[Ian Jones]

http://www.paulgraham.com/goodart.html

That is a very interesting read indeed. Mr Graham has crystallised a concept which I think we all intuitively recognise, but is lost in the noise of modern subjective art criticism. He argues that good art and good taste are not subjective, rather through common human traits we find certain things more beautiful.

Of course, I'm more of a designer than an 'artist', so I naturally already lean towards this assessment of beauty.

What do you think?
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[T_England]

"Nothing is beautiful, only man: on this piece of naivete rests all aesthetics, it is the first truth of aesthetics. Let us immediately add its second: nothing is ugly but degenerate man - the domain of aesthetic judgment is therewith defined."

Friedrich Nietzsche quote really, really makes sense. Id rather spend my time reading his stuff than a bumbling ramble from a random on the internet, lol.

No offense to you at all i think its great you brought this up, and i appreciate it. I just happen to think this guy is a douche, he just doesn't seem to get it i find his mindless ramble degenerative.
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[Ian Jones]

I really don't understand your reaction. How is he a douche? What do you disagree with?
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[T_England]

ok prehaphs a bit a knee jerk reaction there but still

"A lot of philosophers have had a hard time believing it was possible for there to be objective standards for art. It seemed obvious that beauty, for example, was something that happened in the head of the observer, not something that was a property of objects. It was thus "subjective" rather than "objective." But in fact if you narrow the definition of beauty to something that works a certain way on humans, and you observe how much humans have in common, it turns out to be a property of objects after all."

How does that make it part of the object? A substance can be toxic, to a human. A image can be beautiful, to a human, in many cases individual humans. These are all traits of humans, not objects. Like a sensitivity to cyanide, its because of the body and interactions between substances inside it not the substance itself.

I just dislike the way he is presenting his arguments with a disregard for simple logic, then calls out philosophers for having a hard time "believing" something as though he were an expert on the matter
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[T_England]

As for "Good" and "Bad" taste the way i try to think about these things is this. There is no such thing as "good" or "bad" taste as that would imply there would have to be a precise point when something becomes "good" or "bad".

I think it has something to do with dualism that a lot of people have covered far more eloquently than i could ever achieve.

But basically my understanding is such, fat and thin do not exist, when does one become fat? some cultures would consider one thing fat the other not

good and evil, are again random points of temperament and its also subjective when does one become evil?

So on and so forth, good and bad taste fall firmly in this argument, i probably wouldn't agree with the taste of a moron however i wouldn't call his taste bad and mine good, i would say his taste his taste is consistent with his understanding and experience, whatever that may be

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