Why is Art so Powerful?

Perhaps the simplest answer to this question is that art touches us emotionally.

Art is powerful because it can potentially influence our culture, politics, and even the economy. When we see a powerful work of art, you feel it touching deep within your core, giving us the power to make real-life changes.

It has the power to educate people about almost anything.【小题1】 During the pandemic, some artists created vivid and impressive paintings to spread the message of wearing a mask, which was well received by the whole public.

It breaks cultural, social, and economic barriers. While art hardly really solves poverty or promotes social justice on its own, it can be used as a fair playing field for conversation and expression. 【小题2】 Therefore, anyone can learn to appreciate art regardless of their social status, economic standing, or political background.

It accesses higher orders of thinking. Art doesn’t just make you absorb information. 【小题3】 This is why creativity is a form of intelligence—it is a special ability that unlocks the potential of the human mind. 【小题4】

【小题5】 Many times in history we have heard of people being criticized, threatened and even killed because of their artwork. Those responsible for these reactions, may it be an aggressive government, take these measures against artists knowing how much their works can affect the politics in a given area. In the hands of good people, however, art can be used to give back hope or offer courage in a society that’s undergoing a lot of hardships.

Groundhog (土拨鼠) Day falls on February 2! Every year on this day, a crowd gathers in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania to see whether a groundhog named Phil will come out of his hole. If the sun is shining and he sees his shadow before going back into his hole, it means winter will last six more weeks. But if the day is cloudy and he remains outside, spring will come early. Curiously, Phil is not alone. In the region around Milan, tradition has it that if the bear comes out of his hole on this day and sees its shadow due to clear weather, he will be able to make himself a nice dry bed and then he’ll want to keep on sleeping. This will show that the winter will continue. But if it’s a rainy day, the bear will have to stay out — and spring will come soon.

“These traditions can be traced back to Indo-European civilizations 3,000-5,000 years ago,” says Venetian historian Elena Righetto. “That’s why they are spread all over Europe,” she explains. The deepest meaning of the tradition, according to Righetto, is in its seemingly contradictory (矛盾的) nature. It might seem illogical (不合逻辑的) that cold days mean the coming of spring, or that groundhogs and bears would decide to stay out just when the weather is bad.

“The idea is that the darkest moment, when everything seems to go wrong, is when we experience a rebirth, a new life,” explains Righetto. There is a thought that life comes from darkness, just as plants start to grow from the seeds left underground during winter. This thought is so powerful that it crossed countries and survived centuries.

These traditions don’t protect people from bad weather, death, or illness, but they protect them emotionally from some of the anxiety related to those coming realities. They don’t solve the real problem, but they solve the mental problem — they help you live through the hard times of life. In a way, if we can believe in the magical powers of groundhogs and bears, we might find even a longer winter a bit warmer and friendlier.

Sleep-deprived (缺乏睡眠的) human parents know the value of a quick nap, but it turns out Chinstrap penguins have us all beat. When nesting, these Antarctic birds take four-second-long “microsleeps,” a strategy that allows parents to keep constant watch over vulnerable eggs and chicks, all while amounting to 11 hours of total sleep a day, according to a new study.

It’s hard to sleep in a community of nesting Chinstrap penguins. The Antarctic summer sun provides 24/7 daylight. And then there’s the eye-watering smell of ammonia mixed with rotting fish and penguin wastes. “It made me dizzy,” says co-study leader Won Young Lee, a researcher at the Korea Polar Research Institute.

Like other penguins, Chinstrap parents take turns guarding the nest. While one bird protects the chicks, the partner hunts at sea. Then the penguins trade places. For two months between egg laying and fledging, it’s a series of nonstop demands.

To study how penguins manage to accomplish all this and get the necessary sleep, Lee and his team first stuck biologgers, small battery-powered devices, to the backs of 14 nesting penguins of both sexes. This device functions like a smartwatch, measuring physical activity, pulse, and the ocean depths of hunting birds. Next, the team captured each of the penguins, anesthetizing (麻醉) them to attach the devices and temporarily implant electrodes into their skull to measure brain activity. When an animal is awake, the brain constantly buzzes with activity. During sleep, however, brain waves slow down and stretch out. When Lee started reviewing the data, he was surprised to discover the birds slept in four-second intervals (间隔) throughout the day and night while caring for their egg or chick.

While the data is convincing, Cirelli, a neuroscientist at the University of Wisconsin who wasn’t involved in the study, notes that the researchers only studied the penguins during nesting periods, making it impossible to tell if the birds microsleep when they’re not parenting. The other challenge is understanding how micro sleep impacts the brains and bodies of the penguins. Sleep deprivation in humans causes a range of health problems, and it’s not clear whether penguins experience this, too.