Ah, the vicarious pleasures of watching other life struggle, suffer, and die form a safe distance ... maybe with popcorn ready at hand. Not so taboo nowadays, I think. For those who are into it, there’s quite a resurgence of enacting the Ancient Roman dictum of “bread (like fast food for those who can’t afford better) and circus (like the both literal and figurative bloodsports that surround)” … this in our oh so civilized society, so as to keep the vast majority of us appeased in times of ever-increasing want. Always was and always will be so no point in being opposed to this, the attributes of the so called “real world”. Besides, no such thing as the vicarious pleasure of seeing others well off while one is in suffering; and if there is, it doesn’t pertain to the real world anyway.

Am I getting things generally right here? My bad for the tonality if not.

I can enjoy a well played out physical contact sport. I’ve seen quite good, and brutally intense, kickboxing where the competitors gave each other long, earnest fraternal hugs when the match ended. This hugging thing is deemed uncomfortable, un-male-like behavior by many of us. But this same portion of us are not thus uncomforted when a boxer bites off the ear of another.

I take many a competitive sport to be mock-aggression, with or without bodily contact, much like a good portion of childhood play is. Something we engage in as practice for the real thing, but not the real thing itself; certainly not something wherein we must become the victor at any and all costs. I assume there has to be some mock-aggression in the stereotype of girls playing with barbies if there is to be had any fun to begin with in such play. More social than physical, but again serving as practice for the real deal in terms of conflicts.

Generally asking: What has bloodlust to do with this? Well, other than a resurgence in the general populace's desire for it.

No doubting that.

'First person point of view' is potentially just as innocent as 'conscious experience,' such as a novel being written in the first person point of view. — ajar

You’ve managed to spur my interests.

And how is a fictional first-person point of view an innocent ignorant assemblage of words? That we can all understand what a novel, fiction, written in the first-person point of view entails directly contradicts your affirmation.

Besides, I was addressing an "occurring (i.e., actually happening) first person point of view". You were saying this assemblage of words has an unclear referent. Again, how?

Psychopathology turned into an artform. This artform affectively speaking only to … psychopaths. Not inscrutable by a long shot. Still, this gives no contribution to the thread's question of what art is, never mind good art.

The context would be your own being in the world, for it addresses that which is "first-person". But I too am getting tired of this rather dull subject. I'll do my best to let you further discuss this with others without butting in.

Alright. What about "an occurring first-person point of view"? Do you deem that phrase to be reified or paradoxical? If so, I'm curious to find out how.

Respectfully, from my POV, you 'mysterions' (I dub thee such playfully) are trapped in the grammar of a word. — ajar

You sound as though to say that words can't, or at least don't, refer to real givens.

Consciousness is a word, yes. So is Earth, no?

On what experiential or rational ground do you grant the first word no referent when, I presume, you do the second?

yet insisting that the existence of such an entity is beyond question. (If philosophers do question it, they are monsters who can't be serious.) — ajar

If you - or anybody else - as an occurring first-person point of view want to question the reality of your own occurrence as a first-person point of view, I say knock yourself out.

It's when the conclusion is made by an occurring first-person point of view that their own occurrence as a first-person point of view is a falsity (an illusion or whatnot: basically, not real) that the "cannot be taken seriously" issue comes into play.

And where was it ever claimed that a first-person point of view (of which consciousness cannot be devoid) is "an entity"? Last I heard, it's addressed as a "be-ing": a verb, if not an outright process.

And so artifacts are always meaningful in so being artifacts in this sense which is intrinsic to our very notion of what an artifact is. — javra

If I understand what you're saying, and it is very possible I don't, I disagree. — T Clark

Fair enough. To try to clarify my meaning: “artifact” as word to us means/signifies the following concept: “an object that was made by some person(s) hand or labor intentionally (this rather than accidentally, or else not as a byproduct of some other process(es) the person engages in)” If this word “artifact” has real-life references, then that which the word references will be concrete instantiations of “an object that was intentionally made by persons' hands or labor”. Hence, all concrete instantiations of artifacts are discerned to so be because we find them to mean that somebody made them with intent by hand or labor. I might be going in circles, my bad if I am, so here’s an example: You’re in a desert and you come upon a watch on top of a rock. Naturally, the watch you deem to be an artifact; the rock you don’t. When you see the watch, your implicit thought is, “someone made this thing with intention (rather than accidentally or as a byproduct of some other activity) by hand or labor”. The rock you deem to not be made by anybody, intentionally or otherwise, irrespective of the means available to them. Therein lies the watch’s pivotal meaning to you as an artifact: it’s something that someone intentionally made by hand or labor. And even devoid of an audience, the artifact would have this same meaning to its creator(s). Devoid of this meaning it holds relative to us, no one would be able to discern it as an artifact. The watch would just be a more intricate rock.

If this doesn’t make my position clearer, bummer, but so be it. I get your intention to head off.

As I noted before, I'm reading Collingwood's "Principles of Art" and I'm really enjoying it. — T Clark

Sounds good. Hope you enjoy it through to the end.

I addressed my uncertainty about this issue in a recent post addressed to Tom Storm. I don't know if you saw it.

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/642426 — T Clark

Saw it, and I've re-read it. Here's my own current take. All (created; human made) form follows function - with "function" being in this context a fancy word for "intent, purpose, hence, in this way, use (i.e. the purpose for which something is employed)". Maybe debatable but I'll uphold it. When it comes to fine art, the product, or artifact, as form is a result of the designer's/producer's functional/intentional usage of what is to become the artistic form as vehicle to express something more or less personal, if not idiosyncratic, so that a community might understand it. So all fine art as product is there because it was deemed useful in this sense: it, as form, is supposed to be a vehicle for conveying that which the artist intents to communicate.

Let me know the extent to which we might disagree on this.

I don't understand how the fact that something was made intentionally gives it meaning. I think we may be about to fall into the "What does 'meaning' mean" abyss." — T Clark

But then, any artifact as form follows function - its intended usage. So I figure that any artifact, by shear virtue of so being a form that is resultant of some function, or intended use, carries as part of it this very meaning to anyone who discerns it to be an artifact: an artifact, of itself, in part means "some thing that was intended to be for some usage, hence purpose, and thereby is".

You were saying it is possible for artifacts to have no meaning outside of a viewing audience - which I implicitly take to not be the artifact's creators. Yet artifacts as forms always are due to the intent, purpose, usage ascribed to them by those who create them. And so artifacts are always meaningful in so being artifacts in this sense which is intrinsic to our very notion of what an artifact is. Hence, they have meaning outside of the viewing audience's particular attribution of meaning to them: they always signify, minimally but then also necessarily, "a form that follows the function assigned to it by its creator(s)"; i.e., a person-caused, hence made, functional form.

Then, given that we recognize artifacts as "forms that follow the functions given to them by their creators" we can then assume they were given functions that they in fact were not. Thereby unintentionally forsaking their original intent, hence their original meaning*, and imbuing them with novel meanings based on the functionality we attribute to them.

Nevertheless, the task of distinguishing non-art from art and craft and fine-art is the task of figuring out if the object, firstly, occurs due to an intended usage and, if so, secondly, determining what its intended usage as object originally was.

At least that's what I'm currently entertaining.

* Footnote: as to meanings' meaning, it always pivots around intent, hence purpose, hence function - this either literally or metaphorically. Or so I'm thinking. E.g., A sign's significance, or meaning, is that which is intended by the sign. An example of it being metaphorical: when the sign is heavy clouds, the sign's significance is probable rain - heavy clouds can mean probable rain - in so far as heavy clouds (metaphorically) intend for there to be rain. But if this gets debatable, I understand what you mean by "the abyss".

I've been endorsing two meanings of the word "art." 1) Something artificial without meaning beyond the viewers experience and 2) Something offered for aesthetic judgement or, as you expressed it, intended by some being to be art. I think they both work and I don't think they contradict each other. — T Clark

I don't mean to pester but to better understand: How do you discern artificial from non-artificial in definition (1) if not by that which is artificial occurring (necessarily but not sufficiently) on account of a persons' (or cohort's commonly shared) intent that it occurs? In other words, if you can't discern whether it was intended to be by one or more persons, how can you discern it to be an artifact?

I ask because if intent is inherent to what artifacts are, then all artifacts would yet have a meaning in so being: they all signify being the outcome of some intent. And this again gets to the issue of how an artifact can be devoid of all meaning outside of the viewer's experience - if meaning of "being a creation" is innate to being an artifact.

In which case, some might not help but wonder why the creator(s) of the artifact bothered to create it - for it then is factual that it was the result of intentions - which again speaks to the intentions of those who produced it.

I'm probably missing something, but I'm not getting what that is. ... You're of an engineering background, so I'm thinking of buildings, which are functional artifacts. Can you find it possible that an engineer could design a building in manners perfectly devoid of aesthetic properties? I'm here thinking of the proverbial notion that form follows function: when this occurs, the end result would be aesthetic in the sense of elegant (or something to that effect).

I've been pushing the definition of art as something without meaning beyond the viewer's experience. — T Clark

Think back to what we were all discussing in terms of differentiating art from non-art - this irrespective of its aesthetic standing. In order to be art some being must have intended it to be art and, in so intending, that being must have meant it to so be - thereby imparting it with this meaning. Hence, even in this basic facet of it, for X to be art it must have the minimal meaning of having been intended to so be by someone - and this fully independent of any viewer's experience of it.

Otherwise:

How do I turn that personal, idiosyncratic standard into something a community can share? — T Clark

Though taken a bit out of context here: That's the rub of it all, I think. Even in assuming that the prototypical artist intends to convey some affective state to other(s) - something I myself champion - the same question holds.

[...] Quality of art is a measure of the extent to which a specific community consistently has positive experiences [...] — T Clark

I'd embellish this by saying that quality of art is a measure of the extent to which a specific community consistently is brought closer to eudemonia - to a flourishing of being - by said artwork (regardless of whether its pretty or morbidly grotesque, initially appealing or revolting, and so forth). How would that work?

I hear you. — Tom Storm

Cool. Glad I didn’t come off as too much of a jerk in saying what I said.

Only by exposing yourself to new things and sticking with them and, perhaps reading about them, can one come to appreciate their subtleties or lack there of. This means sticking with things you are not drawn to and possibly dislike. Subjectivity is something we can overcome. I gradually 'discovered' a lot of music, novels and movies by doing this. — Tom Storm

Got to understand and appreciate traditional African artwork that way. More recently also contemporary minimalism, which I wanted nothing to do with before understanding what others saw in it as a genre. So, yea.

The challenge with an overly personal or subjective account of art is it tends to render Citizen Kane equivalent with an Adam Sandler movie (or insert piece of shit of your choice). I guess a criterion of value is usually established by a community of shared understanding. Which kind of leaves us to talk inside to our bubbles. — Tom Storm

Going back a bit to what I was saying about commonly shared tastes in relation to food and the exception of some humans somewhere finding human shit to be a delicacy: if what is shit (in terms of art out there) to the vast majority of us is deemed a sublime delicacy by some select few, this doesn’t change the fact that it doesn’t serve the vast majority’s affective appetites any. (I know. I'll try to fully stop my chastising of much of modern art with this last comment on it. :smile: ) But could we in any way address this and like issues outside of our intersubjective bubbles?

I'd really like to hear a few choice navigation points from a phenomenological approach to artistic value. — Tom Storm

As regards art's aesthetic rather than monetary value (the two often do not coincide) as a generalized topic for philosophy: I think any phenomenological approach would have to first find the universalizing principle to aesthetics in all of us, in all beings capable of the experience for that matter, this just as much as it does with the principle of aboutness. Then again, I'm not a phenomenologist, just have certain affinities to some of it.

For me a key question isn't merely whether the art is any good but what the consumers of that art are getting out it. — Tom Storm

Yes; "exactly" I want to say. I’ll offer that in many ways good art parallels good food. We each have our own tastes – in part due to different needs for different nutrients, upbringing, so forth – but if someone where to tell me that some food tastes good when I in fact don’t find it so, I won’t enjoy eating it irrespective of how objectively good they tell me it is. To me, it’s not about an objective value that is somehow innate to the object – for I don’t think that any non-sentient object has an intrinsic impartial value in itself - but about what is innate within all of us as beings – what impartially exists in this sense – and which finds its diverse uniqueness by placing in relation the complexities of our psyches with items we become aware of. So good art, like good food, is always good in actuality only in relation to some living being(s). "Good" is good only in relation to whom it is good for. Yet degrees of commonality occur between us despite our diversities – and we tend to enjoy it when they do. As one example when it comes to food, all humans can agree that human excrements are not good tasting (well almost: in my comparative cultural studies I once did see a video showing certain humans eating human feces on fine dining plates as a delicacy. Not to be taken too seriously, but they do say that exceptions make the rule).

Maybe mediocre art provides transcendence for mediocre people? :razz: — Tom Storm

:grin: :up: Without taking transcendence here literally, I for one certainly do uphold this. There’s no doubting that some humans have the capacity to grasp deeper meaning than others, with the profundity of aesthetic experience being intimately associated. Nor, for me, is there any doubting that none of us are endowed with the pinnacle of deep understanding relative to all beings that every were, are, and will ever be. I know myself to be of mediocre tastes by comparison to others – and in fact would hate the idea of it being otherwise, for then there would be nothing left to learn. There’s the willful, openminded enquiry into other’s taste to better comprehend what others aesthetically see, with this sometimes rubbing off on oneself in terms of aesthetic appreciations. And if not there’s still greater comprehension. But, also biasedly speaking, for me equally important is the courage to maintain one’s own authentic aesthetic as in fact being true, or real, relative to oneself, this in spite of what others might comment – for we humans often times take mirth in deriding each other’s affinities rather than accepting the diversity of experienced beauty that can be found in different persons.

Now, though I’ve taken my jab at modern art – as you previously called me out on – I don’t find myself to be hypocritical in so saying this now. Like a food that doesn’t taste good to me, I’ll be honest in my own aesthetic truths in regard to art pieces (without intending to demean others for their contrasting affinities; a live and let live mentality, at least as an ideal) … Otherwise nonauthenticity results (saying one sees something to be in a way one does not see it to be) - thereby leading to the emperor’s new clothes statements I previously gave in relation to much, but not all, of modern art.

I think it's equally true that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder", and that there are aesthetic standards within disciplines. — Noble Dust

I’ll try to illustrate a point via near absurd extremes. Will a frog’s lack of aesthetic calling for a work of art we all hypothetically enjoy, call it art X, take away anything from the work’s value? Suppose the frog could talk and, in so doing, tells us that art X is worthless, nonsensical, instead pointing us to a fly resting on some branch saying, “now there is something worth giving your attention to, worth contemplating, something that truly attracts the deepest inner workings of your soul!”. We don’t deny the frog its own aesthetic truth, but are well enough aware that our own capacity for understanding is far greater than its and, in so knowing, we don’t earnestly compare apples and oranges in attempts to establish which of the two – art X or the fly on the branch – is most infused with aesthetic worth. Importantly, this for us rather than the frog. On the other extreme, lets momentarily fathom an artistic psyche that stands in the same relation to us that we stand to the frog: a deity of artistic manifestations, a Dionysus of sorts. This deity (with a small “d”) creates a work that is dear to it, whose truths its deems profound, sacred, appealing: call it art Z. We look at art Z and understand nothing of it; if not for our here knowing it was the creation of this deity, art Z to us would in fact be worthless, nonsensical. Would this in any way invalidate the reality of the aesthetic calling we ourselves find for art X (but not art Z)? If we were to be honest with ourselves, not in any way. Art X is what calls to us, pulling us nearer, magnetizing us - and not art Z.

This assumes a simple and straightforward cline regarding depth of understanding among beings. But things are never this simple. I may find song S aesthetic within this emotive context but not some other. My degree of depth of understanding doesn’t significantly change in me as an individual but, even so, my aesthetic attractions toward the same creation might change, change back, and change again.

This for me further illustrates that the objectivity of aesthetics – if it does in fact occur – cannot be found in anything palpable, such as within an object itself. It instead resides in that which makes aesthetics a common, if one wills, meta-experience within all of us: What the frog, us, and that deity of the arts all share in common in terms - not of tangible outcomes, but - of the calling toward of the soul in relation to something it deems as other. Simplifying aesthetics to this calling for ease of argument, the objectivity, impartiality, of aesthetic reality is to be found in the universality of this calling in and of itself. We might be drawn toward different things, but the calling in all of us remains the same when we are so drawn.

Aesthetics is not equivalent to art. But in terms of an art piece’s aesthetics: IMO, the ideal artwork needs to hold Goldilocks aesthetics, such that it speaks neither to the understanding of frogs nor to the understanding of deities, but to us. In my laconic appraisal of modern art, in its attempt to be ever more refined, to speak to deities of abstract understanding, it has become a joke, even to the vast majority of artists themselves. For it has in large part become nonsensical to most; and those few curators and such that are refined enough to catch glimpse of beauty here and there in what most take to be nonsensical have forgotten that the purpose, the power, of art is to communicate. Its not intended to be a secret language shared by an exclusive few, but to grab hold of as many as possible. Without this, our art becomes socially powerless.

As to the standards upheld by the gatekeepers of the artworld, you’re right: they’re intended to filter out, for example, that which is froggishly mediocre from that which is profoundly viable to society as is. I often blame the corporatization of these gatekeepers for their most often failing to do so nowadays (the music industry comes to mind as one example I find blatant), but this gets into a whole other branch of hot potatoes. Still, like the commonsense standards of decency, these often implicit standards of what makes art good can change with the interests of society. Toward the lowest common denominator, here lacking any profundity (e.g., Godsmak’s song “I stand alone”), or else toward a refinement so elevated that it turns around upon itself to become a joke to everyone (e.g., too many paintings consisting of white on white, if that much, called, “untitled”).

Anyway, a lot written. Simply wanting to exchange views as best I can. I think most of us sense that the standards for good art are nowadays more often than not missing in some way: thereby evidencing that there are such a thing as standards for good art to begin with. But I, personally, so far don’t know how to pinpoint them .. organically or otherwise.

There is always disagreement even amongst those qualified to participate in this organic process. But inevitably, standards get set; some bits of milk rise to the top, and some get skimmed off. I'm of the believe that, in general, this process works pretty organically and well enough, but of course, some scum rises to the top, and some cream get's discarded. — Noble Dust

I agree with this as far as (imperfect) ideals go, but am dissatisfied with what is currently occurring in practice. I of course might well be a dinosaur, but I've talked to youngsters that share the same view.

Short on time for now. I agree in large. Still, defining these standards of becomes quite difficult, it at all possible. But I agree it's something one senses ... even when one's tastes are not in accord with the given artwork that is produced.

There’s the saying that beauty, aesthetics, is in the eye of the beholder. I find this to be true. But then what differentiates the aesthetic from the unaesthetic for the given individual? And, then, for all individuals that can differentiate between the two? - this irrespective of their unique preferences. A very difficult question, asked now for millennia. But my hunch is that in this question’s answer lies the resolution to what aesthetics is, to unraveling its capacity for power, and hence to it value for us. This rather than in focusing in on any particular object’s appraisal. This latter approach I imagine being akin to trying to define what intelligence is by focusing in on a given equation and asking other’s what they see in it. It doesn’t address the question.

As for my playful jab at the situation in modern art, truth is there is much bias in it, a bias primarily rooted in a personal indignation on behalf of artists I’ve known and known of. I can greatly admire artists whose works I personally find unaesthetic. Virginia Woolf quickly comes to mind. Or Kandinsky. Examples however don’t matter, for these too are in the eye of the beholder. What matters to my biased appraisal is the toil that these artists incurred in bringing forth something they themselves deeply believed in: aesthetic truths that spoke to their heart. This so that their efforts and accomplishments are nowadays considered on par in worth to realizations such as that of “Pile of Bricks” – which conveys what to you, personally, if I might ask? To me, at best, it conveys the sterility of an art piece devoid of anything sacred to the artist: the expression of the meaningless to be found in a meaningless world. If you do find beauty in it, explain it so that I might expand my horizons - even if I don’t share your tastes. But if not, and one professes it to be aesthetic, that to me it is a bit like affirming the naked emperor to be clothed.

Whose to say? If not I, not you, not even the artist has a voice in the matter - each of us as a unique beholder - then in my all too indignant bias I can well see how some can say that art and the esthetics its supposed to contain indeed does not matter. But this perspective is not my cup of tea.

P-o-B looks like a pile of bricks. If I saw it in a museum, the intent of the artist that it be considered as art would probably have been clear to me. At the job site, it probably wouldn't be. As Tom Storm noted, if it were a sculpture of the human form, I probably would recognize that it was intended as art, even at the job site. — T Clark

Don’t know if this will humor you but it humors me. In college I worked as a security guard at a relatively small modern art museum. A visitor had left their grocery bags inside by the front entrance upon entering the museum (I forget if it was raining or not). Long story short, soon enough some other visitors started asking who the artist of this artwork was (the visitor’s grocery bags, that is). It was quite the rave for a little while.

Might as well have been some pile of bricks that was momentarily left behind by some visitor ...

I know it’s elitist of me - bad me - but when the emperor has no clothes there are no clothes on the emperor, irrespective of what others might affirm. Saying this in relation to the overall theme of the thread, or of the OP at least … rather than being a reply to what you wrote.

But sure, I agree with the quote.

If I saw the Thinker at a construction site I would know it was art while I probably wouldn't even notice Andre's Pile-o-Bricks. Does that have a bearing on whether or not P-o-B is art? I don't think so. To me, it's the artificiality and the intent that makes something art. — T Clark

OK, I didn't get this statement then. If you don't recognize P-o-B as an intended artifact, then how would you discern it to be art? How would anybody for that matter?

Stone work does something to me. It touches me deeply. I don't know why, but I can feel the surface of the stones in the picture. Smell the dust. Feel what it's like to pick them up. Strangely enough, I can feel those same things with P-o-B, so it's probably not the right work to use as an example with me. — T Clark

Just because something is aesthetically pleasing does not entail that it is art. A nice enough sunset, for one example, is not deemed by anyone to be an artwork. (Leaving possible monotheistic perspectives - where God is the creator the the sunset, kind of thing - out of this).

Point being, even if you find P-o-B to be aesthetic, this of itself doesn't constitute it as an artwork (from your pov).

Or does it? In which case, anything aesthetic - like a gorgeous tree - is discerned as artwork by you ... But then, where would the intent part fit in? (And I won't be satisfied by God-did-it like answers, personally at least.)

But you know, we cannot speak of happiness analytically (Wittgenstein would not), which is a very peculiar thing. We can talk about what makes a person happy or un, but happiness simpliciter is hands off. — Astrophel

I've been contemplating that a lot lately and for some time now: an idea regarding volitional valence. In short, when we obtain what we intend as intended, volitional happiness (as in the archaic notion of luckiness, good fortune), irrespective of how minor or major the intent. Likewise, when our intention is in any way impeded, volitional suffering (bearing the weight of an unwanted circumstance). All this however is contingent on the reality of intentions and, hence, some notion of teleology - and, in an indirect way, on the reality of freely willed choices. Things of course get very complex, but that's the short version of it. Anyway, addressed because I at least believe it might be possible to speak of happiness analytically in a suitable enough manner, this at least for the topic of ethics.

Curious to hear your thoughts or rebuttables concerning this overall idea.

The problem is that it is nearly always interpreted as nihilism, as a literal nothingness, although I really don't think it is. It is just the ending or stepping outside the 'nightmare of history' that is being talked about. My view is that there's a shadow, in the sense intended by Jung, in the Western psyche, around this question, as a consequence of the particular religious history of the West, but that is a big argument. — Wayfarer

We westerners tend to be very attached to thingness. We grasp at things as though they were lifeboats that facilitate the very possibility of our own life and, by extension, the possibility of life itself. We even tend to regard our own identity as a thing: if not a stable body than an unchanging soul. Indeed, the very word that English employs for “indefinite nonoccurrence” is “no-thing-ness”. Such that the absence of things is equated to absence of being itself.

Not to refute your hypothesis, but I find this archetypally existential – to not say metaphysical – motif that modern western culture is subliminally steeped in to be at least equally a product of a materialistic tendency: wherein being is equated to physicality. And this carries over into the spiritual as well for the common westerner: If God is not a psyche, a guy, hence endowed with thingness - be it on top clouds or waking the earth in some garden - then this God is no God whatsoever, for whatever is addressed must must be devoid of any real being … so the western intuition tends to flow (notably, this for atheists and theists alike). In contrast there can be found the concept of “the One” in the west and (tmbk, at least some interpretations) of “Brahman” in the east, such that both are here conceived as devoid of thingness … and, yet, rather than being nothingness, are then deemed the essential source for everything. This “no-thing-being” - to so term it - is within these cultural contexts maybe even interpretable as the core essence of life itself. This, again, in direct contrast to the typical westerner’s views that upholds the principle that the only reality there can be can only consist of thingness.

That leaves the question of what standards to apply to determine whether or not art is good. I have some ideas that I tried to lay out in the last few of my posts. They still need a lot of work. — T Clark

Even so, I liked the general idea to them. :up:

One thing engineers need to know is when to apply engineering standards and when not too. For me, art is one of the activities where that type of standard is not the right one. — T Clark

:grin: I tend to agree with you on this one. But, then, how else resolve the questions addressed within this thread? Namely, what "is and is not art" and "what is good art". At any rate, I have a suspicion that there's something wrong with my three variables, but I can't figure out what. Just saying.

Personal opinion and public acclaim do not make any art at all, any more than a stadium full of cheering fans make plays on the field.

[...]

The artist puts all that together. IF he or she is successful in putting it all together really well, there will be individual and public acclaim for 'a great work of art'. Probably -- it might take quite some time to appear, but it usually does, eventually.

People like good art. [...] — Bitter Crank

Didn't know who to pick on so I chose a quote form the thread's creator. But this proposal is freely given for anyone to rip to shreds ... if warranted:

As to what is and is not art, I propose an equation for it consisting of three variables in multiplicative relation to each other, each of which could take on the values of either 0 or 1.

A = the creator’s intent in expressing X
B = creator’s skill in expressing X so that (A) is understood by audience (where “audience” minimally includes the creator)
C = audience’s capacity to understand (A) via (B) (where “audience” minimally includes the creator)

If any variable is assigned the value of 0, the result necessarily is 0 artworks. If the product of these three variables is 1, the result necessarily is 1 artwork.

For quality of an artwork, use the same three variables and prefix “the quality of” to each, then assign some value between 0 and 10 to each variable.

If any variable is assigned the value of 0, the result again necessarily is 0 artwork; otherwise, the product of the three variables can range between 1 and 1,000, thereby quantifying the overall quality of the artwork – within what is a respectable spectrum.

Yes, quantifying of quality with any semblance of precision is, and has always been, problematic. But then I would think that this is what comparative degrees of quality in regard to artwork entail. And yes, it's still all subjective, but these tentatively proposed equations intend to define the parameters of the subjectivity involved.

Also, I figure this can apply from everything like “rhetoric being a form of art” to the Mona Lisa … or whatever one happens to most exalt in terms of artistic manifestation.

… for emphasis: criticisms are welcomed, if not blatantly expected

White light is an object in the world
I agree that white is not an object in the world, as it is an adjective, though I would still argue, as I wrote before, "white light is a physical object"

An object is white if it emits electromagnetic radiation composed of a fairly even distribution of all of the frequencies in the visible range of the spectrum, ranging from 750 to 400nm

Consider red light. Red light is electromagnetic radiation of 750nm. Red light is a physical thing that is visible, tangible and relatively stable in form.

White light is the set of violet light, blue light, cyan light, green light, yellow light, orange light and red light. Such a set is visible, tangible and relatively stable in form.

The definition of an object is anything that is visible or tangible and is relatively stable in form.

IE, it follows that white light fulfils the definition of an object. — RussellA

I wonder how you would account for the occurrence of extra-spectral colors in the purple-magenta range, for - not being part of the (visible) electromagnetic light spectrum - they don't seem to satisfy your requirement for being "objects in the world".


Color circle (RGB)
Crossover1370, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

In relativistic discourses, there can be subjectively generated and intersubjectively validated or invalidated goals based on pragmatic considerations. — Joshs

I get that, but ... Excuse me for this overused example, but it serves to illustrate why this in itself is incomplete: in relativistic discourses, is the intersubjectivity of current day neo-Nazis (maybe seeking absolute authority over all other as goal) any more right or wrong than the intersubjectivity of those antagoniztinc to neo-Nazis (maybe seeking the often derided notion of harmony among humankind, as in humanism, as goal)? Or consider the total intersubjectivity obtained by converging these two conflicting interests within a common society: does ethics boil down to a matter of "might makes right", such that regardless which faction might overtake the total intersubjectivity addressed, it would be the good faction strictly on grounds of having annulled the other faction's intents and, thereby, very being?

Same can be asked of whether slavery is a good. To bring things into a more modernized setting: if the slavery entailed by sex trafficking is a good. In both cases, the slave would be deemed a subhuman relative to the community addressed and - much like any lesser animal - would not be considered as holding any viable capacity to pertain to the given intersubjectivity of slave-owners. If these slave-ownership intending subjects were to wipe out all subjects antagonistic to the intent of slave-ownership, would that then make slave ownership and a good thing?

For such reasons, I associate moral relativism to "might (i.e., the successful implementation of power over other) makes (i.e., brings fourth the reality of) right (i.e., that which is ethically good)". And, personally, I can't abide by this. I'll currently leave my grounding for this to be affective.

You may not like my interpretations of Nietzsche's will to power, but "might makes right" need not be its only interpretation: Where "power" translates into "ability to accomplish", "will to power" could, at least hypothetically, translate into "will (driving impetus) to accomplish one's one's intent(s)". In which case:

Supposing that our intents all pivot around the affective end of an ideal imperturbable bliss (one which we'd all ideally like to obtain were it real and/or possible), and further momentarily supposing this affective end to be something akin to, say for example, a global actualization of Nirvana (or of Brahman, or of "the One"), then: Will to power would be a will to actualize this end as best one can - such that, for example, instead of implementing power-over-other (which leads to the supreme goal of cosmic autocracy) one implements things such as compassion and respect for the other's intrinsic value. The latter, in bringing us closer to the end of Nirvana or some such, wouldn't be an instant actualization of this end but, instead, would increase humanistic values amongst all, ideally in all cultures globally.

The inconsistency to this, of course, is the Nietzsche explicitly affirmed that there is no such thing as Truth, i.e. an accord to an ultimate reality. And, in this, I disagree with him. But I don't find his "will to power" to be nonsensical.

As off-the-wall as all this might be, maybe you can better see what I mean by an objective good: if, as multiple philosophical traditions have it, there is an ultimate reality that satisfies this envisioned affective end we all pursue in all that we think, believe, and do; then there is a real universal end/goal/telos which when pursues brings us closer to this good and which when deviated from - namely, by intending fictitious, hence incorrect, hence wrong intents - brings about bad.

Its a very heavy, loaded, topic to address and discuss, but there you have my shpiel. If I do err, I'll err on the side of the golden rule (on the side of an impartially, else independently, real right) and against the belief that might makes - hence, produces - right (which to me is innate to relativism).

Ever read Beckett's "Molloy". — Astrophel

I've only enjoyed his "Waiting for Godot", and I haven't read "Molloy" - though I do like theater of the absurd in general.

Anyway, a bit off point, but interesting, and it illustrates just how hard it is to find the guilty agency. — Astrophel

And yet at the end of the day, for one cliched example, the heartbroken individual who was cheated on by his/her lover and best friend (to not address worse occurrences) knows this to be the case quite directly, knows of both agency and of culpability as regards both self and other in concrete enough form … rather than, say, endlessly gazing into the ethereal near-nothingness of an undifferentiable cosmic process of becoming wherein no individuated agency seems to occur. Which is to say, it may be difficult to philosophically pinpoint but agency - along with its capacity to do wrongs - nonetheless is a pivotal aspect of the lives we live.

The whole point is happiness, isn't it? Is it really, as Mill put it, better to be a philosopher dissatisfied than a pig satisfied? There is a bit of cultural condescension in this, I would think, but the idea is important. I think we would have to consider if there is anything such as profound wisdom that carries an affectivity. — Astrophel

Happiness, yes, but it can mean different things to different folks. Moreover, happiness and virtue hold no easily discernable necessary relation. The gangster who massacres others and thereby gains greater respect in the form of fear (rather than the respect that accompanies forms of sincere love), he too obtains happiness in so accomplishing. But not states of being such as that of equanimity in a tumultuous world wherein fortunes can turn on a dime. A difficult topic indeed for, in accordance with what we both previously commented on, everything we do and intend is done not just affectively but, more importantly, for some kind of affective end.

If we seek knowledge for the sake of power-over-other (a common enough interpretation of the adage “knowledge is power”) then why is it that we seek such increased power to begin with? Only for its envisioned affective end. If we seek ignorance - as I’ve been told certain nihilists such as Cioran at times prescribed - here again it’s done for its envisioned affective end. Anything we actively intend is intended, at the end of the day, for its envisioned affective end. And this envisioned affective end can only be an intrinsic good to us – as “useless” (as some have described intrinsic value) as is our own being to our own being, and yet for whose sake everything that we engage in is done. So I uphold that so too should wisdom be intended: for its envisioned affective end.

Rather than describing this envisioned affective end as obtained happiness, which is fickle, I’d rather describe it as the obtainment of an unperturbable bliss … one relative to which we might either get closer to or further away from; one which in part brings about the equanimity previously mentioned. And you’re right, eastern traditions maintain this ultra-end of unperturbable bliss to be found in Nirvana, or Brahman; but then so too do certain western traditions uphold the reality of its being as a telos. Sophia as the principle which, as such western traditions would have it and as I’d like to believe, guides us toward it.

Then again, that which we envision could be mistaken. In a world of relativity there would be no objective truth to whether the envisioned affective end pursued by a mass-murder is right/correct/real and thereby obtainable or else wrong/incorrect/false and thereby a fictitious end to pursue - this in contrast to the envisioned affective end pursued by those who intend virtue as best they can. According to many a philosophical tradition, however, this is not the case: for such affirm the belief-independent reality of an envisioned affective end that is in fact real and thereby right, i.e. the correct aim. For example, the Platonic notion of "the Good".

Needless to add, this subject matter - as complex and convoluted as it can get - is to me very intimately associated with ethics and intrinsic value in general.

Innocence and guilt make no sense to me at all. I think when we refer to a child's innocence, we are really referring to her purity and uncluttered experiences. Free of guilt, yes, but what is guilt as a working ethical concept (not as, say, a psychological concept, about feelings of remorse, resentment, etc.)? — Astrophel

I strictly mean technical culpability; else phrased, responsibility for wrongdoing for which adequate amends has not been given. As in being innocent rather than guilty of a crime. When I mentioned that newly birthed infants are birthed perfectly innocent, I intended that they're birthed perfectly free of culpability. Various peoples' perspectives differ on this, but that's my take. Still, for the spiritual/religious: karma may have brought us into this world, else the sins of our ancestors or some such, but - even when entertaining such perspectives - once here, we start off with a blank-slate of culpability. The same applies for our being existentially "thrown into the world", if this happens to be one's perspective.

As far as "guilt as a working ethical concept" the aspiration to be ethical to me in large part translates into the aspiration to be as free as possible of non-amended wrongdoings, i.e. to be as free as possible from wrongdoings and to remedy as best one can those wrongs one is guilty/culpable of.

Going back to what I was previously mentioning:

Clear consciences tend to follow such ethical intents, or so I've been told. For that matter, I don't directly or indirectly know of anyone who glorifies wrongdoings while having much time for things such as (I'd like to say authentic) beauty, love, or wonder. That there might be exceptions in this and that, why not. But as a general rule, it doesn't occur. The experience of these and similar enough states of being does, however, occur in an early enough youth - which at least coincides with a time period when we have a far fewer quantity of wrongdoings by comparison to ourselves as adults: hence a time period when we had a far clearer conscience.

But, to be frank, my basic point was, and remains, that I don't see the point to wisdom if its about misery, bitterness, self-flagellation, control-mongering, or something of this ilk. If, however, wisdom where to in part bring about eudemonia (with emphasis that eudemonia does not equate to ignorance) despite all the wrongs one has committed and which were committed by other(s) against oneself and one's loved ones, then I can find value in the ideal.

Or maybe I should ask (to be honest, in a semi-rhetorical fashion): Why should wisdom be considered a good by a so-called "lover of wisdom"? For example, is it supposed to hold some instrumental value, such as that of allowing one far greater manipulative control over others for the sake of increased capital; else, are all the understandings that it reputedly entails supposed to hold some intrinsic value that forsakes eudemonia (i.e., being of good spirit/daemon; hence, of a healthy and flourishing mind)?

OK, thanks for the reply.

As I said, animals can recognize kinds of things. — Janus

Again, my perspective accounts for this. But maybe this would be too far of topic.

Again, you have affirmed that my perspective is intellectually lazy or dishonest. The affirmation was yours. Its up to you to cogently justify it. — javra

I've stated my case several times. I don't feel like doing it again. — T Clark

You stated your statement (repeatedly at that) and provide no cogent justification for it. In a world of relativism I don't know, but in the world I inhabit, that is intellectually lazy or dishonest.

Speaking on behalf of myself, apology accepted.

Again, you have affirmed that my perspective is intellectually lazy or dishonest. The affirmation was yours. Its up to you to cogently justify it.

:up:

Anyway, what I suspect at back of all this, is that ‘nous’ has a meaning which modernity, generally, literally can’t understand. It’s something that was lost in the transition to modernity, to understand it requires a shift in perspective — Wayfarer

:grin: Yes, I suspect the same thing.

So, for me identification is not identity; it is more primordial than the abstracted concept of identity, the idea of something being itself. — Janus

Ok, but to me that's what the metaphysical law of identity, as with all other laws of thought, intends to capture: our inescapable, predetermined, "primordial" limitations / boundaries of thought.

What is primordial, in my view, is difference. — Janus

I don't get how there can be difference discerned without there being discerned difference between identified givens. Could you elaborate?

This is where my accusation comes in - you use science when it fits with your worldview and ignore it when it doesn't. — T Clark

And pray tell, where does scientism and/or physicalism any empirical science contradict my propositions?

Or maybe objectivity is not a good?

The basic idea behind all of this is that of hylomorphic dualism - that the psyche (soul) has two aspects, sensory and intellectual. Intellect is what sees the forms/essence/ideas and it does that by in some sense becoming one with it. Obviously there is no such union on the level of sensory interaction but there is on the level of the intellect. — Wayfarer

Thanks for the references. I'll check them out. I'm familiar with hylomorphic dualism. I do prefer the term "anima" to "soul" due their differing connotations, thought they can end up meaning the same thing. But yes, I'm in agreement with this perspective.

Still, I grant that I haven't familiarized myself with Thomism very well.

I don't even know what that means. — T Clark

Ah, well that then explains things well enough for me. The sentence you're addressing is, after all, the summation of the longer passage you just quoted. I'll simplify my questions:

Q: Is evolution randomness devoid of any selective forces?

If you answer "yes" I'll not so humbly disagree with such an ignorant stance. If you answer "no" then:

Q: Do these selective forces select for that which is most accordant to what is objectively real?

If you have no idea of what "accordance (in the sense of "agreement; harmony; conformity; compliance")" is or else of what "objective reality" is, do let me know. But I might not be of great help in explaining.

But to however illustrate, just as a human who presumes he can fly and thereby jumps off a tall building dies and is thus selected against by evolution for not being accordant with objective reality, so too will a species whose manners of life are discordant to the ever changing, objectively real ecosystem(s) it inhabits be selected against by evolution - be it the dodo bird, or any other of innumerable species that have become extinct.

Considering that comprehension of what I've written occurs, where is the intellectual laziness or dishonesty in this, um, perspective lets call it?

BTW, if you queasiness has to do with "metaphysical objectivity", I can of course understand the relativist's pov. Still, I did mention both physical and metaphysical objectivity as the telos/purpose of evolution. Moreover I blatantly disagree with the relativist - which would embark us on a different course of enquiry. For instance, if no metaphysical objectivity, then are all metaphysical laws/principles of thought fully relative and thereby subjective - such that the law of identity differs from individual to individual?

You guys just want to pick and choose those aspects of science that jibe with your magic-realistic world view and reject those that don't. That's intellectually lazy at best, intellectually dishonest at worst. — T Clark

You picked on me, so I'll ask of you: how is "the process of evolution selects for that which is most conformant to objectivity via variations" intellectually lazy or dishonest. You mean to say evolution doesn't do that?

If you were to have no conception of what a house is, and you where to see what others know to be a house, would you perceive a house when looking at the raw image(s)? Same can be asked of an apple or orange.

My inclination is to conclude that without holding acquaintance of the idea (eidos: form / concept / abstraction ... and also the (epistemic) essence of that addressed) of X, one cannot perceive the X in the raw percepts.

How we gain various concepts from percepts converged with thoughts together with cultural transmission (I’ll personally add, together with some degree of biological inheritance … far more applicable to lesser animals than to us) is a very complex thing regardless how it’s addressed. But it doesn’t seem to diminish what I’ve just proposed. We identify by forms, and this speaks to the law of identity in that it can only be a form that is self-identical relative to us - be the form an entity, a specific/identified process (the process of running), or something else. And without any identification of anything, we cannot establish any relations between ... well, again, forms/eidoi.