In this fascinating interview, Neil Denny talks to Arthur I. Miller, historian and philosopher of science, about the progress of science and art, how they merged in the 20th century and continue to do so today. As Miller says, ‘… at the beginning of the 20th century, scientists were beginning to think like artists and artists were beginning to think like scientists.’ But this was not a new development even then; as Miller points out, great creative minds like Leonardo da Vinci ‘thought there was no distinction between art, science, and technology.’

The idea that science and art share a close relationship makes sense to me: they’re both ways of interpreting the world so that it makes sense to us; they open up our imaginations to new ways of seeing and change our perspectives by revealing deeper worlds, from the subatomic to the galactic; and great breakthroughs in science happen not only as the result of painstaking observation and experiment, but in great flashes of creative, visionary brilliance. Listen to the podcast discussion here

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