(Translated from the Hebrew)
Good evening.
As stated, I will talk about elephants and polymaths, and about multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary fields.
I will start with the elephants. I assume that many of you know the ancient Indian fable about the blind men and the elephants.
There are many versions, but in principle it goes like this:
There is a group of blind people who hear that an elephant is about to come to town. They know that there are very interesting and curious animals called elephants; that they are very complex animals.
They want to know what an elephant is. They have never encountered one. When the elephant comes to town, all the blind people stand at different points around it, as the elephant is enormous and the blind people are people, smaller than the elephant. Each one touches the elephant as this is their way to learn about the world around them. Each one formulates a picture in his mind, about what the elephant looks like. Then they share their experiences. The one who stood by the elephant’s leg, thinks it is a pole. The one who stood by the elephant’s ear, think it’s a big, thin sheet. The one who stood by the elephant’s trunk, thinks it’s a rubber pipe. The one who stood by the elephant’s stomach, thinks it’s a large, firm wall.
So, they find out, to their amazement, that each one thinks that the elephant is something else. Now, there are different versions to the story, but in most, they start arguing and fighting until they are all bleeding. Each one thinks that the others are stupid or trying to deceive them, or purposely trick them.
It is obvious to them that each one touched an elephant, and the others touched something else, but not an elephant. They, themselves, felt, touched, smelled an elephant. That’s reality.
What can be done in such a case, for them to know what is an elephant?
One option is that each of them take the elephant and go on a very long journey with it, during which they can touch all parts of the elephant. Then they can somehow try and put everything together. This is not a simple task. To rebuild what is an elephant.
Another option is that each one realizes that they saw only part of the elephant, each one saw only one part and together they can reconstruct what an elephant looks like.
Here also, there are two possibilities.
One is that each person says what he felt and then they can collect their descriptions. An elephant is also a pole, and a sheet, and a wall. Or something more intellectual that will bring them to a better understanding of what an elephant is. They will use their relationships to try and reconstruct what an elephant looks like. This is called integration of different perspectives. This way the leg will not just be a pole, it will really be a pole, but everyone will understand in what position it is in comparison to the other parts. How can they really reconstruct the picture, while each part is obviously relative and connected in some way to the other parts, so that they can understand how an elephant works, how it moves, how it eats.
It seems that this is not a simple task and it is obvious that the fable is a parable not to physically blind people, but to those with blind spots. This parable tells us that we are all blind, that we all see only part of reality. We all have blind spots that we are not even aware of, just like those who touched the elephant in one part and did not realize that there could be another perspective. This is because we have a limited ability to perceive reality.
This way, we actually do not understand reality and also have a hard time accepting another and new perspective, based on the other parts of reality. We cannot communicate with others to hear about their perspective on reality, how they understand reality, understand their reality as something legitimate.
Now imagine that these blind people were surfing social media. Each one saw the movie that everyone is talking about, the social dilemma, or over the network trap, which just tells us who are those who gave the network its name.
It is known that in the past there was great hope that the moment social networks opened, this would be a gigantic, open ocean of information for each and every one to come and take, and each one would be able to see reality and be exposed to many different perspectives. This was supposed to be some remedy for our Blind Spots. From many sources it seems that, on the contrary, exactly the opposite is happening. People are closed in on their perspectives, in the way they see reality. Homogenous and monolithic communities think the same about the world, and reality.
They claim that network managers purposely flood them with information that matches their beliefs, their opinions and their behavior. We know that everything is open and exposed on the network. Nothing is concealed and this is how they are growing stronger in their opinions, in the way they see reality, as if this is the only reality, these are the facts. Each one even receives a different set of facts; this is a set of facts on reality, and this is reality. Others, who see reality in a different light are stupid, ignoramuses, and in the worst case, liars and people who are trying to trick us.
As I said previously, our understanding of reality is also damaged, as well as the ability to look at things from a different perspective, in light of additional information, different knowledge, from another source, showing reality in another light. Imagine that these blind people were scientists, researchers at Bar-Ilan University, or at another university, and they had to renew, discover, create, understand reality, because that is their mandate, for the good of humanity. We all understand this, and definitely today, during the Corona pandemic.
Each one would come with a different perspective: the life scientist, with a biological perspective, the behavioral scientist, with a psychological perspective, the computer scientist, with a computer perspective, and the philosopher, with a philosophical perspective.
Each one would try to understand, for example, the brain, which is a topic close to my heart, because I work in brain research. The human brain is a very complex phenomenon. For many years scientists have tried to understand it, without many major breakthroughs. If we could really understand the human brain, we would be somewhere else, from many, many perspectives. But many people look at the brain from diverse angles. As I said earlier, also biological, also psychological and also philosophical.
Each person has a different, and limited, perspective, which can only explain part of the situation. It is also very difficult, because we each received certain education, within specific methodologies, I would even say axioms, so we see reality through the education we were given.
Academic education also opens up the world, but to a certain extent, closes and limits it, because our perspective is based on our education. This might result in a situation where people understand certain angles of the brain, but they have to learn about more fields, to understand the entire brain, or elephant. Just like the blind person who was taken to all sides, or at least several sides, of the elephant, so that he could communicate with others, hear about their understanding, their lexicon, their style of speech, the way that they perceive the world.
Only this way can we possibly increase our understanding of complex phenomena, which are the scientific events that we are facing. Now, you could say, that’s simple, it is obvious that there must be some multidisciplinary approach, and even more so, an interdisciplinary approach; an integration between perspectives, so that we can understand complex ideas. But, surprisingly, it seems that things are not like this these days.
So, actually, in early history, during the Greek era, people would read Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. In fact, interdisciplinary education, inter-liberal education, was taken for granted. Even more so, areas of study were not divided by content. There was no division into disciplines, but more by character. There was a hierarchy of fields; some were more technological, some more artistic, but there was no division into fields.
Later, and if we are talking about the Renaissance, take the most obvious example, Leonard de Vinci, who was considered one of the greatest inventors of all generations. He made some revolutionary inventions, which preceded his generation by far. He was extremely knowledgeable in many fields – in science, technology and art. Many attribute his breakthroughs in thought, in creativity and innovation, to the fact that he looked at reality from different perspectives and could suddenly look at anatomy from another angle, because he knew architecture, but also art, and that’s what enabled him to have major breakthroughs.
Over the generations, we have also seen writings by different people, which have been blurred through time, talking about the importance of knowledge in many fields and of communication with diverse people, in order to understand the world in a more innovative and creative manner.
But, 200 years ago, a dramatic change occurred that is still affecting us today, and probably not for the better. When this started, possibly in the 18th century, the end of the 18th century, there was a great increase in the amount of knowledge in the world, and people became suspicious of the possibility that man could control several fields of knowledge, even to the extent that enables him to communicate with other people, who have a different kind of knowledge.
This started in academia and dispersed downwards, while academia started dividing knowledge into disciplines – sociology, history, mathematics, medicine, and each one learned a specific field. Also today, most students probably study one subject, expanded or single unit, but one subject. And this is considered the true, correct way, to specialize, to really know. If you specialize or study more than one subject in greater depth, you are a quack, an amateur, or a dilettante. In fact, in order to be an expert, and truly to understand, you have to specialize in one field. This approach has spread to all disciplines, as teachers teach students in all levels of education, from primary to high school and academic institutions. Teachers were taught to be history teachers, or mathematics teachers, or sociology teachers. So, this division has rooted itself and the whole world follows suit.
This is despite the approach, as we mentioned, that contradicts intuition and our perception of reality. In a naïve way, our perception of reality is integrative. We do not see, as claimed by Lionel Elvin: “when we walk in the street, we do not see flowers for half an hour, and birds for half an hour and something else for half an hour. We perceive everything holistically, and the perception of each part of our reality is affected by its other parts. Even so, this methodology, known as academia, has penetrated every field of thought, and is considered the bon ton, and to this day, the right way.
Today, the winds are slowly changing, as the world becomes more complex. Science is demanding so much more, and people have realized that we have to take the multidisciplinary approach, and even more so, the interdisciplinary approach.
I am proud to say that Bar-Ilan University is a pioneer in this mindset. Many years ago, the university established an interdisciplinary program and we have many interdisciplinary research centers, where students and scientists meet and work together. By the way, this approach is opening up in many places, and in many top universities, around the world.
So, the approach has started to change, and today people are talking in new terms. This is the second word that appears in the title of my lecture. Polymaths. The word polymath comes from Greek. Poly means many. Math is a body of knowledge, an active body. When you invest in it, learn it, think about it, and process it in your brain.
Polymaths are people who control many bodies of knowledge. They are required to have three characteristics, and today there is a large group of researchers focusing on this. They must have diverse knowledge, not within the same field, but from a variety of fields.
They must have depth, sufficient depth so that they truly understand reality, or at least in specific fields, so that they have openness and understanding of how to communicate with people who think differently than them; to know their world of knowledge, their basic axioms. There must be an integrative ability, the ability to connect between fields, to renew, so that one profession or field, one picture of reality, will suddenly light up from a different perspective, through the prism of looking from another field. So that this becomes the best way to break through a mindset. We all tend to be very fixated in a certain picture of reality, because it is most comfortable and easy. We need another spotlight to shine on darker corners, which we cannot see by looking from another field.
It seems that many Nobel Prize laureates are polymaths, engaging in many fields. Many studies also show a connection between polymaths and success. Take, for example, science and music, a very common combination among leading scientists. Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, and the list goes on, have themselves testified to the fact that many times their breakthroughs in science came because they had knowledge in another field, that they could come out of the box, or think things differently. In order to think differently, one must have an opposite, or different, picture.
So, polymaths have started to interest others, and have been considered legitimate, but not totally. Some universities, and some academic departments, are still somewhat suspicious about polymaths, and this is connected to superficial approaches. But this perspective is becoming fixated. We also have clear polymaths within the Jewish World that have made major changes and contributed much to the Jewish People.
An obvious personality is Rabban Yochanan ben Zakai, who actually managed to preserve and save the Jewish World after the destruction of the Second Temple and the actual loss of political independence. He made his famous statement, “If you have studied much Torah, do not take credit for yourself, because that is what you were created to do.”
Now that you have been created, you have the basic obligation to study a lot of Torah. What is a lot? According to the regular, simple, approach, one could think that it is a lot of the same knowledge, but it seems that a lot means something else, according to Rabban Yochanan ben Zakai and others.
This is what I learned from Rabbi Shabtai A. Hacohen Rappaport, of the High Institute of Torah at Bar-Ilan University, who said that “he received from Hillel and Shammai,” so he could learn from two totally different educational schools. While others followed one approach or another and were not able to integrate between the two, we see that he learned, or wrote that he learned, many, many things. There is a long list of topics that he studied, each different to each other, and it is even said that he learned it all, meaning different topics. He had many students, as detailed in the Talmud, and each one of them was someone different; a person whose mind was open to many directions, one who could both raise and educate students who took different approaches, because it all was open and there were many options.
The belief that much knowledge directs towards diversity, and not much towards the same, is strengthened in another personality, Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, who was the president of the Sanhedrin and redactor of the Mishna. He is claimed to have said “I have learned much Torah from my teachers, and more than that from my friends, and from my students, more than all of them.” Here, again, he is talking about quantity, not as quantity from the same source, but from different sources. And not only from different sources, but from different hierarchies. People who knew more than him – his teachers, like him, his peers and less than him – his students. Each one brings from the place he is in, a different perspective, and the result is a diverse richness of knowledge, a major amount of knowledge. So, we, in fact, have been created, and the natural process that might bring spiritual greatness, new ideas, is the ability to learn from many different sources, and to learn much knowledge.
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, who wrote a lot about innovation and creativity and is not always known for this, adds to the understanding of “All my days I have been raised among the sages.” In an original manner, he explains that learning, growth, creation, and development come from among the learned, from the different disciplines of knowledge, from diverse people, sages, who might even disagree. He says this explicitly. And he believes that the meeting between diverse fields, between people with different perspectives, on reality, is like the blind people who touched different parts of the elephant. This meeting encourages creation and innovation, like the creation of the world.
It is interesting to see that in modern day writings, in researches, many speak exactly like Rabbi Nachman, about the gaps and rifts that result in creation and innovation.
To conclude, I would like to quote Shane Parrish who was interviewed one month ago in the Ha’aretz supplement. Parish is a former Canadian cybersecurity expert, who became a guru of creativity and entrepreneurship in Silicon Valley, and among hi-tech experts. He speaks exactly about this.
I will read a short quote from the interview, where he says: “I believe that our mistakes come from blind spots, things that we do not know. Our thought quality is greatly dependent on models that exist within our heads. To most of us, the keyword is diversity. Most of us are not exposed to, and do not understand, insights from diverse fields. Therefore, we overuse models that we know, even when they are not suitable for the situation. For whoever holds a hammer in his hand, everything looks like a nail. I am sure you’ve experienced this. Engineers think of systems, psychologists think of incentives, and businessmen thing of risk factors. Nobody sees the entire picture. Each one has large blind spots, but they do not even know that they are there. If we give people a much wider perspective on how the world operates outside their niche, we can gain a greater understanding of how the wheels turn and try to work with it, rather than against it.”
Dear PhD graduates, today you have experienced innovation and I want to tell you that the School of Advanced Studies has also been renewed, and from this year one can also study for a formal PhD in two departments, from an understanding that one’s encounter with two schools of thought and pictures of reality is very important.
Many of you have, anyway, come from interdisciplinary programs. You have heard many opinions, been exposed to different people, and you had to renew. You know how hard it is, and how important it is to be exposed to diverse perspectives.
I hope that you continue to renew and to understand the importance of recognizing reality from different angles, from communicating with different scientists, with different professionals, with those who have knowledge in other fields.
But, even when you return to the Israeli society, to the world society, that is coping today with an increasingly complex reality, challenges like plagues, climate crises, poverty, migration and terrorism, complex phenomena that require multidisciplinary understanding, you will know that the way to deal with these is by the combination of many diverse perspectives.
The modern workforce has become so complex, requiring flexibility and change, and communication with so many people. When you return to society, with this multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach, you will help people talk to each other, communicate with each other, trust each other, to make this world a better place.
Good luck!
