Strange encounters on the grounds of third culture

I always wondered what will happen when scientists and artists come together in collaborative projects. Can they understand each other's language properly? Will there be misunderstandings?
Several of my questions are being answered now because of science-art collaborative forums.
Recently on an online scientist-artist collaborative group, an interesting interaction happened. There were one or two  scientists and there were several artists. Of course I was there as a representative of both the fields and funnily forced to act as an interpreter and ambassador!
And this is the jist of conversation between people representing various fields:

                                                                               Part: i

The funny story of  scientists, a few artists and a scientist-artist interpreter!

Artist 1 : Why art? Perhaps art making is a way to develop the self. Isn't DNA changeable? If so, then art may be a way to program DNA. And because art is a language comfortable with complexity, it is very well suited to finding new patterns. If Gregory Bateson's statement is true, that noise is the only source of new patterns, art making is the way to enter the domain of 'noise' and searches for patterns. That's what I like about art, the process more than the product.

Scientist 1: Genomic DNA changes, of course, but we cannot make full use of the genome until we understand it's mechanisms. Sequence patterns in genomic change are as beautiful as any pattern in nature. Patterns are everywhere, including noise the same as harmony. I'm not familiar with Bateson, but it sounds like he was trying to make a point. If we put our heads together, do you think Bateman believes we will go on forever without ever finding a pattern completely unrelated to noise?

Artist 2: Is genetic engineering a threat to birth of art oriented individuals? what is intent of genetic engineering and are their ethical components to this science? Will scientists (mad-haha) try to create the superior human organism devoid of annoying artistic tendencies and only create high caliber scientists/engineers/politicians ?

Artist 3: Art changing DNA? Errrrrrrr.... that seems a bit difficult for me to grasp..... Evolutionary value doesn't have to be quite that direct I don't think. "The miracle of your mind is that you can see the world as it *isn't" Kathryn Schulz .
Here's what I've read there is proof for- Practitioners of the Arts (I'm talking Music, Visual, Literary- all Arts) alter their brains with constant practice. That's not limited to Artists- what ever any of us do on a continual basis shapes the way our brains work. On a basic level MRIs reveal that the act of drawing involves rapid firing of *both* sides of the brain. Geiger's data from testing dyslexics shows an abnormally extended peripheral vision *and* an improvement in reading ability when new hand/eye coordination tasks are learned. Children draw symbols for things before they try to realistically depict objects.
This suggests we live in the Abstract before we live in Real. Why? (There must be a Grant in that question somewhere....)
Scientist 1: you're way over my head, with the exception of course that process rules! That's unanimous with artist 1but would we agree that this discussion itself could be pre-process or process, either one?
Artist 3, here is an example of two people typing different languages. Abstract and real are not thought of in psychiatry in the way you describe and I just do not see it making sense in any way. So that's one noteworthy point. Another is that you're entirely over my head with the metaphysical. It's hard for me to even converse about that, because that kind of thinking is foreign to me at this point. That's why I say different languages. In science, you have to be careful of things like MRI studies you reference. They're not reliable papers, so you steer clear of them.
I try to keep an open mind and embrace what I don't know. I imagine that what I don't know will be more magnificent still, and the passion comes from there. Does that ring a bell for anyone? So in this case, artist 3, I believe you made false assumptions that got in the way of your own problem-solving, which of course we all do from time to time.
DNA is very good at what it does. Somatic mosaicism, conceptualized in the 1950s by Nobel Laureate Barbra McLintock, may in fact be occurring within each individual brain cell independently during new brain cell formation. If this were the case, first of all, we'd find out that our brains are a lot more like corn than we originally thought. But not only that, we do in fact know that formation of new brain cells is influenced by environmental factors, doing art almost certainly among them, and all the while this process is entirely programmed genetically. This kind of imagery I wish I had the talent to visualize for others. New concepts can be conveyed in ways that don't require scientific rigor, and ambiguity can be positioned at just the right places for future direction.
Abstract, real...maybe I can understand if you explain it more, artist 3 . I don't get it

Me - Krishna: DNA changes are not that easy and instant in the natural world unless chemicals and radiation are involved. Just because you create art, will it change your DNA and make you a different person genetically and these changes will be inherited by your children? I am afraid that doesn't happen so easily, artist 1!
However, when you are thinking about new things in your creative processes, new connections will be formed in your brain cells like in any other new work a person is doing ( Making new cell connections is different from DNA changes!) It is not limited to art. That is why neuro-scientists ask us to keep our brains in an active state always. I can interpret your reply in that sense, artist 3.
Having said that I want to add if you try to do several things at a time, like multi-tasking, brains of several people can't cope with it and they will keep forgetting things and make mistakes! This is my experience too! Yes, creativity helps in several other things, including science. But it should not become a burden on brain's capability in case of multi-taskers.
Scientist,hello again, artist 3 is talking in terms of art. Abstractions may be formed "by reducing the information content of a concept or an observable phenomenon" like the abstract art. Here you will get a vague idea but not like the real thing when you see something like drawing of a man that somewhat looks like a human being but not exactly a picture of him. Real is exactly what you see and observe things in our real world. Like painting a picture just like the person is - sometimes like a photo - photorealism?! Am I right artist 3?

Artist 3: Dr. Challa, Yes, you have interpreted my ramblings quite well, and thank you.

Scientist 1: Artist 3, Thank you for engaging in an intellectually oriented cross-disciplinary discussion. I appreciated many of your points. The way you presented abstract and real sounded metaphysical to me because I thought it implied manifestation. That's why I was asking for clarification, which Dr. Challa provided, with her usual insight and humility. You and I seem to both sense a language barrier, but "Attack of the corn brain. Ouch."? C'mon, let's just leave it at that ok?

                                                                                 Part ii

Of generalizations,  impatience  and non- understanding of facts

Artist 2: -Science takes apart the pieces(or chips away as if to sculpt) to understand the components
-Art takes the components to build a final piece(modeling)...Or builds a final piece out of elements that are solidified to make components(assembly painting).
-Math and Art join smaller elements together to form a union (Venn diagram/ formula)
to make a larger piece with more comprehension to the viewer or to aid in understanding of a concept due to its completion.
-Science and sculpture take away from the whole to make a final analysis or re-represent the whole by a reduction.
Science reduces an entire object down to its most basic elements to understand the entire object in more clarity and in order to build alternative means to accomplish the same results by modification of its smallest elements.

Scientist 2: That is what you artists understand! Superficial stuff!!

Me - Krishna:

To categorize anything and label it helps us organize things in a better manner. Let us imagine a room full of books and newspapers on various topics dumped on one another like rubbish in a dust bin. If you want to consult an art book, imagine how much time it will take to search for it from the heap of books. If you categorize books , label them and keep them in an alphabetical order, it would save both time and energy. Even a child knows this. Science wants to make things easy for you. If you want to live in an disorderly world that is okay with us. why blame science for putting some wise advise into your head?

Science never asks you to spoil the environment. It tells you, what is what and what you should or shouldn't do. If you cannot utilize the knowledge properly and blame science for all the ills, it is like a bad worker blaming his tools for the mishaps that he causes!

Making anything into pieces or several parts and studying it is part of simplifying things which science endorses.. Sometimes it would be better if you study things in separate parts, try to analyse each part's importance individually, then combine them to understand the whole process. It is simplifying things! Can you understand the whole process of a system at a time without understanding the role played by each part separately? It confuses people more! That is making simple process complex!

Artist 2: Thank you Dr. Krishna, for explaining. I sure didn't go that deeply.

                                                                            Part iii

Prejudices,  closed minds and misconceptions

You can read all about it here : http://kkartlab.in/profiles/blogs/can-one-swallow-make-a-summer

                                                                        Part iv

Misinterpretations, strange imaginations and disputes

Artist 4: I think the general direction of the discussion has already flowed past the observations I'm going to make:
1) epigenetics - that is, environment (in its literal and wider senses) altering DNA (via RNA). There is evidence that a wide variety of factors, including one's emotional environment effects DNA - disputed of course as with all things, but it's an ongoing and current thesis. Art practice and participating in culture therefore may well effect DNA.
2) there are a number of ways of 'interpreting' evolutionary theory. One is to focus on the individual maximising their gene transfer (leading to ideas like 'the selfish gene') and the other is to focus on how populations maximise survival of the next generation. Art/culture clearly has its part to play in the latter where art/culture is valued by a population - an idea current within (some parts of) archaeology
3) There are arguments current within the history and philosophy of science, as well as in anthropology and sociology, that neuro-imaging is little more than latter-day phrenology with all the criticism of dubious pseudo-science that goes along with that observation.
-how's that for cats among pigeons?

  Me, Krishna, Artist 4, I understood what you are talking about. "Environmental factors" in epigenetics that can effect temporary (inheritable for a few generations) genetic changes are usually issues like food, chemicals, pollution, radiation exposure, temperature, parental age and of course things like stress that can have direct affect on metabolic processes of an individual ( the effect of emotions is disputed according to recent studies). But art and culture??!! Never heard about it ( but there is a chance - if in your culture you are using chemicals during undertaking cultural processes like people in India use harmful chemicals during Holi celebrations and if you are using toxic chemicals or pigments to paint) Can you give any specific examples and provide proof? Your interpretation is very imaginative -- made me smile -- but doesn't have solid base. The things I mentioned as environmental factors come into direct contact or have direct impact on the Biological mechanisms. Art is more involved with the thought process ( again the argument that positive and negative thought processes have impact on Biology of a person is disputed in a recent study) and therefore doesn't have "direct environmental effect" on genes.
A gene that contributes to an individual animal behaving differently becomes the gene for its distinctive behaviour is rubbish. Dawkins is not the only person that falls into this trap. In the 1970s many spoke of a gene coding for physical and behavioural characteristics. Also a gene must be compared with another for the same trait. It is not an entity that stands alone in its own right. As J. B. S. Haldane correctly pointed out, genetics is the science of differences not similarities. Quite simply, you and I can both be selfish—the differences between us cannot. You cannot apply personal characteristics to a comparison. In his book, The Selfish Gene, Dawkins jumps back and forth from one definition to the other, claiming that they are interchangeable—which they are not. The result has been to encourage biological determinism. A whole generation of scientists are brought up on this confusion.
"Selfish", when applied to genes, doesn't mean "selfish" at all. It means, instead, an extremely important quality for which there is no good word in the English language: "the quality of being copied by a Darwinian selection process." This is a complicated mouthful. There ought to be a better, shorter word—but "selfish" isn't it. Genes are not "selfish" in the human sense!
The term "selfish gene" was coined (by Dawkins) as a way of expressing the gene-centred view of evolution as opposed to the views focused on the organism and the group. From the gene-centred view follows that the more two individuals are genetically related, the more sense (at the level of the genes) it makes for them to behave selflessly with each other. Therefore the concept is especially good at explaining many forms of altruism, regardless of a common misuse of the term along the lines of a selfishness gene. An organism is expected to evolve to maximize its inclusive fitness - the number of copies of its genes passed on globally (rather than by a particular individual). As a result, populations will tend towards an evolutionary stable strategy.
'Selfish'? Selfish is actually a distracting term ( Dawkins himself said that!). In spite of the repeated cautions that he himself does not believe genes have motives, the framing metaphors caught the imagination of the world especially that of non-scientists.
Like several other scientists I too don't think genes are selfish like human beings.