This series of posts explores how imagination is connected to the development of man’s mind and how imagination has provided man’s mind with capabilities that exceed the capabilities of the minds of other entities created in Genesis thereby enabling man to “master the earth” (Gen 1:28) and be master over the other entities created in Genesis.

Imagination and the Mind of Man

Review of the previous post.

The previous post, post number 4 of 7, discussed how man’s ability to imagine allows man to have a memory that is superior to the memories of any of the other entities created in Genesis

Preview of this post.

This post, post number 5 of 7, presents further abilities which can be attributed to man’s ability to imagine.

1. Other abilities which are connected to imagination^[1]

In addition to the characteristics of complex memory and complex communication skills discussed in the series titled “In God’s Image,” it might be argued that the gift of imagination generated several additional traits which make the mind of man different from the mind of animals and gives man the ability to exercise his free will and to progress.

(1) Since imagination permits us to form a mental impression of that which is not within our immediate senses, we can use present words and expressions to form new words and expressions which may not be immediately apparent.  This gives us the ability to take a single phrase and repeat or repackage it in new ways. This is the ability that, for example, allowed Harold Arlen to take the simple musical phrase associated with “shave and a haircut” and turn it into the hit song “Get Happy”, or Aaron Copeland to use the Shaker song “Simple Gifts” in a monumental work such as “Appalachian Spring,” or Rodgers and Hammerstein to turn the simple musical practice scales into the song “Do Ra Mi” in the “Sound of Music, or Picasso to create his great Guernica based on his understanding of that event, and many other examples. We can create and express ourselves in ways that are meaningful to others. Using our imagination,  the experiences of one person can be made manifest to others whereby wisdom can be gained by others without requiring the others to experience the consequences of an act. This skill improves our ability to communicate. As we progress, our skills at complex communication are improved.

(2) Imagination permits us to translate lessons learned in one situation to knowledge that can be applied in other situations that may differ from a present situation even though the situations may differ, or even though we are in the present situation but were not present for the other situations which we are using to guide our choices in our present situation^[2]. Furthermore,  our imagination allows us to take an idea from one art form and use it in another. For example, an engineer can use a mathematical concept such as translating letters into the digits 0 and 1 and invent a digital computer or digital music. This is the ability which allows a musician such as Giuseppe Verdi to translate the Shakespeare play of “Othello” into an opera “Otello”. We can take a moral lesson learned in one situation and apply it to actions in another situation. We can learn that fratricide is morally wrong from the Cain and Able story and apply it to prevent us from killing another human being who is not our brother. We can imagine the consequences and need not experience them.

(3) Our imagination allows us to convert sensory impressions into words or symbols. We can imagine how things appear in one form when we actually experience them in another form. The Picasso Guernica painting mentioned above is an example of this. As another example, this ability allowed impressionist painters to translate their sensory experiences of scenes of outdoor life into paintings. In this way, a city dweller can have a sensory experience associated with a countryside located far from the city. Our senses can actually be extended in this way. Another example is our ability to translate sensory impressions into words, and vice versa. Poetry is an example of this. The translation of senses into words or other concrete forms can also be used in a multi-step connection process. That is, words can be formed and used in a way that evoke a sensory experience in the imagination of the reader which, in turn, evoke another feeling in that reader or viewer. Paintings of horrific events are often intended to evoke anger in a viewer, novels which detail fictional events may be meant to evoke a vision of actual events in the reader, which, in turn, are intended to evoke feelings of anger, pity, fear, or the like in the reader. An example of this multi-step process made possible by our imagination can be found in the chorus of the song “Back Home Again in Indiana” published in 1917 by Ballard MacDonald and James Hanley:

Back home again in Indiana,

And it seems that I can see

The gleaming candlelight, still shining bright,

Through the sycamores for me.

The new-mown hay sends all its fragrance

From the fields I used to roam.

When I dream about the moonlight on the Wabash,

Then I long for my Indiana home.

The words evoke immediate impressions of sight and smell which, in turn, evoke feelings of nostalgia. These words thus work to translate sensory impressions into words which our minds again translate into feelings. Sense to words to symbols to feelings – all of these translations require our mind to imagine something that is not within our immediate senses.

Our imagination is, in turn, itself enhanced by our ability to remember complex thoughts and ideas. The more we know, the more we can imagine.

Preview of the next post.

The next post, post number 6 of 7, presents a discussion of how imagination affects man’s ability to make decisions, and thus how man must use his imagination in the process of learning.

^[1] See, “The Mind” by Marc Hauser, Scientific American, September, 2009, Volume 301, Number 3, pages 44-51.

^[2] Books of memoirs and history books are examples of this. We need not have personally  experienced the Civil War in order to learn from it.