Objectivist Esthetics, R.I.P.

[ThatGuy]

12 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

I wrote - here:  

[ES] "Repeat, Rand's strictures on technical evaluation presuppose that a work has been classified as art. "

Oops, I almost missed that post.  There you're going for foundations, which I wish you would go after instead of trying to get "abstract" painting and sculpture into Rand's theory by coattailing on music.  Contra your view, I think that if one accepts Rand's foundational theory, then "abstract" painting and sculpture don't squeak in.  But are her foundations correct?

My viewpoint, as you might recall I've said in the past, is that her basic theory is (1) too narrow and (2) reliant on her notions of "sense of life," of which she presents three different accounts, and no way of establishing any of them.

I'd like to see an attempt at presenting what you'd consider a good theory of art.

Ellen 

Reminds me of Ronald Merrill's discussion of Rand's theory, in THE IDEAS OF AYN RAND, where he ask similar questions and makes similar criticisms. Some relevant excerpts:
......

“Absolutely central to the Objectivist esthetics is the notion of ‘sense of life…

“The creator of a work of art expresses his sense of life—or at least a sense of life. Barbara Cartland expresses the sense that romantic love is all-important; Stephan King that fear and horror are fundamental to existence; Mickey Spillane that conflict and violent are the essence of life. Horatio Alger expresses the sense that justice is ultimately decisive in human affairs; Jean-Paul Sartre that it is not. These are the metaphysical judgments of one-dimensional writers; the judgments of Jane Austen, or Victor Hugo, or Ayn Rand, could not be so briefly summarized.

“How is a sense of life projected by a work of art? Rand’s approach is epistemological: Just as a concept is formed by dropping the concrete examples and retaining the essence which characterizes them, art expresses the creator’s sense of life by dropping that which he regards as unimportant and retaining only the important.

“According to Rand, the reader or viewer or listener responds to art on the basis of the level of agreement between his sense of life and that of the artist. This seems open to challenge; many people deliberately choose art which expresses the sense of life they would like to have, father than the sense of life they do have. Consider Ayn Rand herself. Rand’s sent of life, as projected in her novels, is one of a world in which men can accomplish great things, but only by means of a violent, tortured struggle against desperate odds. Yet in her own esthetic tastes, exemplified by her choice of music, she sought a sense of life which was free of all challenge or threat, pure undiluted happiness.

ESTHETIC DIFFICULTES AND DEFINITIONS

“Yet though she makes a major contribution to the field, Rand’s esthetic presents some serious problems.

…

This leads us further: What of non-representational art in general? ‘Modern’ (non-representational) painting and sculpture challenge the Objectivist esthetics also. Are they not art? Certainly not by Rand’s definition. Many people, including myself, would say that non-representational paintings are not important art, that they might be better be classed as decoration. Even so, they can convey a sense of life, albeit only in a mild and very generalized form.

 

….
“These problems arise because Rand’s definition of art is fundamentally flawed. It violates an important principle of epistemology: Every man-made entity is properly defined in terms of its function.

…

“Applying this principles to art leads us to a better definition. To begin with, it is certainly true that all art is man-made; a painting of a landscape may be art, but not the landscape itself. There is our genus. What is the function of art? Note that when we speak of function, we mean the purpose from the point of view of the user. For what purpose do we use art? What we seek from a work of art is to be induced to feel an emotion—specifically, a sense of life. There is our differentia. Thus, the correct  definition of art is: A man-made object or process the function of which is to induce a sense of life in the observer.

“Though this definition does not immediately lead to an esthetics of music, it at least does not make the problem more difficult, as Rands’s does.”

"

[Jonathan]

On 10/28/2017 at 9:45 PM, Ellen Stuttle said:

I wrote - here 

[ES]  "[...], is there any basis on which you would say of any type of man-made image that it couldn't qualify as art? Or, reverse the direction, do you have any criteria which a man-made image must meet - beyond being a man-made image - in order to qualify as art?"

You replied - here:

[J]  "Rand's view was that, in order to qualify as art, it had to be created according to the creator's metaphysical value judgments, and only those judgments, and had to be created only for pure contemplation. It could serve no other purpose. It could not be "utilitarian," such as advertising imagery or technical manual illustrations.

"In Rand's world, artists walk or chew gum, never both at the same time. (Except artists who are architects; they qualify as artists while creating work which she accepts as art despite specifically saying that it "does not re-create reality," and which she admits serves utilitarian purposes."

Apologies for sniping just that section and leaving the rest aside. No time for discussing now. I think your description of what Rand thought re criteria is correct, but what I was asking is what, if any, criteria you think a man-made image must meet to qualify as art. I've wondered for a long while on what basis, if any, you'd rule out any man-made image from the category "art."

Ellen

I wouldn't rule out any man-made image. Humans can, and do, include aesthetic content in anything and everything.

Besides, I don't find the idea of ruling things out important or exciting.

[Jonathan]

On 10/28/2017 at 10:29 PM, Ellen Stuttle said:

I wrote - here:  

[ES] "Repeat, Rand's strictures on technical evaluation presuppose that a work has been classified as art. "

Oops, I almost missed that post.  There you're going for foundations, which I wish you would go after instead of trying to get "abstract" painting and sculpture into Rand's theory by coattailing on music.

I'm not "trying to get 'abstract' painting and sculpture into Rand's theory."

I'm only pointing out contradictions, such as that music doesn't meet her definition or criteria of art. I'm pointing out that the arguments that O-vishes use to reject abstract painting and sculpture are also grounds for rejecting music, dance and architecture. One must use double standards in order to accept those art forms while rejecting abstract paintings and sculptures.

O-vishes need not accept abstract paintings and sculptures in order to address my criticisms. They could opt instead to give up their double standards by rejecting music, dance and architecture .

That would be the obvious first step. The next step would be to begin objectively testing all individual works which are alleged to be art, including Rand's novels, for their ability or lack thereof to comply with her criteria of intelligibility and communication. Nothing qualifies as art by Objectivist criteria until such testing is done, and until individual works succeed in communicating.

A truly objective aesthetics would be consistent, it wouldn't have double standards, contradictions, irrational exceptions, or subjective preferences snuck in and mislabeled "objective." 

Quote

My viewpoint, as you might recall I've said in the past, is that her basic theory is (1) too narrow and (2) reliant on her notions of "sense of life," of which she presents three different accounts, and no way of establishing any of them.

I agree.

Quote

I'd like to see an attempt at presenting what you'd consider a good theory of art.

I'm working on one.

[Ellen Stuttle]

6 hours ago, Jonathan said:

I'm not "trying to get 'abstract' painting and sculpture into Rand's theory."

I'm only pointing out contradictions, such as that music doesn't meet her definition or criteria of art. I'm pointing out that the arguments that O-vishes use to reject abstract painting and sculpture are also grounds for rejecting music, dance and architecture. One must use double standards in order to accept those art forms while rejecting abstract paintings and sculptures.

O-vishes need not accept abstract paintings and sculptures in order to address my criticisms. They could opt instead to give up their double standards by rejecting music, dance and architecture .

OK, you are not "trying to get 'abstract' painting and sculpture into Rand's theory."  You're just trying to get O'vishes either to include "abstract" painting and sculpture or to kick out music (and dance and architecture).  You're claiming that they're engaged in double standards in not either including or disincluding all.

I do not agree.  I think that each of those categories is a separate case.  I think that your insistence upon seeing them all as instances of a common category disregards the nature of each.  I think that, in terms of Rand's theory,  O'vishes are correct in including music and disincluding "abstract" painting and sculpture.  Architecture I think is problematic - and Rand might have been thinking so herself toward the end of her life.  I've given little thought to dance.  The sense in which music qualifies as a "selective recreation of reality" is tricky but not unnavigable.  I don't buy the details of Rand's hypothesis as to how music works, but she was presenting that idea only as an hypothesis, not as necessarily correct in order for music to be art by her definition.

 

6 hours ago, Jonathan said:

That would be the obvious first step. The next step would be to begin objectively testing all individual works which are alleged to be art, including Rand's novels, for their ability or lack thereof to comply with her criteria of intelligibility and communication. Nothing qualifies as art by Objectivist criteria until such testing is done, and until individual works succeed in communicating.

Jonathan, do you really doubt that there are many individual works - and very much Rand's own - which qualify as art by Rand's definition of art and her theory of the nature of art?

You cook up a huge fuss over Rand's "outside considerations" statement - which you interpret in a way which casts her as an idiot - but I think that what she meant isn't hard to understand and isn't different except in her typical rhetorical flourishes from standard boilerplate on esthetic judgment.  One sets aside reactions to the what in judging the how.  That Rand sometimes engaged in pronouncings that outstripped her expertise, that there are features of her presentations which she didn't think through well, granted.  But I don't think that these problems produce difficulty in understanding what classifies as art according to Rand's views.

 

6 hours ago, Jonathan said:

I'm working on one.

Super!

Ellen

[Brant Gaede]

J and I have agreed Rand needed different definitions for different categories of art--that her one definition excluded several categories.

My idea about what is "art" is an abstraction of reality into something physical that refers both to reality and the abstraction--that all art is thereby abstract.

--Brant

J is not onto Rand about her deficiencies so much as onto her followers who champion those beyond reason and Rand's own epistemological criteria even into the ridiculous--I merely point out there is no such thing as an Objectivst Esthetics--no logical fit into her philosophy's four basic, vertically integrated, individualistic principles (hence esthetics is about what is considered art and about art but not what art should be [philosophy is about should be--the artist does the should be for his own work, not the other guy's])

[Jonathan]

20 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

OK, you are not "trying to get 'abstract' painting and sculpture into Rand's theory."  You're just trying to get O'vishes either to include "abstract" painting and sculpture or to kick out music (and dance and architecture).  You're claiming that they're engaged in double standards in not either including or disincluding all.

Yes. I'm saying that the Objectivist Esthetics needs work. Its supporters need to decide what the hell it means, then take it for a test drive in reality to actually objectively measure what qualifies and what doesn't, and then adjust the theory accordingly.

Right now, music, architecture and dance don't qualify. And, as I've said many times, if we go by my little tests of O-vishes, nothing else qualifies either, including realist romantic paintings.

 

Quote

I do not agree.  I think that each of those categories is a separate case.  I think that your insistence upon seeing them all as instances of a common category disregards the nature of each.

Each of the separate categories is united with the others under Rand's category of "art." SHE insisted on putting them into a common category which she didn't think through very carefully.

 

20 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

I think that, in terms of Rand's theory,  O'vishes are correct in including music and disincluding "abstract" painting and sculpture...The sense in which music qualifies as a "selective recreation of reality" is tricky but not unnavigable.  I don't buy the details of Rand's hypothesis as to how music works, but she was presenting that idea only as an hypothesis, not as necessarily correct in order for music to be art by her definition.

No, it's unnavigable. If you believe otherwise, then navigate it.

Until such navigation occurs, and until Rand's missing objective "vocabulary" of music exists, we'll remain in the position that Rand identified as treating tastes in music as a "subjective matter." In other words, we must treat musical tastes exactly as we treat tastes in abstract art, as well as tastes in mere decoration.

Additionally, there's also the missing objective means of judging any art form for its aesthetic merits. Rand mentioned the issue as being outside the scope of the then-current discussion, but neglected to ever return to it. The Objectivist Esthetics still lacks the set of "esthetic principles" which Rand stated "must guide an objective evaluation."

Until that set of principles is identified, all opinions, interpretations and evaluations of any works of art are a subjective matter.

Rand snarked out over other philosophers who she claimed "failed dismally" at identifying objective aesthetic principles. She and her followers seem to believe that her snarkiness was a valid substitute for the missing set of objective principles. It's not.

 

Quote

Jonathan, do you really doubt that there are many individual works - and very much Rand's own - which qualify as art by Rand's definition of art and her theory of the nature of art?

I don't doubt that some works could qualify as art to some people according to Rand's criteria. Generally speaking, it won't be O-vishes who successfully identify "artists' themes."

But, again, the problem is all of the contradictions, irrationality and double standards that Rand and her followers inject into the discussion. How many people must succeed in identifying an "artist's theme"? One? Twenty percent? Fifty one percent? And why that number? Does the same number apply to testing abstract art? If not, why not? Do only the responses of "average viewers" count, or is that just something that Kamhi tries to sneak in as the standard?

Lot's of whats, whens, wheres and whys that remain unanswered. Lots of assertions with nothing to back them up.

 

Quote

You cook up a huge fuss over Rand's "outside considerations" statement

It's not just the phrase "outside considerations," but also "exclusively by identifying the evidence contained in the work and allowing no other, outside considerations." And her ardent followers believe in and obey that command. You see Tony doing it here. They intentionally disregard visual references to common history. They consider such to be evidence not contained in the work, despite its being contained in the work. They recognize that Rand didn't like such content, and therefore banned it from her method of aesthetic hermeneutics.

She didn't know, or care to know, of the long history of visual art depending on historical references, including sometimes to the point of having the equivalent of "program notes" as in program music. She seems to have mistakenly believed that explanatory gallery placards came into existence with the advent of abstract art. And she offered no explanation of why a work of art must not include some brief "program notes" as being considered supplementary context which the artist provides as being included among the "inside considerations." Those methods and intentions don't cease to exist or to be valid just because visual arts ignoramus Rand either didn't know about their history or personally didn't like them.

 

Quote

...which you interpret in a way which casts her as an idiot - but I think that what she meant isn't hard to understand and isn't different except in her typical rhetorical flourishes from standard boilerplate on esthetic judgment. 

I don't think that her views were standard boilerplate on aesthetic judgment. Perhaps on literature, but not the other arts. What makes Rand look like an idiot is her attempting to apply her rules and preferences in literature to the other arts.

 

Quote

One sets aside reactions to the what in judging the how.  That Rand sometimes engaged in pronouncings that outstripped her expertise, that there are features of her presentations which she didn't think through well, granted.  But I don't think that these problems produce difficulty in understanding what classifies as art according to Rand's views.

 

Heh. Um, if that were true, then Rand's critics wouldn't all raise the same objections, such as, ""Personally, I find Rand's definition of art absurdly limited. By the way, exactly what reality is 're-created' in a Bach fugue?" (-- Denis Dutton grilling O-vish bossypants Louis Torres.)

J

P.S. You might recall His Royal Published Highness attempting to answer Dutton's challenge, but failing due to having skipped the "exactly" part of the question. His Excellency described it as "something like a dialogue or a set of related developmental process in nature, or something of the kind, involving two, three, or four interacting entities."

Heh. And when I'm much less vague in interpreting the objectively observable attributes and their relationships in abstract paintings and identifying them as "interacting entities," His Majesty attempts to inject ridicule into the discussion by quoting his silly wife's reaction to my comments. Double standards. Irrationality.

[Jonathan]

I don't remember having seen this before.

You can receive an "award" for "objectivity" in arts criticism, scholarship and commentary (by "award" they mean nothing more than a mention on their website, and by "objectivity," they mean that if you agree with them, share their personal aesthetic limitations, and are angry enough to publicly scream "That ain't art!!! Ayn Rand said so!!!" That's "objectivity" in aesthetics.):

https://www.aristos.org/aris-award-1.htm

"Briefly stated, (the Aristos awards) are given for objectivity in arts criticism, scholarship, or commentary. Such objectivity involves the recognition (usually implicit) that art has a particular nature, and that the art of the present necessarily bears a fundamental similarity to the art of the past. Often, the resulting conclusion is that a work regarded as art by experts is not art at all. The fullest explication of the point of view underlying the awards is found in What Art Is: The Esthetic Theory of Ayn Rand."

Hahahaha!

It's "not art at all!" NOT ART! NOT ART!

Did I stutter? IT'S NOT EFFEN ART!

J

[Jonathan]

Louis Torres and Michelle Marder Kamhi, What Art Is: The Esthetic Theory of Ayn Rand (pgs 57-58)

"A work of art cannot be properly evaluated as 'good' or 'bad' on the basis of a sense-of-life response. She thus draws a crucial distinction between esthetic response (though she does not use that term) and what she terms esthetic judgment. The former is a spontaneous, emotional reaction to the work as a whole. The latter is a function of intellectual appraisal; it is a dispassionate evaluation of the success with which the artist projects his intended theme. Whether one shares or does not share an artist's fundamental view of life, Rand explains, 'is irrelevant to an esthetic appraisal of his work qua art.'"

Torres and Kamhi are correct about everything in the above statement, including the appraising of the artist's intended theme.

---

So, what are the obstacles to bringing the deceased Objectivist Esthetics back to life?

First, there's the problem of Objectivism categorizing things as valid art forms which do not meet Objectivism's stated definition and criteria. There are restrictions which were apparently intended to be aimed only at "modern art," but which in reality hit a much wider target, definitely including music, architecture and dance, and very likely including most of all of the other art forms to one degree or another.

Second, there's the problem of the missing means by which to make objective aesthetic judgments. Rand recognized the need to identify "the esthetic principles which apply to all art," and which "must guide an objective evaluation," but she never provided them. Nor has any of her followers. Since, as Kamhi and Torres correctly note above, mere aesthetic responses are "spontaneous, emotional reactions," they therefore do not adhere to the Objectivist philosophy's notion of objectivity, which is the act of volitionally adhering to reality by applying the rules logic and reason to any given individual situation. Objectivity cannot be practiced until those missing "objective esthetic principles" have been identified and put into practice. And nothing can qualify as art until that time, since Rand's view was there was no place for "whim" or for "the unknowable, the unintelligible, the undefinable, the non-objective in any human product." Nothing, therefore, can qualify as art until the moment that the missing objective means of making aesthetic evaluations has been delivered. There is "no place" for art until those means have arrived.

Third, logically, the missing objective means must include the process of comparing viewers' interpretations of a work of art to the artist's intended meaning, and that intended meaning must be established by some means outside of the work of art (such as a written explanation or an audio recording of an interview with the artist, etc.). The same would be true of objectively evaluating any human action; one would have to compare the results to what was intended to be achieved. Since artists' statements of their intended meanings are actually pretty rare in comparison to the number of all art works, very little will qualify as potentially qualifying as art.

Fourth, there's the problem of Objectivism not having addressed the issue that all viewers do not possess the same observational and cognitive abilities, and that such differences in abilities are relevant to objectively measuring how well any human action, including art, has been performed. In other words, the artist and his abilities are not the only things to be taken into consideration, but a truly objective means of making aesthetic judgments must account for differing abilities in viewers so that a work of art could not be judged to have failed when the reality was that only certain viewers had failed to identify meaning where others had succeeded.

In order to overcome these four problems, a truly objective Objectivist Esthetics would have to be something very different from that which died on the operating table at the beginning of this thread.

J

[Brant Gaede]

7 hours ago, Jonathan said:

In order to overcome these four problems, a truly objective Objectivist Esthetics would have to be something very different from that which died on the operating table at the beginning of this thread.

J

All is needed is a sub-category Objectivist Esthetics a la Ayn Rand. STOP!!!!

What she said is what you got/get. STOP!!!!

The rest is bullshit if it is Rand added onto.

We are really talking about the philosophy of Ayn Rand. It should be Ayn Rand Esthetics.

Objectivism a la Ayn Rand died when she died in 1982.

True Objectivism is Realityism. The objectification of reality.

To truly appreciate Ayn Rand bifurcate the philosophy from the art then examine the art for the remnant philosophy. I think The Fountainhead  is the best way to go. I think Atlas Shrugged was Rand going off the rails into controllism through moralism de lux. That novel was way too much, even for her. Ayn Rand died for Atlas Shrugged.

--Brant

she came, she saw, she conquered--that included Nathaniel Branden (she wanted him she got him she kept him until the lying stopped; the lying proved the love, the honesty disproved it [he was supposed to keep the lying going that she started])

 

[Jonathan]

11 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

All is needed is a sub-category Objectivist Esthetics a la Ayn Rand. STOP!!!!

What she said is what you got/get. STOP!!!!

The rest is bullshit if it is Rand added onto.

We are really talking about the philosophy of Ayn Rand. It should be Ayn Rand Esthetics.

Objectivism a la Ayn Rand died when she died in 1982.

True Objectivism is Realityism. The objectification of reality.

To truly appreciate Ayn Rand bifurcate the philosophy from the art then examine the art for the remnant philosophy. I think The Fountainhead  is the best way to go. I think Atlas Shrugged was Rand going off the rails into controllism through moralism de lux. That novel was way too much, even for her. Ayn Rand died for Atlas Shrugged.

--Brant

she came, she saw, she conquered--that included Nathaniel Branden (she wanted him she got him she kept him until the lying stopped; the lying proved the love, the honesty disproved it [he was supposed to keep the lying going that she started])

 

I think that the Objectivist Epistemology could be properly and consistently applied to the field of aesthetics. But you're right, no need to limit it to Rand's version of objectivity, logic, reason, etc. Those things can be applied without reference to her.

[Jonathan]

On 11/2/2017 at 1:35 PM, Jonathan said:

Louis Torres and Michelle Marder Kamhi, What Art Is: The Esthetic Theory of Ayn Rand (pgs 57-58)

"A work of art cannot be properly evaluated as 'good' or 'bad' on the basis of a sense-of-life response. She thus draws a crucial distinction between esthetic response (though she does not use that term) and what she terms esthetic judgment. The former is a spontaneous, emotional reaction to the work as a whole. The latter is a function of intellectual appraisal; it is a dispassionate evaluation of the success with which the artist projects his intended theme. Whether one shares or does not share an artist's fundamental view of life, Rand explains, 'is irrelevant to an esthetic appraisal of his work qua art.'"

Torres and Kamhi are correct about everything in the above statement, including the appraising of the artist's intended theme.

---

So, what are the obstacles to bringing the deceased Objectivist Esthetics back to life?

First, there's the problem of Objectivism categorizing things as valid art forms which do not meet Objectivism's stated definition and criteria. There are restrictions which were apparently intended to be aimed only at "modern art," but which in reality hit a much wider target, definitely including music, architecture and dance, and very likely including most of all of the other art forms to one degree or another.

Second, there's the problem of the missing means by which to make objective aesthetic judgments. Rand recognized the need to identify "the esthetic principles which apply to all art," and which "must guide an objective evaluation," but she never provided them. Nor has any of her followers. Since, as Kamhi and Torres correctly note above, mere aesthetic responses are "spontaneous, emotional reactions," they therefore do not adhere to the Objectivist philosophy's notion of objectivity, which is the act of volitionally adhering to reality by applying the rules logic and reason to any given individual situation. Objectivity cannot be practiced until those missing "objective esthetic principles" have been identified and put into practice. And nothing can qualify as art until that time, since Rand's view was there was no place for "whim" or for "the unknowable, the unintelligible, the undefinable, the non-objective in any human product." Nothing, therefore, can qualify as art until the moment that the missing objective means of making aesthetic evaluations has been delivered. There is "no place" for art until those means have arrived.

Third, logically, the missing objective means must include the process of comparing viewers' interpretations of a work of art to the artist's intended meaning, and that intended meaning must be established by some means outside of the work of art (such as a written explanation or an audio recording of an interview with the artist, etc.). The same would be true of objectively evaluating any human action; one would have to compare the results to what was intended to be achieved. Since artists' statements of their intended meanings are actually pretty rare in comparison to the number of all art works, very little will qualify as potentially qualifying as art.

Fourth, there's the problem of Objectivism not having addressed the issue that all viewers do not possess the same observational and cognitive abilities, and that such differences in abilities are relevant to objectively measuring how well any human action, including art, has been performed. In other words, the artist and his abilities are not the only things to be taken into consideration, but a truly objective means of making aesthetic judgments must account for differing abilities in viewers so that a work of art could not be judged to have failed when the reality was that only certain viewers had failed to identify meaning where others had succeeded.

In order to overcome these four problems, a truly objective Objectivist Esthetics would have to be something very different from that which died on the operating table at the beginning of this thread.

J

Ugh! I'm slipping. I forgot to include point five:

Fifth, there's the problem of Objectivism misidentifying the concept of "esthetic judgments" as being about appraising the technical merits of how well an artist projected his view of existence. Such judgments are not aesthetic, but simply normal judgments. They are the same as judging how well a plumber, engineer or ditch digger performed his task. Actual "esthetic judgments" would appraise the effects and affects of what Kamhi and Torres in the above identify as "esthetic responses."

Rand did a little sleight of hand. The field of aesthetics is about judgments of beauty, taste and sentiment. Such judgments are, as Rand, Kamhi and Torres recognized, "spontaneous and emotional." They are subjective. But Rand wanted them to be objective. Everything had to be objective. Therefore she tried to force aesthetics judgments to become objective by substituting a different concept for them. She might as well have declared that judging a writer's spelling to be correct is an "esthetic judgment." Or that measuring the dimensions of a canvas is an "esthetic judgment."

It's a very similar tactic to how Dr. Ex-Mrs. Dr. Comrade Sonia, PhD., once tried to prove that judgments of beauty were "objective" by playing the little game of substituting the concept of "health" for the concept of "beauty." You just take a phenomenon which is subjective, and then hope that no one notices that you've switched to a different concept which has objectively measurable characteristics. Voila, the subjective thing is now objective by association, which is kind of almost the same as being objective, if we squint our eyes and pretend a little.

Contrary to Rand's little shell game, real "esthetic judgments" are not about judging an artist's "technical mastery," but about the beauty, taste and sentiment with which he creates his art, and which his art evokes. Aesthetic judgments are about the "spontaneous and emotional" responses that Rand tossed aside and decided not to explore or have any curiosity about whatsoever, despite being a romanticist and craving the emotionally stimulating.

J

[Ellen Stuttle]

42 minutes ago, Jonathan said:

[....]

Jonathan, thanks for that post, and the previous one which you quoted in full.

You've provided a very clear delineation of many (though not all) of the bonkers lengths to which you go in producing your contrived piñata corpse.

Haven't time for responding now.  I might have time tomorrow.  For now, I'm just enjoying laughing at your stunts.

Ellen

[9thdoctor]

5 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

Jonathan, thanks for that post, and the previous one which you quoted in full.

You've provided a very clear delineation of many (though not all) of the bonkers lengths to which you go in producing your contrived piñata corpse.

Haven't time for responding now.  I might have time tomorrow.  For now, I'm just enjoying laughing at your stunts.

Ellen

Well come on, get the ball across the goal line before spiking it and starting the victory dance.

[Jonathan]

23 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

Jonathan, thanks for that post, and the previous one which you quoted in full.

You've provided a very clear delineation of many (though not all) of the bonkers lengths to which you go in producing your contrived piñata corpse.

Haven't time for responding now.  I might have time tomorrow.  For now, I'm just enjoying laughing at your stunts.

Ellen

Great. Bring it, don't send it.

My arguments are sound. The logic is watertight. Items 2 and 5 are especially potent.

When addressing them, remember to hold all of the context in your mind at the same time! Pay attention to Rand's actual statements! All of them!

J

 

[Jonathan]

18 hours ago, 9thdoctor said:

Well come on, get the ball across the goal line before spiking it and starting the victory dance.

Heh. Ellen has been doing a lot of that during the past few years. Despite her announcements of how killer her offense is, she never gets the ball into the end zone. Doesn't even kick a field goal, but quietly punts and then disappears for a while.

J

[Jonathan]

Hahaha! Check this out:

Here’s a link to the topic “esthetics” at the online Ayn Rand Lexicon

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/esthetics.html

Compare this selectively edited excerpt to the original:

Edited version at the Lexicon:
"The esthetic principles which apply to all art, regardless of an individual artist’s philosophy, and which must guide an objective evaluation . . . are defined by the science of esthetics—a task at which modern philosophy has failed dismally."

Original:
"The esthetic principles which apply to all art, regardless of an individual artist's philosophy, and which must guide an objective evaluation, are outside the scope of this discussion, I will only mention that such principles are defined by the science of esthetics -- a task at which modern philosophers have failed dismally.”

OMG! Hilarious!

Why, oh why, would anyone remove the section “...are outside the scope of this discussion, I will only mention that such principles…”???

Why hide that information?

What other reason could there be for such editing other than the dishonest desire to leave the reader with the impression that Rand had succeeded in identifying the principles?

What a clown show.

J

[Brant Gaede]

Deleting that is one thing. Actual rewriting quite another. Regardless, if the original text is available never use anything else for scholarly work.

--Brant

yes, it was effectively rewritten by the use of deletion

[Brant Gaede]

There is, of course, no "science of esthetics" nor will there ever be. Rand never came with a definition of science so she uses it as a stolen concept to dress up her ideas. I don't hold this against her; that's her lack of a good liberal arts education, something very few people ever get, especially in today's colleges and universities. (If she had had a good liberal arts education--that's a more rounded liberal arts education--she'd never have become a great novelist.)

--Brant

[Ellen Stuttle]

8 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Hahaha! Check this out:

Here’s a link to the topic “esthetics” at the online Ayn Rand Lexicon

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/esthetics.html

Compare this selectively edited excerpt to the original:

Edited version at the Lexicon:
"The esthetic principles which apply to all art, regardless of an individual artist’s philosophy, and which must guide an objective evaluation . . . are defined by the science of esthetics—a task at which modern philosophy has failed dismally."

Original:
"The esthetic principles which apply to all art, regardless of an individual artist's philosophy, and which must guide an objective evaluation, are outside the scope of this discussion, I will only mention that such principles are defined by the science of esthetics -- a task at which modern philosophers have failed dismally.”

OMG! Hilarious!

Why, oh why, would anyone remove the section “...are outside the scope of this discussion, I will only mention that such principles…”???

Why hide that information?

What other reason could there be for such editing other than the dishonest desire to leave the reader with the impression that Rand had succeeded in identifying the principles?

What a clown show.

J

Why would anyone remove the reference to "this discussion"?  Um, just maybe because the discussion which was referred to in the original essay isn't in the Lexicon.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

8 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Heh. Ellen has been doing a lot of that during the past few years. Despite her announcements of how killer her offense is, she never gets the ball into the end zone. Doesn't even kick a field goal, but quietly punts and then disappears for a while.

J

A killer offense?  Against what?  Nothing?  What I've quietly pointed out is the lack of the overwhelming substance you claim to have.  You have bits of substance here and there, but no where near enough to make a corpse out of Rand's actual theory, only out of the substitute you've largely concocted yourself.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

On October 31, 2017 at 12:25 PM, Jonathan said:

Right now, music, architecture and dance don't qualify. And, as I've said many times, if we go by my little tests of O-vishes, nothing else qualifies either, including realist romantic paintings.

J wrote :

"Right now, music, architecture and dance don't qualify. And, as I've said many times, if we go by my little tests of O-vishes, nothing else qualifies either, including realist romantic paintings."

Your tests of O'vishes which I've seen have consisted of your using Rand's statement about esthetic judgment as your base and asking for identifications of an artist's theme and then, when people fail to identify a theme, saying that therefore the work doesn't qualify as art according to Objectivism.

However, as I've already pointed out, this is reversing the procedure.  A judgment of esthetic merit is only relevant to a work which has already been classified as art.

Consider an analogy to types of vehicles.  Asking if a vehicle is a good car wouldn't be an appropriate question if the vehicle is a horse-drawn carriage.

If you were using your tests merely to demonstrate that Rand's stated method for esthetic judgment is defective, then I would agree that you're pointing up a problem - but a problem with her method specifically, not by reverse formation a problem with her definition.

Again, an analogy to testing a vehicle:  If an auto repair shop has defective methods of gauging a car's performance, this doesn't mean that the item brought into the shop isn't a car.

Note, in case I need to repeat this:  I'm not saying that her definition is unproblematic, just that you aren't demonstrating a problem with her definition by demonstrating a problem with her method of esthetic judgment.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

On October 31, 2017 at 12:25 PM, Jonathan said:

I don't doubt that some works could qualify as art to some people according to Rand's criteria. Generally speaking, it won't be O-vishes who successfully identify "artists' themes."

But, again, the problem is all of the contradictions, irrationality and double standards that Rand and her followers inject into the discussion. How many people must succeed in identifying an "artist's theme"? One? Twenty percent? Fifty one percent? And why that number? Does the same number apply to testing abstract art? If not, why not? Do only the responses of "average viewers" count, or is that just something that Kamhi tries to sneak in as the standard?

Lot's of whats, whens, wheres and whys that remain unanswered. Lots of assertions with nothing to back them up.

The question I asked is if you "really doubt that there are many individual works - and very much Rand's own - which qualify as art by Rand's definition of art and her theory of the nature of art".

Your shifting to what you don't doubt "some people" might think doesn't answer the question, and your bringing in identifying artists' themes is a further example of your reverse procedure discussed in the post above.

 

On October 31, 2017 at 12:25 PM, Jonathan said:

Each of the separate categories is united with the others under Rand's category of "art." SHE insisted on putting them into a common category which she didn't think through very carefully.

No, each of the separate categories I mentioned - music, dance, architecture, and "abstract" painting and sculpture is not "united with the others under Rand's category of 'art'".  The context was my disagreeing with your insistence that if the latter is excluded, then logically the others must be excluded too - a claim you argue for by means of non-sequitur linkage of all of those categories.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

On November 5, 2017 at 12:18 PM, Jonathan said:

Ugh! I'm slipping. I forgot to include point five:

Fifth, there's the problem of Objectivism misidentifying the concept of "esthetic judgments" as being about appraising the technical merits of how well an artist projected his view of existence. Such judgments are not aesthetic, but simply normal judgments. They are the same as judging how well a plumber, engineer or ditch digger performed his task. Actual "esthetic judgments" would appraise the effects and affects of what Kamhi and Torres in the above identify as "esthetic responses."

Rand did a little sleight of hand. The field of aesthetics is about judgments of beauty, taste and sentiment. Such judgments are, as Rand, Kamhi and Torres recognized, "spontaneous and emotional." They are subjective. But Rand wanted them to be objective. Everything had to be objective. Therefore she tried to force aesthetics judgments to become objective by substituting a different concept for them. She might as well have declared that judging a writer's spelling to be correct is an "esthetic judgment." Or that measuring the dimensions of a canvas is an "esthetic judgment."

It's a very similar tactic to how Dr. Ex-Mrs. Dr. Comrade Sonia, PhD., once tried to prove that judgments of beauty were "objective" by playing the little game of substituting the concept of "health" for the concept of "beauty." You just take a phenomenon which is subjective, and then hope that no one notices that you've switched to a different concept which has objectively measurable characteristics. Voila, the subjective thing is now objective by association, which is kind of almost the same as being objective, if we squint our eyes and pretend a little.

Contrary to Rand's little shell game, real "esthetic judgments" are not about judging an artist's "technical mastery," but about the beauty, taste and sentiment with which he creates his art, and which his art evokes. Aesthetic judgments are about the "spontaneous and emotional" responses that Rand tossed aside and decided not to explore or have any curiosity about whatsoever, despite being a romanticist and craving the emotionally stimulating.

J

Now you've taken onto yourself the role of keeper of the dictionary in the sky wherein correct meanings of terminology are kept and you've accused Rand of playing a shell game by substituting a different concept for the concept she was talking about when instead she was just using terminology differently from your decreed correct meanings.

And as if there's no such topic as technical assessment discussed in art schools.

And as if you haven't made multiple technical assessments yourself.

Ellen

[Jonathan]

9 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

Why would anyone remove the reference to "this discussion"?  Um, just maybe because the discussion which was referred to in the original essay isn't in the Lexicon.

Ellen

And they didn't notice that editing the statement removed Rand's admission that she wasn't addressing what she was criticizing others for nor addressing? Heh.

[Jonathan]

8 hours ago, Ellen Stuttle said:

J wrote :

"Right now, music, architecture and dance don't qualify. And, as I've said many times, if we go by my little tests of O-vishes, nothing else qualifies either, including realist romantic paintings."

Your tests of O'vishes which I've seen have consisted of your using Rand's statement about esthetic judgment as your base and asking for identifications of an artist's theme and then, when people fail to identify a theme, saying that therefore the work doesn't qualify as art according to Objectivism.

However, as I've already pointed out, this is reversing the procedure.  A judgment of esthetic merit is only relevant to a work which has already been classified as art.

And I've replied to your objections with even more information and analyses, to which you haven't responded.

J