Jeffrey Epstein’s Affiliation With The Edge Foundation
For several years now, Jeffrey Epstein has been an energetic and supportive member of a very interesting group, called Edge Foundation: Third Culture, which was assembled by his friend publisher John Brockman. In 1988, Brockman founded the group, which was initially designed to accept only those who are considered interesting and those who possess out of this world intelligence. Majority of the affiliates of Edge Foundation are Jeffrey Epstein’s friends and through the Jeffrey Epstein Foundation he encourages the work of many Edge members.
CP Snow’s classic work, The Two Cultures, which was first published in 1959 inspired Brockman, this work explores the gap in communication between literary intellectuals and scientific intellectuals thus the phrase Two Cultures. Later, Snow, elaborated how much was lost because of the effect of essentially two “different vocabularies,” which made it effectively difficult to communicate. The scientists were not interacting efficiently to the artists and the artists were not communicating effectively to the scientists. There is almost nothing that can keep them from comprehending each other. Even with art, the scientists searching for mutual understanding, in say an artist such as M.C Escher, whose mathematical symmetries were stunning to them, were ignored by the artists, who were content with the “emotive” power of a painting expressed through light, tone, and color, as well as technique. It all comes down to one party, the scientists, while looking at a modern art abstraction and comment “I do not get it” to one more party, the artists, declaring “I do not understand it.”. As Jeffrey Epstein put it, “This reminds me of a story I heard about the physicist Richard Feynman who agreed to trade lessons in physics for lessons in art with his zany artist friend Jyair Zorthian. Even though Feynman turned into a very good draftsman, his friend Zorthian was still not able to see the beauty of physics even when Feynman tried to demonstrate electromagnetism using a coiled magnet. In that circumstance, a disaster took place since the Two Cultures clashed despited Fynman’s reputation as an outstanding physics teacher.
We have this gap right now. In 1963, Snow added a new essay, “The Two Cultures: A Second Look,” in which he suggested that humanity would be greatly benefited by having this gap of communication close, so that not only could the Two Cultures benefit, but mankind would be enriched well. This party is now called The Third Culture, a name coined by Snow himself. Brockman utilized this as the basis of his choice to create a party that is composed of artists and intellectuals who all have different emphasis in order to come up with a forum that will deal with anything and everything and allow the audience to gain entry into the deepest thoughts of these thinkers.
As the publisher, Brockman acts like a glue to these people by organizing events that allow them to share their candid thoughts and opinions on the various questions thrown at them, their answers to these queries are then compiled in a collection of Edge essays.
Every year, Brockman issues a new question, and it is dutifully answered by many affiliates of the Third Culture. Some of the questions can be profound and deep, others philosophical, and others, quite mundane. Nevertheless, given the people answering, there are always surprises, as able thoughts make the most of what is there. It is the creativity at play that’s so much fun to view.
Some replies to his queries are too glib, others, cynical, some downright idiotic, but there is enough richness in content to gratify and stimulate even the everyday curious mind. When Jeffrey Epstein is asked about a good place to start, he would simply respond ” If the quest is for richness and originality of thought amidst the world’s elite minds then I recommend Brock’s yearly query as the best place to start with.”.
