? Certainly enlighten them as to their
available paths, their strengths ... but please don't discourage someone from
being a visionary engineer by declaring that they'll never be as 'important'
as an artist.

------
panglott
Often art requires engineering (sculpture especially, but some computer games
are essentially literary or art projects).

Should engineering require art? Maybe our built environment would be
pleasanter if more of it did.

~~~
biztos
I like that idea.

As you probably know, in the art world there's a nontrivial business of
fabricators. Consider a giant lamp-bear[0]. That's pretty hard to build: it
has to not fall over and kill the students, it has to survive the winter, it
has to be transportable from wherever you build it.

There's a whole cottage industry that just does things like that. (Not all of
them large of course.)

Wouldn't it be cool if engineering projects called in a team of artists?
Probably the closest anyone's come to that is having murals on public
buildings.

[0]: [https://www.brown.edu/about/public-
art/Fischer](https://www.brown.edu/about/public-art/Fischer)

~~~
Jtsummers
Groups developing systems that interface with humans bring in artists (by
various titles) all the time. In the programming world these are our UI/UX
designers. In aircraft, it's the person or persons deciding on how the
passenger cabin should look and feel. Same for other vehicles. For buildings,
it may be the architect, but more likely a team working with them.

~~~
biztos
Yes but doesn't this just bring us back to the "are engineers artists"
question?

UI/UX designers are not "artists" by conventional definition, and architects
are in such a special zone of "engineering-plus" that some of us end up called
Software Architects.

In other words: his exceptional aesthetic sense doesn't make Jony Ive an
Artist except in a let's-decide-what-an-artist-is discussion. Which this is,
of course. :-)

~~~
Jtsummers
I was responding to your question here:

    
    
      Wouldn't it be cool if engineering projects called in a team of artists?
    

By saying it does happen. Could it happen more, sure, but it does happen quite
often, and for more than just murals.

Regarding the general debate here of engineer vs artist, I gave up on it. We
have to first agree on what is meant by "art". By some definitions,
engineering is very clearly art. By others, it's very clearly not.

------
return0
of course not, we make money.

~~~
ythl
This is the most compelling argument I've read in the whole thread as to why
engineers are not artists

~~~
jamesrcole
is someone disqualified if they make money?

------
venomsnake
They are orthogonal. By definition art is useless. A 5km hanging bridge is a
engineering wonder - link the right places on the earth it is economic engine
of tremendous growth. Put it in the middle of the gobi desert - it is an art
installation while still keeping the engineering wonder status.

------
plussed_reader
Is writing copy for the editorial page of a newspaper art? Seems to me a lot
of the language that goes into programming serves more of a functional purpose
vs. an aesthetic/artistic purpose.

I liked what dasil003 brought up about the demo scene; I agree with that
sentiment.

------
emilsedgh
"It has nothing to do directly with defending our country _except to help make
it worth defending_ "

That italic part added by the author changed the context in a very meaningful
way. Before realizing that was added by author I became more inteeested in
that conversation.

Such a wise and thought provoking addition to an otherwise disappointing
conversation.

~~~
mcphage
> That italic part added by the author changed the context in a very
> meaningful way.

"Italics mine" means that the current author (in this case, Brian Gallagher)
italicized a portion of the passage to emphasize it, it doesn't meant that
they wrote the italicized text. That's still part of Robert Wilson's quote, he
actually said that.

~~~
emilsedgh
Oh great. In this case Im back at searching the rest of the conversation.

Thanks for the explanation.

~~~
mcphage
No problem :-)

------
pcmaffey
Engineering and Art are siblings on the path of knowledge.

------
gfiorav
No, of course not. Anybody who thinks this probably misunderstands craft and
art.

~~~
ythl
Really, because I feel like "craft" and "art" are highly subjective terms. How
is the iterative process of creating perfect code any different from the
iterative process of sculpting the perfect sculpture?

Haven't you ever looked at a code or software project and gotten that distinct
feeling of awe that arises in you when you realize you are looking at
something high quality, something that required real craftsmanship to make?
That is art.

It most recently happened to me when I discovered Vue.js. As a diehard angular
user, Vue was just so clean, so simple, so beautiful - a breath of fresh air
in a warzone of competing monolithic javascript frameworks.

~~~
AndrewDucker
That's amazing craftmanship you're admiring.

Art has no function. Craft has function.

~~~
dragonwriter
The primary function of art (it may have others, but this function is what
defines it _as_ art) is to create a response in the person experiencing it; it
is not without function.

------
SticksAndBreaks
No, because we get money. Also artists spawn less fundamentalism terror and
mostly work with there suboconcious.

