Objectivist Esthetics, R.I.P.


Jonathan

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On 1/6/2018 at 9:02 PM, Jonathan said:

Tony has apparently already lost track of what the conversation that he's having is about.

He had written that a concept is not a fact. Regi responded by asking, "Really? Then, what is it? A fiction?" Right there is where Tony got lost, apparently decided that Regi was seeking instruction from him, and therefore Tony realized that it was a perfect opportunity to expose Regi to some information that would be new to him via quoting Rand on the topic of "concepts."

You've probably heard the term "mansplaining":

"Mansplaining is a blend of the word man and the informal form splaining...Lily Rothman of The Atlantic defines it as "explaining without regard to the fact that the explainee knows more than the explainer, often done by a man to a woman",[5] and feminist author and essayist Rebecca Solnit ascribes the phenomenon to a combination of "overconfidence and cluelessness".[6]"

It's time for a new concept (just so you know, a concept is a "mental integration of two or more units which are isolated by a process of abstraction and united by a specific definition."):

Randsplaining. It's when a Tony, or any of the kids at OO or SOLOP, displays the combination of overconfidence and cluelessness in parroting Rand's theories to people who know much more than the idiot explainer.

J

Ha! the escape-artist. How does this relate? What you call "parroting" is of those O'ists who actually conceptualize and don't need to be top academics to do so. The ploy above, to cover the fact that YOU are not a "people" who "knows much more" than me. You are anti-conceptualist. It was to you I raised the essentiality of concepts in art, after many early and fruitless attempts - not to Regi or anyone else - but you believe this smoke-screen gives a way to slip out. Tricky.

You had identified yourself as an anti-conceptualist in your turning of art into a "proven" and "provable" science (and, ironically and self-servingly, have recruited a conceptual scholar to your support).

Weird, in years of debate, I have not read the word "consciousness" come from you. Which speaks enough of how delimited your thinking is of the reality of man's mind - and art theory.

Find just one fresh thought you have brought to this discussion. You haven't had any ideas or original insight into art to bring here, only attacks on those who do; this is a topic which needs exploratory thinking of which I've done enough. Instead, in the past you made a pastime of *empirical* fault-finding with Rand's *conceptual* theory, and impressing young Objectivists with your technical knowledge (mostly irrelevant) and pouring scorn on any who dare argue - until everyone who can think independently deserts the debate. And Rand's theory, you 1. don't understand, conceptually 2. when you do, deliberately misrepresent into a straw man. 3. when someone confronts and points out your errors, will not admit to nor correct. In your concretism you can later claim to have defeated all the debaters, who really gave up on the argument as a waste of effort. 

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2 minutes ago, anthony said:

Ha! the escape-artist. How does this relate? What you call "parroting" is of those O'ists who actually conceptualize and don't need to be top academics to do so. The ploy above, to cover the fact that YOU are not a "people" who "knows much more" than me. You are anti-conceptualist. It was to you I raised the essentiality of concepts in art, not to Regi or anyone else - but you believe this smoke-screen gives a way to slip out. Tricky.

You had identified yourself as an anti-conceptualist in your turning of art into a "proven" and "provable" science (and, ironically and self-servingly, have recruited a good conceptual thinker to your support).

Weird, in years of debate, I have not read the word "consciousness" come from you. Which speaks enough of how delimited your thinking is of the reality of man - and art theory.

Find just one fresh thought you have brought to this discussion. You haven't any ideas or original insight into art to bring here; this is a topic which needs exploratory thinking of which I've done my share. Instead you made a pastime of empirical fault-finding with Rand's conceptual theory, and impressing young Objectivists with your technical knowledge (mostly irrelevant) and pouring scorn on any who dare argue - until everyone who can think independently deserts the debate. And Rand's theory, you 1. don't understand 2. when you do, deliberately misrepresent into a straw man. 3. when someone confronts and points out your errors, will not admit to nor correct. In your concretism you can later claim to have defeated all the debaters, who really gave up on the argument as a waste of effort. 

You're making up more nonsense about me. Lies, distortions, distractions, and outright retardation.

If you come back to reality, try to address the substance of the challenges that I've put before you.

Making up irrational shit about me isn't a very good substitute for facing the challenge.

I will give you credit, though, for stepping into the arena despite constantly getting your ass kicked. Right now, you're the best that the Objectivist Esthetics has got! Kamhi doesn't have the courage to step into the ring. And Bissell is an even bigger intellectual pussy, only showing up briefly now and then to pout. Intellectually, you're weak, but at least you have the courage to keep opening your mouth to do more damage to your cause than good.

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I know you, J. What someone constantly doesn't say, one finds (eventually) is as informative as what they do say.

What you do say is always defensive, personal or insulting. Getting at truths isn't in your repertoire, you don't proffer anything, you don't ever find agreement and you don't suggest a useful direction. This would show weakness, by you, I know. 

Your "Address the substance of the challenges"? That you still make ~empirical~ demands about ~art~ indicates you haven't absorbed how redundant they are. 

My argument may not be the best, but can you try to imagine hearing one made comprehensively - at its very best? IOW, imagine what sort of 'ass-kicking' could Rand have given you if she'd responded to your piffle. In a hundred words she'd have taken apart your position (I'm not so sure you have one, even after this time). You wouldn't be sitting for a long time. (No, don't go there. Remain in your pleasant fantasy land, where you'd have given Rand what's what).

 

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18 hours ago, anthony said:

I know you, J. What someone constantly doesn't say, one finds (eventually) is as informative as what they do say.

What you do say is always defensive, personal or insulting. Getting at truths isn't in your repertoire, you don't proffer anything, you don't ever find agreement and you don't suggest a useful direction. This would show weakness, by you, I know. 

Your "Address the substance of the challenges"? That you still make ~empirical~ demands about ~art~ indicates you haven't absorbed how redundant they are. 

My argument may not be the best, but can you try to imagine hearing one made comprehensively - at its very best? IOW, imagine what sort of 'ass-kicking' could Rand have given you if she'd responded to your piffle. In a hundred words she'd have taken apart your position (I'm not so sure you have one, even after this time). You wouldn't be sitting for a long time. (No, don't go there. Remain in your pleasant fantasy land, where you'd have given Rand what's what).

 

Hahaha! Oh, I would have buried Rand in a debate on aesthetics! Simply quoting her definition of art and then quoting her statements on architecture which contradict that definition, and then not backing off when she offered her typical nonsense explanation along with bullying, would have had her ten times as enraged and flustered as she was reported to have been over Hospers' gentle but slightly critical treatment of her. Telling her that I don't accept her blatantly obvious contradiction, or her irrational attempt to gloss over it and fake reality rather than manning up and admitting to her stupid error would have caused her to go into meltdown implosion mode.

Rand never really faced informed, sustained criticism of her theories. She surrounded herself with young, adoring acolytes, and her public appearances were packed with the same. Her events were set up in a way which kept her protected. Her public q$a sessions allowed no opportunity for follow up. She would have gotten absolutely smeared in debate format.

She was very good at attacking others' mistaken beliefs, and totally ripping them to shreds, but her ideas were new enough that she never had to face someone doing the same to her. People didn't know, or even care to know, her ideas well enough to know the holes and the bluffs and the bullshit to seek a debate with her. If anyone of intelligence had studied her work and then debated her on her ideas (rather than theirs) they would have wiped the floor with her. And with her temperament, she would have embarrassed the hell out of her self by responding with a tantrum.

As for your claim that I don't discuss consciousness, and your eagerness to shift the conversation to that topic, because you imagine that I've got evil views, and that you're an expert on the subject, we've been there before. It's a tactic that you jump to when youve got nothing else. You invent positions for me to take on the subject of consciousness, come to conclusions about what you believe that I must think, argue against those conclusions, and act like you're winning an argument against me. It doesn't seem to matter to you what my actual views are. I tell them to you, then you ignore them and claim that I've never discussed the issue, and that that therefore means that I'm hiding something, and that you know what it is.

Youre a retarded, lying asshole who keeps on using the same piece of shit maneuvers to avoid the substance of what you've been challenged with.

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On 1/7/2018 at 6:30 PM, regi said:

Hi Anthony,

I am totally familiar with Rand's definition of concepts, which happens to be wrong but close. If you are interested in a correct epistemology, please see the articles, "Knowledge," and, "Concepts--Simple."

A fact is whatever acutally is. If someone has a concept, that concept is a fact which actually exists. It is not a metaphysical fact, it is a psychological fact. Rand did get that right.

"Things of human origin (whether physical or psychological) may be designated as 'man-made facts'--as distinguished from the metaphysically given facts." [Philosophy: Who Needs It, “The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made”]

Randy

Okay, I've no problem with that. Just as long as the qualifier "man-made facts"  (or "psychological facts") is remembered. In the context I was saying it, I had referred to "a fact" vis-a-vis "a concept" as a *metaphysical fact* clearly (I thought).

Your "Knowledge" is interesting and in your clearly-written "Concepts-Simple" your absorbing theory introducing a dual (if I may call it) "essence", also, the "extrinsic and intrinsic" which needs more reading from me.

In the former essay, I believe I noticed already a few departures from Rand. You write:

"The basic building blocks of knowledge are concepts, which are also the foundation of knowledge".

And: "Concepts are not knowledge: I said concepts are the foundation of knowledge, but by themselves, they are not knowledge, because their function is identification".

Concepts are not knowledge? The "foundation" of knowledge? ("Concepts represent condensations of knowledge..." ItOE)

The concepts' "function is identification"? But "identity" begins earlier with perception, "... the awareness of specific, particular things which he can recognize and distinguish from the rest of his perceptual field--which represents the (implicit) concept "identity"". (ItOE)

I'd put it simply that the conceptual stage is the making of identification - i.e. differentiation and integration -- *explicit*.

Our concepts as I see it, are the products and consequences of identification brought about by the function of conceptualization (not the function of concepts) -- and indeed *are* our knowledge. 

I think it's crucial to knowing Objectivist theory - and Objectivist art theory - that man's identification, as with animals, starts immediately and directly with his senses-percepts. 

(You lost me with "All knowledge is propositional").

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19 hours ago, Jonathan said:

 

As for your claim that I don't discuss consciousness, and your eagerness to shift the conversation to that topic, because you imagine that I've got evil views, and that you're an expert on the subject, we've been there before. It's a tactic that you jump to when youve got nothing else. You invent positions for me to take on the subject of consciousness, come to conclusions about what you believe that I must think, argue against those conclusions, and act like you're winning an argument against me. It doesn't seem to matter to you what my actual views are. I tell them to you, then you ignore them and claim that I've never discussed the issue, and that that therefore means that I'm hiding something, and that you know what it is.

Youre a retarded, lying asshole who keeps on using the same piece of shit maneuvers to avoid the substance of what you've been challenged with.

5

Lying, no. Deductive, yes. You have made little, to zero case for ~art as you see it and know it to be~ in the entire thread, and I had to deduce your 'position' from the many negative clues you give. You think anyone disclaiming "not art" is bla, bla - a hater, etc. and must prove it! But yet you won't specify where you draw the line, say, between auto design, and art, and, nor, significantly what art IS (for you). You've made no criticisms ever, of anything in postmodern art, including the pissoir exhibit, thereby implying that it is all equal artistic value. Made by an artist? Then it is good art which must not be criticised. One infers. In the end, it's your lack of honest candor which you can blame. (When I've pointed out the mystical premises surrounding art, again you would not respond, either way). So put up or shut up and cease your whining.

What you have, explicitly said, revolves around 'abstract art' only. When it's mentioned that this art form is simple sensationalism, you went into your usual rage and claimed I "must prove it".

Consciousness? I'm glad you could finally write it. Again, when you never articulate the word, I assume the concept does not rate highly to you. Except - it is the elephant in the room, which anyone talking about art, viewing it and producing it, cannot forever squeeze around without acknowledging, finally. Where is art - without consciousness? You have not once replied to that. To Rand, of course, art isn't an end in itself regardless of its high importance, and is trumped by man's consciousness (from where art comes, anyhow).

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18 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Hahaha! Oh, I would have buried Rand in a debate on aesthetics! Simply quoting her definition of art and then quoting her statements on architecture which contradict that definition, and then not backing off when she offered her typical nonsense explanation along with bullying, would have had her ten times as enraged and flustered as she was reported to have been over Hospers' gentle but slightly critical treatment of her. Telling her that I don't accept her blatantly obvious contradiction, or her irrational attempt to gloss over it and fake reality rather than manning up and admitting to her stupid error would have caused her to go into meltdown implosion mode.

Rand never really faced informed, sustained criticism of her theories. She surrounded herself with young, adoring acolytes, and her public appearances were packed with the same. Her events were set up in a way which kept her protected. Her public q$a sessions allowed no opportunity for follow up. She would have gotten absolutely smeared in debate format.

She was very good at attacking others' mistaken beliefs, and totally ripping them to shreds, but her ideas were new enough that she never had to face someone doing the same to her. People didn't know, or even care to know, her ideas well enough to know the holes and the bluffs and the bullshit to seek a debate with her. If anyone of intelligence had studied her work and then debated her on her ideas (rather than theirs) they would have wiped the floor with her. And with her temperament, she would have embarrassed the hell out of her self by responding with a tantrum.

If we take the Objectivist metaphysics and epistemology--reason applied to reality--it's all congruent with science, a science that pre-dated Rand and was hard won. Rational self-interest covers the rational part of the Objectivist ethics. This is the center of her philosophy. Individual rights is the politics transmogrified by her to laissez faire capitalism.

What she then did was take morality, which is more cultural than intellectual, and combined it with the ethics, but not formally. This gave her authority ongoing gravitas. It didn't stop there. She expanded Objectivism to everything she had a strong opinion on. Thus true Objectivism is not the philosophy of Ayn Rand, but that's what she called it. Hence the true believer needs to study and apply it for a lifetime to achieve mastery, said mastery being fools' gold, actually gibberish.

Galt's Speech, where Objectivism all started, except for the name, is a long moral screed. Rand was more a moralist--she was greatly proud of being a moralist--than a philosopher. This was quite understandable in the mid 1950s when the novel was published. She was heroically confronting the moral and intellectual blockade and monopoly of the left and was hated, ignored and ridiculed for it. The intellectual force of the left was spent in the matrix of the Vietnam War protests and has never come back.

Then came Trump--the businessman displacing the politicians and the left dominating mainstream media. Now we have the left's overt violence and thuggery giving the lie to its/their moral superiority.

--Brant

it's time for Rand again

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2 hours ago, anthony said:

If one takes consciousness as axiomatic, all the rest follows logically.

 

All of the rest follows logically? Great, then put it into the form of a syllogism.

 

How about this one:

Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments, and can serve no purpose other than contemplation -- it can serve no utilitarian purpose.

Architecture does not re-create reality and serves a utilitarian purpose.

But architecture is a valid art form anyway.

 

Is that your idea of Rand's having logically followed the axiom of consciousness?

 

How about this one:

A contradiction cannot exist. An atom is itself, and so is the universe; neither can contradict its own identity; nor can a part contradict the whole. No concept man forms is valid unless he integrates it without contradiction into the total sum of his knowledge. To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one’s thinking; to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one’s mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.

Classifying architecture as a valid art form contradicts the Objectivist Esthetics' definition and criteria of art.

Therefore we'll resolve the problem by inventing a "special class" in which to place architecture; a class made up of items which magically qualify as art despite not qualifying, which will allow us to maintain the contradiction and abdicate our minds while pretending not to.

 

How about this one:

As a re-creation of reality, a work of art has to be representational; its freedom of stylization is limited by the requirement of intelligibility; if it does not present an intelligible subject, it ceases to be art.

Music cannot tell a story, it cannot deal with concretes, it cannot convey a specific existential phenomenon, such as a peaceful countryside or a stormy sea...music’s emotional content is not communicated conceptually or evoked existentially, one does feel it in some peculiar, subterranean way...Until a conceptual vocabulary is discovered and defined, no objectively valid criterion of esthetic judgment is possible in the field of music...

But music is a valid art form anyway.

 

How about:

Works which deliver nothing but a mere mood are not art.

Music communicates emotions, which one grasps, but does not actually feel; what one feels is a suggestion, a kind of distant, dissociated, depersonalized emotion—until and unless it unites with one’s own sense of life. But since the music’s emotional content is not communicated conceptually or evoked existentially, one does feel it in some peculiar, subterranean way.

But music is a valid art form anyway.

 

Here's another:

The psycho-epistemological process of experiencing art goes from the perception of the object to the conceptual grasp of its meaning, to an appraisal in terms of one’s basic values, to a consequent emotion.

Nothing has ever been proven to have successfully followed the above process in reality. In fact, Objectivists have been shown to be unable to successfully follow the above proposed process.

Therefore the process is valid and logically flows from the axiom of consciousness!

 

And one more:

Music conveys the same categories of emotions to listeners who hold widely divergent views of life. As a rule, men agree on whether a given piece of music is gay or sad or violent or solemn. But even though, in a generalized way, they experience the same emotions in response to the same music, there are radical differences in how they appraisethis experience—i.e., how they feel about these feelings.

In listening to music, a man cannot tell clearly, neither to himself nor to others—and therefore, cannot prove—which aspects of his experience are inherent in the music and which are contributed by his own consciousness. He experiences it as an indivisible whole, he feels as if the magnificent exaltation were there in the music—and he is helplessly bewildered when he discovers that some men do experience it and some do not. In regard to the nature of music, mankind is still on the perceptual level of awareness.

Since I hold contradictory views in the above two premises about music's ability, or lack thereof, to communicate content, music is therefore a valid art form.

 

And a bonus one:

Ayn Rand felt something in listening to music, while recognizing that other people didn't.

Other people feel something in looking at visual abstract art while recognizing that Rand and others don't.

Therefore music is art and visual abstract art is not.

 

And another:

To equate a potential with an actual, is vicious.

Music does not have an actual conceptual vocabulary, but only Rand's wish for a potential one.

Therefore treating music as actually, currently being a valid art form is not vicious.

 

Tony, when you say that something logically follows from the axiom of consciousness, you actually have to prove that it follows. You have to show that it actually applies to reality. You have to demonstrate that the art forms that you accept as valid actually adhere to the definition and criteria that you're advocating. You can't just make an assertion and leave it at that. Understand? Making a bald assertion isn't the use of logic or proof.

There's nothing about the fact of consciousness that leads to the idea that all art forms must conform to Rand's theory of literature and representational visual art. The only things that actually lead to that conclusion are Rand's personal, subjective preferences, aesthetic limitations, and arbitrary double standards.

 

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3 hours ago, anthony said:

Lying, no. Deductive, yes. You have made little to zero case for ~art as you see it and know it~ in the entire thread.

You're confused. It is YOU who has made zero case for art as you see it and know it. Making a case for it would require proving that any alleged work meets the definition and criteria.

3 hours ago, anthony said:

You've made no criticisms ever, of anything in postmodern art...

Bullshit. I've been critical of postmodernist works.

3 hours ago, anthony said:

You think anyone disclaiming "not art" is bla, bla - a hater, etc. and must prove it!

False. I've never said or ever suggested such a thing. I've been critical of specific people, and not of "anyone" who says something. As for proof, yes, people must back up their statements with proof. If, say, Kamhi states that people can't get depth of meaning out of artworks in which she gets no depth of meaning, I require proof. The fact that she gets no depth of meaning doesn't logically lead to the conclusion that no one does. The fact that Rand, or Pigero, or Tony, or Dr. Comrade Sonia, PhD., or Thomas Miovas gets nothing out of a work of art is not proof that nothing can be gotten out of it.

3 hours ago, anthony said:

...thereby inferring that it is all of the same artistic value.

That's your retarded misinterpretation, not my position.

3 hours ago, anthony said:

Made by an artist? Then it is art and not to be judged.

That's not my position, and I've told you so many times. Stop assigning me positions that I don't take, you irrational, Rand-demented dipshit.

3 hours ago, anthony said:

One infers. In the end, it's your lack of honest candor which you can blame. (When I've pointed out the mystical premises surrounding art, you would not respond, either way).

"One" infers? No. Only retarded Tony so infers. Rand-demented Tony who assigns people positions that they don't take so that he can avoid the reality that he can't answer the exact same challenge that he proposed to test abstract art!

3 hours ago, anthony said:

Consciousness? I'm glad you could finally write it. Again, when you never articulate the word, I assume the concept does not rate highly to you. It is the elephant in the room, which anyone talking about art, viewing it and producing it, cannot forever squeeze around without acknowledging, finally. Where is art - without consciousness? You have not once replied to that. To Rand, of course, art isn't an end in itself regardless of its high importance, and is trumped by man's consciousness (from where art comes, anyhow).

You're a lying lump of shit.

Why in the hell would I reply to your retarded question "where is art without consciousness?" It's fucking retarded. No one is advocating art without consciousness!!! Dipshit! No one has taken the positions that you're arguing against!!! Why would I want to get sucked into an argument between you and the imaginary enemies who live in your retarded head and who argue against consciousness?

Human consciousness is not limited to your personal level of consciousness. The fact that you do not experience in a work of art what someone else does says nothing about the nature of consciousness for all mankind. Your retarded level of consciousness is not the universal limit of all mankind. Your unaware, unobservant mindset is not universally shared by all humans. And that includes in regard to all art forms, including representational realism, and not just abstract art forms. You're a blithering idiot. Even after things are pointed out to you that you hadn't noticed in representational realist paintings, it takes a very long time for them to sink in through your thick skull. You resists accepting their existence in reality, and recognizing that others saw what you didn't and based their views on what they saw.

You can't grasp much simpler topics than consciousness, so I have no interest in playing along with your retarded distraction in which you come to a conclusion about what you think that I must believe, and then act as if the onus is on me to prove that I don't take the position that you've assigned me.

And I'm totally not interested in helping you to pretend that you're a brilliant epistemologist, and that I need to sit at your feet, learn from you, and then be tested by you before I can be deemed worthy of having by challenges answered in the realm of aesthetics.

You're a Rand-demented clown.

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1 hour ago, Jonathan said:

All of the rest follows logically? Great, then put it into the form of a syllogism.

 

How about this one:

Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments, and can serve no purpose other than contemplation -- it can serve no utilitarian purpose.

Architecture does not re-create reality and serves a utilitarian purpose.

But architecture is a valid art form anyway.

 

Is that your idea of Rand's having logically followed the axiom of consciousness?

 

How about this one:

A contradiction cannot exist. An atom is itself, and so is the universe; neither can contradict its own identity; nor can a part contradict the whole. No concept man forms is valid unless he integrates it without contradiction into the total sum of his knowledge. To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one’s thinking; to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one’s mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.

Classifying architecture as a valid art form contradicts the Objectivist Esthetics' definition and criteria of art.

Therefore we'll resolve the problem by inventing a "special class" in which to place architecture; a class made up of items which magically qualify as art despite not qualifying, which will allow us to maintain the contradiction and abdicate our minds while pretending not to.

 

How about this one:

As a re-creation of reality, a work of art has to be representational; its freedom of stylization is limited by the requirement of intelligibility; if it does not present an intelligible subject, it ceases to be art.

Music cannot tell a story, it cannot deal with concretes, it cannot convey a specific existential phenomenon, such as a peaceful countryside or a stormy sea...music’s emotional content is not communicated conceptually or evoked existentially, one does feel it in some peculiar, subterranean way...Until a conceptual vocabulary is discovered and defined, no objectively valid criterion of esthetic judgment is possible in the field of music...

But music is a valid art form anyway.

 

How about:

Works which deliver nothing but a mere mood are not art.

Music communicates emotions, which one grasps, but does not actually feel; what one feels is a suggestion, a kind of distant, dissociated, depersonalized emotion—until and unless it unites with one’s own sense of life. But since the music’s emotional content is not communicated conceptually or evoked existentially, one does feel it in some peculiar, subterranean way.

But music is a valid art form anyway.

 

Here's another:

The psycho-epistemological process of experiencing art goes from the perception of the object to the conceptual grasp of its meaning, to an appraisal in terms of one’s basic values, to a consequent emotion.

Nothing has ever been proven to have successfully followed the above process in reality. In fact, Objectivists have been shown to be unable to successfully follow the above proposed process.

Therefore the process is valid and logically flows from the axiom of consciousness!

 

And one more:

Music conveys the same categories of emotions to listeners who hold widely divergent views of life. As a rule, men agree on whether a given piece of music is gay or sad or violent or solemn. But even though, in a generalized way, they experience the same emotions in response to the same music, there are radical differences in how they appraisethis experience—i.e., how they feel about these feelings.

In listening to music, a man cannot tell clearly, neither to himself nor to others—and therefore, cannot prove—which aspects of his experience are inherent in the music and which are contributed by his own consciousness. He experiences it as an indivisible whole, he feels as if the magnificent exaltation were there in the music—and he is helplessly bewildered when he discovers that some men do experience it and some do not. In regard to the nature of music, mankind is still on the perceptual level of awareness.

Since I hold contradictory views in the above two premises about music's ability, or lack thereof, to communicate content, music is therefore a valid art form.

 

And a bonus one:

Ayn Rand felt something in listening to music, while recognizing that other people didn't.

Other people feel something in looking at visual abstract art while recognizing that Rand and others don't.

Therefore music is art and visual abstract art is not.

 

And another:

To equate a potential with an actual, is vicious.

Music does not have an actual conceptual vocabulary, but only Rand's wish for a potential one.

Therefore treating music as actually, currently being a valid art form is not vicious.

 

Tony, when you say that something logically follows from the axiom of consciousness, you actually have to prove that it follows. You have to show that it actually applies to reality. You have to demonstrate that the art forms that you accept as valid actually adhere to the definition and criteria that you're advocating. You can't just make an assertion and leave it at that. Understand? Making a bald assertion isn't the use of logic or proof.

There's nothing about the fact of consciousness that leads to the idea that all art forms must conform to Rand's theory of literature and representational visual art. The only things that actually lead to that conclusion are Rand's personal, subjective preferences, aesthetic limitations, and arbitrary double standards.

Jonathan,

That's a hell of a nice list.

Especially if used for the scope problem...

Michael

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1 hour ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Jonathan,

That's a hell of a nice list.

Especially if used for the scope problem...

Michael

Thanks!

And there's more. Photography. Dance. Etc. But I didn't think it would be necessary to make an exhaustive list of all that's irrational with the O Esthetics just to refute Tony's opinion that Rand's rules of art naturally and logically flow from the Objectivist Epistemology, and that nothing has to be proven to qualify as art by her theory.

J

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You are rather limited. "Tony's opinion that...rules of art naturally ... from...Epistemology".  Irrational nonsense and misrepresentation.

Art, I said, is based on consciousness, but all the same to you, huh?

Another of your petty attempts to shift the focus off your ignorance.

Last time: The theory is conceptual - from induction, observation, logic and introspection. 

Proof? You need to follow the same process. 

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2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Jonathan,

That's a hell of a nice list.

Especially if used for the scope problem...

Michael

He has two items in that list: music and architecture. For different reasons, each is not a perfect fit.

The field of art is vaster than those. Nit-picking is the problem, not scope.

 

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3 hours ago, Jonathan said:

 

You're a lying lump of shit.

 

 

What gives you the right?

it would seem you have a privileged place here on OL which allows you carte blanche to get away with a stream of libel and insults.

No moderation and no garbage pile. You are one ugly little bully that takes advantage of the fact. You have presumed upon others' manners and restraint, while behaving as you wish. You won't understand how much they have carried you.

("Insensitivity" to John Hospers, eh? Ha! Not that you could see the self-contradiction).

 

 

 

 

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17 minutes ago, anthony said:

Last time: The theory is conceptual - from induction, observation, logic and introspection. 

Proof? You need to follow the same process. 

 

That's exactly what I've been challenging Objectivists to do. Follow the process of proof.

Prove that anything -- anything -- has ever qualified as art by Rand's definition and criteria.

Just one damned thing. That's all. Prove that one work that Objectivists allege is valid art according to the Objectivist Esthetics actually meets her criteria in reality.

 

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3 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

 

That's exactly what I've been challenging Objectivists to do. Follow the process of proof.

Prove that anything -- anything -- has ever qualified as art by Rand's definition and criteria.

Just one damned thing. That's all. Prove that one work that Objectivists allege is valid art according to the Objectivist Esthetics actually meets her criteria in reality.

 

Last comment. *You* need to "follow the same process" to justify (or not) a conceptual theory - one, for oneself - get it?

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20 minutes ago, anthony said:

He has two items in that list: music and architecture. For different reasons, each is not a perfect fit.

Heh. Not a "perfect fit"? What does that mean? It means that they don't meet Rand's criteria, right?

They indeed do not meet her criteria. That fact is not a tiny, superficial problem. Heh. Earlier you had claimed that her theory didn't need proof because it just logically flowed from the O Epistemology. Now you're admitting that two major art forms don't fit.

Hahahahaha!!!!

 

23 minutes ago, anthony said:

The field of art is vaster than those. Nit-picking is the problem, not scope.

Nitpicking? Identifying Rand's blatant contradictions is "nitpicking"? Wow. If anyone else claimed that a non-A was an A, they'd be Kant reincarnated, but when Rand does it, it's just a minor non-issue that can be overlooked?

Anyway, it's not just an issue of those two slightly imperfect art forms not meeting her criteria. Nothing in the entire field of art has been objectively shown to qualify by Rand's definition and criteria. It's not just architecture and music which present problems.

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15 minutes ago, anthony said:

What gives you the right?

it would seem you have a privileged place here on OL which allows you carte blanche to get away with a stream of libel and insults.

No, they're truths, not libels and insults. I identified the fact of reality that you have been lying, and assigning me positions that I don't take.

Your doing so is dishonest, and retarded, and dipshitlike.

Those are facts of reality.

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1 minute ago, Jonathan said:

....logically flowed from the O Epistemology. 

 

 

 

 

...from consciousness. I have to tell you again a few minutes later. Your misrepresentations are close to dishonesty

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17 minutes ago, anthony said:

No moderation and no garbage pile. You are one ugly little bully that takes advantage of the fact. You have presumed upon others' manners and restraint, while behaving as you wish. You won't understand how much they have carried you.

What are  you complaining about? You've been allowed to post lie after lie about me and my positions. Reread this thread. It's amazing how many times I've had to tell you to stop lying about my positions, to stop making up shit, to stop having arguments with people in your kooky head, and then acting as if you were arguing with something that I had said.

Grow up. Show some manners. 

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2 minutes ago, anthony said:

...from consciousness. I have to tell you again a few minutes later. Your misrepresentations are close to dishonesty

So, the Objectivist Esthetics logically flows from the axiom of consciousness, but does so "imperfectly," which means that it only does so if we accept glaring contradictions. But it still needs no proof, because we should just accept and live with the contradictions, cuz it's no big deal.

 

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Positions, you don't have. Oppositions are all they are.

I am not going through the ways that music is different, but I caution anyone to read Rand herself on the subject.

But making an equivalence of the effects of music with the effects of paint slapped arbitrarily on canvas, in order to "prove" abstract art - is pathetic.

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