The latest vlogbrothers video got me thinking about something that has crept into my thoughts a couple of times in the past. If you're not familiar with the vlogbrothers channel, run by John and Hank Green, then you're not spending nearly enough time on the internet young lady/lad. I suggest you spend the next few available hours of your life watching their videos as it will explain their entertaining, informative, introspective and enlightening adventures better than I could.
In John's latest video, titled Drowzees and Masterpieces: Thoughts from London, he talks about not being sure if he's truly excited to see a Van Gogh painting (in this case, Self-Portrait with Bandaged Ear) because he likes the painting itself, or because he's seeing the painting in real life as opposed to through a screen.
This thought has always snuck into my moments of existential dread. It's possible for us to see every masterpiece by every artist to have ever existed on a screen so small it can fit in our pockets, but are we really experiencing it? And if not, then do we have to reconcile with the depressing thought that we will never truly experience all of the things that we desire to?
What if I die without ever seeing the Northern Lights? I could watch hundreds or even thousands of videos of this phenomenon, but this will never fulfil my desire to experience it live. What is that invisible force that creates such powerful emotions within us when confronted with the real thing?
And why is it that music and film seem exceptions to this proposed rule? Under the right conditions I can listen to this specific version of "O Soave Fanciulla", performed by Andrea Bocelli and Ana Maria Martinez, and be overcome by the beauty that's achievable by humankind. But, I'll never experience this performance live, at least not this exact rendition as no live act is ever the same twice.
We don't experience film in real life either, that is to say each time we press play the actors aren't released from a dark room where they lie in wait to perform live for us each night, and yet so many of us derive pleasure and fulfilment from the films we watch. So what is it that film and music have achieved that art and tourist destinations haven't? And when can we synthetically reproduce this anomaly so I can swallow a pill and experience the Rings of Saturn in reality?
I suppose I can find comfort in the fact that robots won't ever experience the things I've been lucky enough to encounter. Surely even their own reflection in a slow-moving stream must be filtered through a screen and a bunch of computer chips somewhere inside their shiny oval heads?
But then again, aren't the things we see filtered as well? Our minds and eyes work together to create the images we see, I mean light doesn't really exist without our being witness to it. So, do we actually experience anything 'live'? And if not..... what?!
And that my friends is another instalment of "Amy's head goes kaboom".
