Subject: Galileo play in Sydney parallels Internet regulation debate? Date: Sun, 09 Jun 1996 23:32:52 -0700 From: Tom Worthington Newsgroups: aus.theatre,soc.culture.australia,aus.org.efa,aus.org.acs,aus.politics,aus.education Last night I attended a performance of the play "The Life of Galileo" by Bertolt Brecht. This was performed by the Sydney Theatre Company, at the Sydney Opera House. This is a slightly busy "new" version by David Hare. The set design by Michael Scott-Mitchell was exciting, but at times upstaged the actors. The set featured two concentric rotating platforms. Curved walls reminiscent of a medieval observatory, were used to effect in several of the fourteen scenes. A model of Jupiter and its moons was a little overpowering. Brecht's play, premiered in Zurich in 1943 and operates on a number of levels. On the surface it is about scientific censorship in Italy in the 1600s. At another level it is about the conflicting obligations of a scientists to scientific truth and social benefit. Brecht has his Galileo arguing that intellectual freedom will ultimately lead to better social conditions for the population. The Cardinal Inquisitor argues that scientific inquiry must be limited (or at least kept from the general population), lest it lead to social unrest and chaos. The set designer added a new layer to this production, by placing an Apple Mac laptop computer on Galileo's desk. This appears somewhat of a fad, after the fashion of the laptop PC in Tom Stoppard's Arcadia (a Compaq in the Sydney Theatre production of 1994, as I remember). Michael Scott-Mitchell perhaps uses the laptop to brings Brecht's play into a modern debate of censorship versus public order on the Internet. Its not difficult to see parallels between attempts by the 17th Century Vatican to control the spread of Galileo's telescope and current government attempts to control the spread of the Internet. Brecht's Galileo argues that the state is attempting to suppress science, because it allows anyone to see truth from afar for themselves. He argues that those in authority fear the truth, not because it threatens social order, but because it threatens their own privileged position. The experts of the court in Florence dismissed the information from Galileo's telescope without even looking through it, much as those in Australian government appear to be now drafting Internet legislation without using or understanding the Internet. The fear of loss of control from the unregulated spread of information can cause as much panic in the corridors of power of the 20th century as those of the 17th. These parallels became more concrete when Professor Sandra Wills, chair of the Teleteaching'96 conference happened to sit down two rows in front of me at last night's performance. The Teleteaching'96 conference is part of the 14th World Computer Congress (IFIP96) in Canberra in September. This will feature "Internet Nasties: Myth or Mismanagement?", an international television program about social and moral dilemmas of the Internet on three continents, followed by a world wide Internet discussion. Anyway, back to the play: John Howard makes a very believable Galileo's, providing a complex picture of a man of genius, who is also humanly fallible. Luciano Martucci was less successful, perhaps having the more difficult role as Andrea Sarti, Galileo's student who represented the rest of us and asked all the difficult questions of the great man. For further details: * "The Life of Galileo", Sydney Theatre Company booking details: http://www.eventnet.aust.com/stc.html * Notes on Galileo and Brecht from the McMurry University performance: http://cs1.mcm.acu.edu/academic/galileo/galileo.html * "From Arcadia to Zeus": http://www.peg.apc.org/~tomw/conf95cl.html * The Drama Theatre of the Sydney Opera House: http://www.sydneyoperahouse.nsw.gov.au/dramathe.html * Photos of the Sydney Opera House from the Monash University Visual Arts Library: http://www.monash.edu.au/visarts/diva/utzon.html * "Internet Nasties" at the 14th World Computer Congress (IFIP96), 2 September 1996: http://www.acs.org.au/ifip96/tele.html#E1 * EFA March Against Censorship: http://www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/NSWMarch.html Tom Worthington http://www.acslink.net.au/~tomw President, Australian Computer Society Inc, GPO Box 446, Canberra ACT 2601