Art reflects life, reflects art
In the television show’s portrayal of a fictitious 2006 election, actor Jimmy Smits played Latino presidential hopeful Matthew Santos, who announced his intention to run with the comment, “We live in cynical times, but hope is not up for debate — there is only hope.” In his real-life nomination speech, Barack Obama echoed, “In the face of war you believe there can be peace, in the face of despair you believe there can be hope.”
The similarities feel almost eerie until one realises that in the modern world, art imitates life but very often, life ends up echoing art to a great degree as well.
In terms of The West Wing and the ongoing presidential campaign in the US, the similarities between Matt Santos and Barack Obama are not entirely unintentional. “Santos was portrayed as a charismatic newcomer, promising hope and the possibility of the first non-white Commander in Chief,” writes Ballard. “In both style and content, he’s a reflection of Obama.” She notes in her article that Obama delivered the key-note address at the 2004 Democratic Convention at the time Santos’ character was being developed, and actor Jimmy Smits confessed that the politician was one of the people he looked to draw upon while fleshing out his role.
“Running against Matt Santos in The West Wing’s election was Arnold Vinick,” writes Ballard. “More by coincidence than design, he bears a striking similarity to John McCain. Played by Alan Alda, Vinick is a veteran Republican from out west, wise in the ways of Washington. […] In The West Wing, Arnold Vinick chose a very conservative Republican as his running mate in an attempt to appeal to his own political base. It’s a move that McCain seems to have mimicked in his choice of Sarah Palin. The series took up real political issues, still hot topics this year — the price of oil and bio-fuels, national security, immigration, health care, jobs, gun control.” As Ballard notes, some of the exchanges between Santos and Vinick are likely to be heard again in real life over the coming weeks. The West Wing’s Republican declared himself to be pro-nuclear while the Democrat spoke against the position. Vinick promised never to raise tax on healthcare, Santos committed to government spending to improve health provision to all.
While refraining from disclosing who won The West Wing’s election, Ballard concludes, “So far, at least, events have been a strange case of art reflecting life, reflecting art,” and quotes Lawrence O’Donnell, who wrote Vinick’s character, as saying: “We ran this campaign in The West Wing before it happened in the country.” Art reflecting life, reflecting art. It happens far more often than we realise, which is why the entertainment media have such a significant role to play in shaping societies, mind-sets and norms. Those of us who tend to casually dismiss entertainment – whether in print or on the airwaves, film or television – as ‘mere distraction’ do so at our own peril, for such forms of the media are made all the more powerful by the subtlety and indirectness of their influence.
In terms of the race between Obama and McCain, for example, it is quite unlikely that either of the politicians is knowingly modelling himself on his fictional counterpart. However, given the huge viewership of The West Wing and its popularity, it is entirely possible that Obama’s candidature itself is made all the more acceptable by the fact that he is going, so to speak, where Santos went before him. Reality follows where fiction led and by the time the 2008 election campaign kicked off, the idea of a non-white person in the office of the American president was no longer startling.
Furthermore, in the same way that war games and manoeuvres are played to estimate the progression of an actual combat situation, the Santos-Vinick debates over issues such as immigration and healthcare could, potentially, influence voter mindsets and even the stances taken by Obama and McCain.
In terms of the above example, it is undoubtedly hard to pin down with exactitude how far art and life reflect and feed off each other. In other areas, however, the relationship is demonstrably evident. A fair bit of modern science, for example, is based on the science fiction of yesterday. Seemingly impossible ideas dreamt up by science fiction writers inspired scientists to find ways of making them reality, for once an idea is there, a significant part of the job is done. After that, what is required is research and practical creativity.
An example of this is the hand-held medical tricorder used by Dr McCoy of the USS Enterprise, in the original Star Trek series of the 60s. When swept over a person’s (or alien’s) body, the flattish palm-sized device would provide all necessary medical details, from broken bones or fractures to internal injuries and blood pressure levels. It inspired researchers at Georgia Tech to develop a new, single-exposure imaging tool that allows the quick, unobtrusive and non-invasive scanning of tissues using photosensitive pixel sensors that observe different wavelengths and allow multispectral imaging. The portable tool helps in the detection of capillary congestion, bruises and pressure ulcers that develop in people with impaired mobility and sensation. Georgia Tech’s Centre for Assistive Technology and Environmental Access researchers have already filed for a patent on it.
Star Trek’s science ‘fiction’ has, in fact, inspired research into and the creation of a whole host of devices and procedures. A 2005 documentary film, How William Shatner Changed the World, [Shatner played Captain James T. Kirk in the original series] presents a light-hearted look at how the television series influenced and inspired today’s technologies.
Another example of science fiction inspiring real life technology is the World Wide Web, which was first envisioned in an identifiably fleshed-out form in the works of Arthur C. Clarke. This remarkable writer also dreamt up a space elevator in the 1979 novel, Fountains of Paradise. In the book, the ‘orbital tower’ is a giant structure rising from the ground and linking up with a geostationary satellite, and used to raise payloads to orbit without having to use rockets — a much more cost-effective method. The author envisioned in the novel that a microscopically thin but strong ‘hyperfilament’ would one day make the elevator possible. Later, he expressed the belief that a type of carbon called Buckminsterfullerene could play the role of the hyperfilament in a real space elevator. This idea has been being worked upon for several years now, and recent developments in carbon nanotube technology have brought Clarke’s space elevator to a space station closer to potential realisation. The epilogue of Fountains of Paradise depicts Earth with several such elevators leading to a giant space station encircling the planet at geostationary altitude. The analogy is with a wheel: the space station as the wheel’s rim, the Earth as the axle and the equidistant elevators as the spokes.
The realisation of this invention would doubtless prove of seminal importance in man’s journey to space. If there was any reason to take fiction seriously, this is it.
— hmumtaz@dawn.com