I love Rauschenberg. I love that he created a turning point in visual history that he redefined the idea of beauty that he combined painting sculpture photography and everyday life with such gall and that he was interested in as he put it 'the ability to conceive failure as progress.'
Robert Rauschenberg was not a giant of American art he was the giant. No American created so many aesthetic openings for so many artists.
I don't think immortality is necessarily the key to understanding the world. You have to be careful with what you think you're achieving. I'm all for science discovering amazing and fantastic things about our world but I think the motivations behind it are slightly askew.