Objectivist Esthetics, R.I.P.

[anthony]

On 12/29/2017 at 9:39 PM, Jonathan said:

No, they're not. Rand's work is the Kantian Sublime. It presents the heroic reaction to threatening phenomena of immense magnitude.

 

You don't understand the concept of the Sublime. It's been clear in our discussions that you don't want to understand it. You're a lot like Newberry in that respect: You're so addicted to the Kantian Sublime (via your exposure to it in Rand's work) that you need fixes of it constantly, and your biggest fix comes from experiencing the Sublime by making Kant a villain of immense destructive influence and magnitude which you feel you can heroically stand up to and feel the strength of your power to resist. That includes vilifying his views on the Sublime.

The Kant that you imagine, project, and assign beliefs to is nothing like the real man who existed. The one that you've created is a fantasy which does nothing but feed your psychological needs.

Who needs to 'imagine" and "assign beliefs" to, or criticize the ole "villain", Immanuel? He accomplished those very well all by himself.

"If I remove the thinking subject, the whole corporeal world must at once vanish". (Critique of Practical Reason)

How could Objectivists object to such primacy of consciousness? Unfair! But can anyone trust their senses' direct contact to reality (or the arts) after Kant's terribly convoluted views on reality and the mind after learning his ideas about phenomenon- noumenon?

The human *sensations* (since that's what they are) experienced naturally and briefly, stunning one's mind with the overwhelming objects or shockingly immense powers of nature has, I guess the argument goes, been continued through to influence artists to produce this mixed bag, called postmodernist art. The "Sublime"-sensations elevated to an art form, with its mixed properties of: superficiality, identity-less sometimes, shocking often, self-ironical, and always "sensationalist". The basic sensations have risen to the top, and there is usually not even an honest emotion to be had from this art. (Am I reminded of masses of people's lack of individual identity, narcissism, cynicism, shallowness and childish, sensationalist behavior? Don't mind me...).

[Jonathan]

20 hours ago, anthony said:

Seeing you recently know all about Objectivist epistemology and metaphysics, please advise me of where I get it wrong, in detail..

You've tried to make the Objectivist Esthetics an axiom because you can't prove that anything has ever qualified as art by Rand's definition and criteria. You recognize that you can't prove it, but, rather than accepting the reality about what that means about her theories, you want to cling to the theories, so the notion of proof has to be eliminated, and the only way to achieve that goal is to make the theory into something which requires no proof, which is an axiom. That's how you've arrived at you retarded, anti-Objectivist opinion that you don't have to prove that anything has ever qualified as art by Rand's definition and criteria.

 

21 hours ago, anthony said:

"Themes", I've done those. What's the problem?

I've explained it to you multiple times, and you're still not understanding it?!!!

The challenge, once again, is for you, or any of Rand's other followers, to objectively demonstrate that any alleged work of art has succeeded in communicating the "artist's theme," his intended abstract meaning, his view of existenc,  by observing only the content of the work and being allowed access to no outside considerations.

How are you not remembering this? It's the exact challenge that you yourself put forth in regard to abstract art! It was the test that you fucking proposed!!!! It is your own proposed standard and means of objectively determining if something qualifies as art or not!!! 

Now, keep in mind that you're not being asked to simply tell us what you think an artwork's theme/meaning might be. Understand? The idea here is to do much more than that, because Rand's theory requires much more than that. You also have to demonstrate that the theme/meaning that popped into your kook head is also the one that the artist intended. 

 

21 hours ago, anthony said:

Now here:

"....the artist starts with a broad abstraction which he has to concretize, to bring into reality by means of the appropriate particulars; the viewer perceives the particulars, integrates them and grasps the abstraction from which they came, thus completing the circle. Speaking metaphorically, the creative process resembles a process of deduction; the viewing process resembles a process of induction.

Uh huh. Now objectively demonstrate that the above happens in reality, and not just in theory. Objectively prove that anyone has grasped the artist's intended abstraction via integrating the particulars.

And saying that it's an axiom is a fucking retarded dodge, not to mention anti-Objectivist. Anytime that you're required to prove something and can't, it doesn't magically become an axiom that therefore doesn't need to be proved.

 

21 hours ago, anthony said:

 

This does NOT mean that COMMUNICATION is the PRIMARY PURPOSE of an artist. His primary purpose is to bring HIS VIEW OF MAN AND EXISTENCE INTO REALITY; but TO BE BROUGHT INTO REALITY, IT HAS TO BE TRANSLATED INTO OBJECTIVE (therefore, COMMUNICABLE) TERMS".

Objectively demonstrate that any work of art has ever succeeded in bringing an artist's view of man and existence into communicable terms.

Start with whatever you think would be the easiest art work to demonstrate a successful conveyance of a specific view of existence via "communicable terms," then work toward the harder art forms, such as music, which even Rand admitted doesn't (yet, in her subjective opinion) have an objective vocabulary, and therefore cannot be said to deal in "communicable terms."

I'll wait. I have peplenty of time. I'm not going anywhere, and neither is this challenge. And you're not the only one whom I've befuddled with it. There are many others who also can't deal with it. Nothing qualifies as art by Rand's definition and criteria.

Hopefully someday some one thing will be objectively shown to qualify, and then another, and another. It'll be a very slow and long process, since each individual work will have to objectively proven to qualify. Some works will never be able to even be considered, due to the fact that we have no record of what view of existence, abstract meaning, or artist's theme the artist intended to project, so therefore we have no objective standard by which to objectively measure if he succeeded in his task.

 

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

7 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said:

Rand's  ethics and metaphysics  has Jewish DNA, notwithstanding the fact that Rand was an atheist.

Bob,

I agree with this (and the rest of your post). You focused on ethics, though. I was thinking more in terms of metaphysics.

Hebrew God: "I am that I am."
Ayn Rand on existence: "Existence exists."

There are other similarities, too. For example, humans are encompassed by God/existence, God/existence always was and always will be, God/existence is the source of everything, there is only one God/existence, etc.

When one asks, "Where did God come from?", this is very similar to asking, "Where did existence come from?"

Like I said, take away the stories and personification and this is the kind of stuff that remains.

Michael 

[anthony]

3 hours ago, Jonathan said:

You've tried to make the Objectivist Esthetics an axiom because you can't prove that anything has ever qualified as art by Rand's definition and criteria. You

 

Objectively demonstrate that any work of art has ever succeeded in bringing an artist's view of man and existence into communicable terms.

 

 

 

You evade what you don't want to hear, often. I told you yesterday. "Objectivist Esthetics" is NOT "an axiom" - its a conceptual theory founded ultimately on the axioms, existence and consciousness which are inescapable. Make the effort, think conceptually. Indeed I can demonstrate "an artist's view of man and existence" which (and if) he has rendered it "in communicable terms" - I have already, more than once. E.g.

Turner and his "Snow Storm, Hannibal Crossing the Alps" painting (earlier). Elements of the picture are a small, hazy sun, the frame filled mostly with massive cloud atmospherics descending to ground-level, jagged rocks, and many dark, scattered and huddled human figures without identity in different postures of activity. These (from memory) are the objective - "communicable" - entities which compose the picture. Seen as a whole composition, it is obvious from ominously dark and yellow colors of the disturbed, swirling clouds, the barrenness of the landscape and the tiny, alarmed-looking and featureless humans, that they are in severe danger. The painting conveys fearfulness, the unpredictable, arbitrary nature of existence, and Nature's overwhelming threat to a humanity who are helpless specks in the universe. The theme: men in danger from their environment. Metaphysical value: A bleak judgment on man's existence. The styling/technique and skill is excellent.

This is not "proof", this is using your eyesight and using your mind.

You are stuck with "empirical proof" in art -- for art, for chrissakes! 

Challenge done. Now you do the same with an "abstract" piece. I have time.

[anthony]

One main thing, the picture isn't the title. A painting is a single 'scene', it has to stand alone and be judged on merit (like an individual) within its own genre unmixed with word-concepts - to be abstracted by its own process different to that of fiction-reading. A title, e.g.: 'Hannibal Crossing the Alps' (approx) is suggestive of "a story", which a painting is explicitly not.

From titles and captions viewers of art are influenced to believe, as in this case a).Turner was there to witness the events and like a photographer, accurately reproduced one instant of an event, the storm, after which (filling in with the viewer's own knowledge of history) Hannibal's army successfully crossed the mountains, etc. etc. -- which makes his work journalistic and part of a 'narrative'; impossible, or narrow and superficial, but the notion lingers.  b). Turner was motivated or "inspired" to paint, through an account he read of Hannibal, which is one possible method, that has been followed or c). and the most feasible, rational method for an abstractive (conceptual) painter, the idea of the elements vs. man was already present in Turner's mind, from early experiences and his value-judgments about them, and he only had to find - select - a subject to 'concretize' it. The causal order is important. What came first? The idea. Then the choice of subject matter, and self-directed action, and an artwork. (The basics of Objectivist art theory, the essentiality of a man's conceptual consciousness in art-creation).

(For Turner the theme of men at risk from an overpowering Nature is repeated so often it indicates this method is true to him. And one can infer that both his (subconscious, preconceptual )"sense of life" - and - his (conscious) evaluation of existence were quite identical, a bleak universe type).

Which confirms Rand, and that to get the best out of it and do a picture justice, avoiding prejudices and preconceptions, one should exclude all other information when ~objectively~ reviewing an artwork. Especially I think, the title. The title/caption (and any extraneous detail, even the painter's name and other works) is useful, empirical knowledge only after the fact.

Disingenuously, a title is often used to add "meaning" to pictures which have no discernible content or meaning (Pollock's drip-painted "Convergence") - or, when a grandiose/sensational title is given to lift mundane artworks.

 

 

 

[regi]

21 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Hebrew God: "I am that I am."
Ayn Rand on existence: "Existence exists."

There are other similarities, too.

Michael,

I found your comments, as well as Bob's, very interesting.

Four years ago I published an article, The Wisdom of Tathagatagarbha, that treated reality metaphorically as the only true God.

I use the name, Tathagatagarbha, a Sanskrit word for the Buddhist concept of the eternal and absolute essence of all reality, as the name of my metaphorical God, (Tath, for short). Though somewhat satirical the article illustrates that everything usually attributed to a God can be understood as reality, which is superior in every way to all the human invented gods.

[BaalChatzaf]

21 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Bob,

I agree with this (and the rest of your post). You focused on ethics, though. I was thinking more in terms of metaphysics.

Hebrew God: "I am that I am."
Ayn Rand on existence: "Existence exists."

There are other similarities, too. For example, humans are encompassed by God/existence, God/existence always was and always will be, God/existence is the source of everything, there is only one God/existence, etc.

When one asks, "Where did God come from?", this is very similar to asking, "Where did existence come from?"

Like I said, take away the stories and personification and this is the kind of stuff that remains.

Michael 

It turns out that the Atheist Rand was Jewish down to her toenails.  Didn't some one write a book about Rand and Objectivism shown the correspondence between Talmudic Judaism and Rand's thinking?

 

[BaalChatzaf]

On 12/30/2017 at 4:12 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Bob,

I agree with this (and the rest of your post). You focused on ethics, though. I was thinking more in terms of metaphysics.

Hebrew God: "I am that I am."
Ayn Rand on existence: "Existence exists."

There are other similarities, too. For example, humans are encompassed by God/existence, God/existence always was and always will be, God/existence is the source of everything, there is only one God/existence, etc.

When one asks, "Where did God come from?", this is very similar to asking, "Where did existence come from?"

Like I said, take away the stories and personification and this is the kind of stuff that remains.

Michael 

In is interesting to not that G-D's name is YHWH (pronounced Yah-Weh)*  which is the hebrew verb meaning  "he is"  So that in effect Jews worshipped a god  whose name is "existence"  So you are quite correct in what you said.  So Ayn Rand's  motto  Existence exists  is cognate to God is God   or God is Existence or Existence is God.  The generic term for god in Hebrew is El, a title,   and in the plural Elohim.  In the Arabic it is Allah which is a title,  not a name.  So it looks like the founders of Judaism and by association, Islam,  connected with the metaphysics of existence.   For the Christians, the main concept was not  existence, but Logos  which is Greek for Word or Idea.  So for Jews , God is Being and for Christians God is Idea.  Much different. 

*From YHWH  it  morphs  to YHVH.  change the Y to J  and you have Jehova which is a mispronouncing of G-D's name.  

 

[anthony]

13 hours ago, BaalChatzaf said:

It turns out that the Atheist Rand was Jewish down to her toenails. 

 

 

Early Jews were objective down to their toenails, the closer explanation.

[Wolf DeVoon]

16 hours ago, anthony said:

Early Jews were objective down to their toenails, the closer explanation.

(shakes head in awe, can't tell if it's blasphemy or Newspeak)

[Jonathan]

On 12/30/2017 at 5:40 PM, anthony said:

You evade what you don't want to hear, often. I told you yesterday. "Objectivist Esthetics" is NOT "an axiom" - its a conceptual theory founded ultimately on the axioms, existence and consciousness which are inescapable. Make the effort, think conceptually. Indeed I can demonstrate "an artist's view of man and existence" which (and if) he has rendered it "in communicable terms" - I have already, more than once. E.g.

Turner and his "Snow Storm, Hannibal Crossing the Alps" painting (earlier). Elements of the picture are a small, hazy sun, the frame filled mostly with massive cloud atmospherics descending to ground-level, jagged rocks, and many dark, scattered and huddled human figures without identity in different postures of activity. These (from memory) are the objective - "communicable" - entities which compose the picture. Seen as a whole composition, it is obvious from ominously dark and yellow colors of the disturbed, swirling clouds, the barrenness of the landscape and the tiny, alarmed-looking and featureless humans, that they are in severe danger. The painting conveys fearfulness, the unpredictable, arbitrary nature of existence, and Nature's overwhelming threat to a humanity who are helpless specks in the universe. The theme: men in danger from their environment. Metaphysical value: A bleak judgment on man's existence. The styling/technique and skill is excellent.

This is not "proof", this is using your eyesight and using your mind.

You are stuck with "empirical proof" in art -- for art, for chrissakes! 

Challenge done. Now you do the same with an "abstract" piece. I have time.

So, clearly you're still not understanding the challenge. Or pretending to not understand it.

The idea isn't just to describe what you see in a work of, and then give your typically snotty, Rand-demented, subjective interpretation of it, and then osycholigize about the artist and his view of existence, but to actually prove that your interpretation matches the artist's intentions. Just because an interpretation pops into your pea brain doesn't mean that you've succeeded in identifying the artist's theme, meaning, sense of life, or view of existence. Other people have differing interpretations than you do, including Rand and her other followers (who are all significantly brighter and more observant that you are). Each of you isn't automatically right in your conflicting opinions about what you think an artwork means just because you feel that you're right and are too stupid and philosophically zealous to recognize that, truly objectively speaking, there is necessarily more involved than just looking at an artwork and declaring that you've identified the artist's meaning. Objectivity requires that you actually confirm what the artist's intentions were. And that's not exclusive to art, but is true of objectively judging any human activity: In order to make an objective judgment, one must know what the person was intending to do.

In other words, the challenge is exactly the same one that Rand's followers issue when I and others explain what we see in abstract paintings, and what we interpret them to mean. They immediately say, "Do you have any proof that your interpretation matches what the artist's intended? Or are you just 'reading into' the paintings?"

Its amazing how clearly you all understand the challenge when you think it's a potent weapon against abstract art, but then how much difficulty you have in understanding the challenge when it's thrown right back at you, and it turns out that Rand's most vociferous aesthetics bossypantses are less competent at identifying artist's' meanings in realist paintings than fans of abstract art are in abstract paintings

You have NOT answered the challenge, nor has any of Rand's other clownish followers.

Nothing has still ever been objectively demonstrated to qualify as art by the Objectivist Esthetics.

As for your clutterbrained stupidity on the subject of axioms, you were indeed trying to make Rand's theory of art axiomatic. You can't provide the proof that I've challenged you to provide, so you used the stupid tactic of claiming that proof wasn't necessary due to the theory being axiomatically true. Only after I called your stupid bluff did you begin backing away from your idiotic attempt to make the Objectivist Esthetics an axiom.

 

[Brant Gaede]

On TV--Day for Night (1974)--James Day asked Rand what she thought about abstract art. Rand replied, "You mean non-objective art?" The best answer is she didn't think about it.  It's less art than photography. And that she could prove objectivity in art.

--Brant

[anthony]

16 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Objectivity requires that you actually confirm what the artist's intentions were. And that's not exclusive to art, but is true of objectively judging any human activity: In order to make an objective judgment, one must know...

 

 

 

 

"...requires you...actually confirm what the artist's intentions were". No it doesn't. Objectivity does not require this mind-reading. That approaches "psychologizing". To be objective is to see things for what they are, to identify and evaluate the human artifacts, not an attempt at judgment of the maker's (subjectively) guessed-at "intentions", good or bad. (A particularly Kantian formulation**). The same way one objectively assesses another individual: by his actions - what he says and does - but primarily, what he does. Nobody knows the actions of another's mind, one sees the results. 

The picture is the thing, and the only "thing" of importance to artist (and a serious contemplator of art). One has to assume that in the making of it, the artist *means it*. One assumes he is skillful enough to depict his view accurately. What he produces is what he importantly views life to be - or nothing, and he's just passing the time. Nobody can have it both ways, art to be unimportant when one wishes it to be, and supremely important when it suits one. So he should stand by his artwork with integrity and face *intellectual* criticism, valid or invalid. What you have indicated time and again is that an artwork is above that sort of criticism, by mere reason of it being "art".

**["Kant argued it was not the consequences of actions that make them right or wrong, but the motives of the person who carries out the action" . Wiki

"Nothing in the world -- indeed nothing even beyond the world -- can possibly be conceived which could be called good without qualification, except a *good will*". I. Kant.

Again, one can see the effects of this philosophy on modern times, promoting the surface ~appearance~ of "doing good" over substantial results - and rejection of a rational morality, acting for one's own 'good'. With his causal reversal, the outcome doesn't matter much, it only matters what you intended to do, and so one need not take responsibility for anything, one's artworks included. 

I bring in Kant again because it's his philosophy which you show is your preference. (Like now, e.g. intentions).You are not going to mix oil and water, i.e., applying the one philosophy of art to a radically different one. I've said I think you have a fruitless endeavor].

In the final analysis, art is *personal*, for the individual, at times an aid to his conceptual integration, at times, for his existential affirmation and at times, his enjoyment - contra the anti-individual, mystical, anti-reason, authoritarian art-climate we know, generally; also an Objectivist hasn't any need of "proof" for existents which he directly sees in reality (and in man-made reality)and how he thinks about them. The point being that he knows he has to identify, think about and judge all existents, since his mind and life depends on it, and if he judges something artistic, wrongly-- well, so what - to any others? He can often correct self-contradictions, else has to take the responsibility himself.

[anthony]

18 hours ago, Wolf DeVoon said:

(shakes head in awe, can't tell if it's blasphemy or Newspeak)

The more I think about it, the more credence I give that remark. Strange to think perhaps, but there had to have been many "objective" people in ancient times too, not only the old Hebrews, and they are why people in various parts could advance at all.  (Objectivity doesn't represent "perfect, complete" knowledge, but simplistically, a respectful approach to and observance of reality, and it is the prerequisite for discoveries of knowledge). If you look at it in context (knowledge is contextual) of primitive times, we could suppose those "objective" Jewish thinkers made a huge leap forward and came up with an elegant, One Explanation for Everything. In that context -what was known then - it was a most rational explanation, while simple enough to comply with Rand's (Occam's) Razor. By equating observations of the mystifying existence of Nature and Man with a First Cause "Creator" (Creation logically presupposes a Creator) and so identifying reality identically with "God". (Abandoning too, the many 'subjective' gods available earlier, and their whim-worshipping of which). This jealous Reality-God promised to punish whoever evaded reality and reward those who chose to acknowledge and follow Reality (er, "God"). Its proponents claimed truthfully. With the Ten C.'s, the Covenant (a voluntary contract)and the Rule of God-Law - which correspond to a Moral Code and, for fun, I'd conjecture, a Bill of Rights wrapped in one, a loose conglomerate of backward people were bound together and could survive and progress as a Tribe under Laws. The ancient version of philosophy continues and in itself hasn't done its followers harm (if not for predations by others and other religions). While it is "mystical", Judaism isn't as explicitly mystical as is Christianity, its off-shoot, I believe. Differing interpretations of Christianity's mysticism are what tore it apart many times into schisms and wars, not so? ( But theology isn't my subject).

[Jonathan]

On 1/2/2018 at 7:19 AM, anthony said:

"...requires you...actually confirm what the artist's intentions were". No it doesn't. Objectivity does not require this mind-reading. That approaches "psychologizing". To be objective is to see things for what they are, to identify and evaluate the human artifacts, not an attempt at judgment of the maker's (subjectively) guessed-at "intentions", good or bad. (A particularly Kantian formulation**). The same way one objectively assesses another individual: by his actions - what he says and does - but primarily, what he does. Nobody knows the actions of another's mind, one sees the results.

Damn, you're clutter-brained!

An objective evaluation of any human action requires knowledge of what the actor intended to accomplish.

I've given several examples in the past:

"If one wanted to objectively judge, say, a NASA mission, it wouldn't be enough to marvel at the technology, power, motion and structural features displayed. One would have read the mission plan to discover if the events that were witnessed had achieved the goal."

"A worker installs pipes on the ceiling of a chemical factory and then turns on a faucet, and the pipes spray water from what appear to us to be random seams. How well did he perform the task? Were the pipes supposed to spray water, or did he fail to connect all of them properly?"

"Say that you're observing a woman who decides to go out and try to accomplish a specific task. She doesn't tell you what she's planning on doing or why -- you have no 'outside considerations' by which to judge her actions. She crosses the street and enters a grocery store. She walks through a couple of aisles, picks up a jar of nutmeg and a bag of sugar, and then purchases them. What's your objective evaluation of her mission? Has she succeeded?"

"I gave the example of trying to identify a woman's task by watching her buying items in a store, and then trying to evaluate how well the task was accomplished. In the scenario, we don't know that she went to the store with the purpose of sticking to a healthy diet and buying ingredients for a salad, but then quickly gave in to her craving for sweets and decided to bake and devour a large batch of her favorite high-calorie cookies, for which she realized that she needed to pick up some nutmeg and sugar. Without knowledge of her intentions, judging how well she performed her task is meaningless -- she did what we saw her do, therefore she appears to have accomplished her task rather than having abandoned it, and therefore only a positive appraisal is possible."

 

Do you understand yet, Tony? No? Well, here's more, please read it carefully:

"If a person wishes to claim that he has objectively identified the 'artist's theme,' then he has to verify that the artist has communicated his intended meaning. If we set out to judge how well an artist has projected his vision, we have to know which vision he intended to project.

"Let's say that an artist wants to present mankind as heroic, but he's somewhat lacking in skill, and the figures that he paints look distorted, which makes us interpret them as sickly and unhappy, among other negative things. If we don't know the artist's intentions, our interpretation of 'his theme' is likely to be that mankind is doomed to be sickly and unhappy. Since we think that he projected that vision very effectively, we come to the conclusion that even though we don't like his vision of existence, strictly aesthetically speaking he has done a tremendous job of expressing his horrible view of mankind (as Rand said, one need not like or agree with a painting in order to judge it as aesthetically great).

"Well, the problem is that it's not his view of mankind, it's not 'his theme,' and he's obviously not the great artist that we've rated him to be. If we don't know his intentions via external means, we have no objective standard by which to decide if he failed or succeeded in presenting his theme."

 

On 1/2/2018 at 7:19 AM, anthony said:

The picture is the thing, and the only "thing" of importance to artist (and a serious contemplator of art). One has to assume that in the making of it, the artist *means it*. One assumes he is skillful enough to depict his view accurately. What he produces is what he importantly views life to be - or nothing, and he's just passing the time. Nobody can have it both ways, art to be unimportant when one wishes it to be, and supremely important when it suits one. So he should stand by his artwork with integrity and face *intellectual* criticism, valid or invalid. What you have indicated time and again is that an artwork is above that sort of criticism, by mere reason of it being "art".

**["Kant argued it was not the consequences of actions that make them right or wrong, but the motives of the person who carries out the action" . Wiki

"Nothing in the world -- indeed nothing even beyond the world -- can possibly be conceived which could be called good without qualification, except a *good will*". I. Kant.

Again, one can see the effects of this philosophy on modern times, promoting the surface ~appearance~ of "doing good" over substantial results - and rejection of a rational morality, acting for one's own 'good'. With his causal reversal, the outcome doesn't matter much, it only matters what you intended to do, and so one need not take responsibility for anything, one's artworks included. 

I bring in Kant again because it's his philosophy which you show is your preference. (Like now, e.g. intentions).You are not going to mix oil and water, i.e., applying the one philosophy of art to a radically different one. I've said I think you have a fruitless endeavor].

You're doing your kooky nonsense babbling thing again. In the above, you're forgetting, or maybe evading, the fact that Rand requires identification of the "artist's theme." She insisted that art must convey the artist's intentions! Rand, not Kant! Pay attention. She insisted that we identify the artist's view. She stated that we must identify his theme, his meaning, his view of existence. She stated that his art must communicate, and that if it doesn't do so, then it ceases to be art.

The evidence in a work of art usually supports many different possible interpretations. Take any ten Rand acolytes, show them a work of art, and each will have a different interpretation, and will insist that his is the one true objective identification of the art work's real meaning. So, when you and nine other of her nutty followers say what you think an artwork means, all of those differing nutty interpretations can't be the "artist's theme."

Understand yet?

On 1/2/2018 at 7:19 AM, anthony said:

In the final analysis, art is *personal*, for the individual, at times an aid to his conceptual integration, at times, for his existential affirmation and at times, his enjoyment - contra the anti-individual, mystical, anti-reason, authoritarian art-climate we know, generally; also an Objectivist hasn't any need of "proof" for existents which he directly sees in reality (and in man-made reality)and how he thinks about them. The point being that he knows he has to identify, think about and judge all existents, since his mind and life depends on it, and if he judges something artistic, wrongly-- well, so what - to any others? He can often correct self-contradictions, else has to take the responsibility himself.

You're still not getting the challenge. You're not being asked to prove that you see a painting, or that you see and identify likenesses of objects in a painting. You're being challenged to objectively prove that anyone has ever identified an "artist's theme" in any alleged work of art while relying only on the content of the work and being denied access to any outside considerations. Words mean things. The words "artist's theme" mean the artist's actual theme, and not the theme that popped into Tony's head when looking at a work of art, and that Tony has therefore decided to assign to the artist.

Rand said that "all art is communication." To communicate is to convey a specific intended message from one person to another. It is not the act of merely inspiring someone to have a "personal" interpretation which differs from the initiator's intended message. Nothing qualifies as art by Objectivism's criteria until a work in question has been objectively shown to communicate the artist's actual theme.

That has not yet been shown to have happened in the entire history of mankind. Tony's asserting that he has identified the "artists' themes" in paintings, while insisting that we don't actually have to verify that they are indeed the artists' themes, is retarded nonsense.

J

[anthony]

4 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Damn, you're clutter-brained!

An objective evaluation of any human action requires knowledge of what the actor intended to accomplish.

I've given several examples in the past:

"If one wanted to objectively judge, say, a NASA mission, it wouldn't be enough to marvel at the technology, power, motion and structural features displayed. One would have read the mission plan to discover if the events that were witnessed had achieved the goal."

"A worker installs pipes on the ceiling of a chemical factory and then turns on a faucet, and the pipes spray water from what appear to us to be random seams. How well did he perform the task? Were the pipes supposed to spray water, or did he fail to connect all of them properly?"

"Say that you're observing a woman who decides to go out and try to accomplish a specific task. She doesn't tell you what she's planning on doing or why -- you have no 'outside considerations' by which to judge her actions. She crosses the street and enters a grocery store. She walks through a couple of aisles, picks up a jar of nutmeg and a bag of sugar, and then purchases them. What's your objective evaluation of her mission? Has she succeeded?"

"I gave the example of trying to identify a woman's task by watching her buying items in a store, and then trying to evaluate how well the task was accomplished. In the scenario, we don't know that she went to the store with the purpose of sticking to a healthy diet and buying ingredients for a salad, but then quickly gave in to her craving for sweets and decided to bake and devour a large batch of her favorite high-calorie cookies, for which she realized that she needed to pick up some nutmeg and sugar. Without knowledge of her intentions, judging how well she performed her task is meaningless -- she did what we saw her do, therefore she appears to have accomplished her task rather than having abandoned it, and therefore only a positive appraisal is possible."

 

Do you understand yet, Tony? No? Well, here's more, please read it carefully:

"If a person wishes to claim that he has objectively identified the 'artist's theme,' then he has to verify that the artist has communicated his intended meaning. If we set out to judge how well an artist has projected his vision, we have to know which vision he intended to project.

"Let's say that an artist wants to present mankind as heroic, but he's somewhat lacking in skill, and the figures that he paints look distorted, which makes us interpret them as sickly and unhappy, among other negative things. If we don't know the artist's intentions, our interpretation of 'his theme' is likely to be that mankind is doomed to be sickly and unhappy. Since we think that he projected that vision very effectively, we come to the conclusion that even though we don't like his vision of existence, strictly aesthetically speaking he has done a tremendous job of expressing his horrible view of mankind (as Rand said, one need not like or agree with a painting in order to judge it as aesthetically great).

"Well, the problem is that it's not his view of mankind, it's not 'his theme,' and he's obviously not the great artist that we've rated him to be. If we don't know his intentions via external means, we have no objective standard by which to decide if he failed or succeeded in presenting his theme."

 

You're doing your kooky nonsense babbling thing again. In the above, you're forgetting, or maybe evading, the fact that Rand requires identification of the "artist's theme." She insisted that art must convey the artist's intentions! Rand, not Kant! Pay attention. She insisted that we identify the artist's view. She stated that we must identify his theme, his meaning, his view of existence. She stated that his art must communicate, and that if it doesn't do so, then it ceases to be art.

The evidence in a work of art usually supports many different possible interpretations. Take any ten Rand acolytes, show them a work of art, and each will have a different interpretation, and will insist that his is the one true objective identification of the art work's real meaning. So, when you and nine other of her nutty followers say what they think an artwork means, all of those differing nutty interpretations can be the "artist's theme."

Understand yet?

You're still not getting the challenge. You're not being asked to prove that you see a painting, or that you see and identify likenesses of objects in a painting. You're being challenged to objectively prove that anyone has ever identified an "artist's theme" in any alleged work of art while relying only on the content of the work and being denied access to any outside considerations. Words mean things. The words "artist's theme" mean the artist's actual theme, and not the theme that popped into Tony's head when looking at a work of art, and that Tony has therefore decided to assign to the artist.

Rand said that "all art is communication." To communicate is to convey a specific intended message from one person to another. It is not the act of merely inspiring someone to have a "personal" interpretation which differs from the initiator's intended message. Nothing qualifies as art by Objectivism's criteria until a work in question has been objectively shown to communicate the artist's actual theme.

That has not yet been shown to have happened in the entire history of mankind. Tony's asserting that he has identified the "artists' themes" in paintings, while insisting that we don't actually have to verify that they are indeed the artists' themes, is retarded nonsense.

J

 

"She insisted that art must convey the artist's intentions!".

"Rand said that "all art is communication"".

I'd like to see the actual quotes about "communication" and "intentions". You have a record of mixing up Rand's ideas in your interpretations.

There's one place we read of "message", but you'll note message is not primary :

"The basic purpose of art is *not* to teach, but to *show*--to hold up to man a concretized image of his nature and his place in the universe". [...]

"Any metaphysical issue will necessarily have an enormous influence on man's conduct, and therefore, on his ethics; and since every art work has a theme, it will necessarily convey some conclusion, some "message' to its audience. But that influence and that "message" are only secondary consequences. *Art is not the means to any didactic end*."p.22

See it? "Communication" is of a didactic nature also, and secondary, whereas art "shows" (not 'tells').

Art has to be "intelligible", yes. "There is no place for the unknowable, the unintelligible, the undefinable, the non-objective in any human product". p.78 

 And - "WE" "don't have to verify" ... anything. Contemplating art isn't a collective effort. It is not empirical, testing for proof or consensus is superfluous. One makes the call after rigorous if not infallible examination and takes the personal consequences - as,  I have made thematic calls of specific paintings that are open to anybody's thoughtful disagreement and counter-identifications, which you choose never to do.What you've made plain you resented from the start, is of art and artist being assessed - in anything: from themes to "sense of life" - because art must stay mysterious and criticizing art remain the preserve of experts, with the relevant education and knowledge of art history. There's your animus to Objectivist aesthetics. Anyone can learn and become confident to evaluate for himself, with no intermediary. Authority figures have trouble with that.

To all your anecdotes, the same reply. An action is done with purpose towards a goal, by a rational person - with ability. But one cannot see his purpose (and "intention"). One sees the end result. If a painter is that inept, rarely, that nothing in his picture is intelligible, or so bad and improbably that he self-defeats his theme - whose fault is that? Only his. Which is "proof" itself of not knowing nor having to arbitrarily guess, anyone's intentions, and that they are of secondary consequence. Many, if not most, pictures are aesthetically very pleasing and technically excellent but also represent a poor value-judgment of existence. Sometimes, that is reversed.

The theme of an artwork displays the artist's final goal and intention, and that, one can identify by his subject choice and his treatment of it(style).. (Without being a mind reader or waiting on 'expert' opinion). What exists is the result of an individual artist's choices, and which could have gone another thousand ways (you must know).

[Jonathan]

Oh, and another thing that I forgot to mention in my last post is your tendency to just outright ignore parts of the challenge, such as Rand's requirement that the artist's theme/abstract meaning must be identified via only the content of the art and not via outside considerations. Heh. Your response is to go online and find and post paragraphs of detailed outside considerations, and then state that you just disregarded them. Heh. Imagine if I were to do the same with information about abstract paintings while claiming to have succeeded in identifying artists' themes via only the art!

Um, a truly objective demonstration would not be ditzy Tony self-reporting what he believes he has accomplished while ignoring almost all of the terms and conditions of the challenge, but of independent, unbiased researchers in a scientifically controlled environment conducting double blind experiments on individuals whom they don't know and who have not been allowed any previous acces to the works of art in question or to any information about them (no outside considerations).

In other words, an objective demonstration would be exactly what Tony proposes as the means and standard that should be applied to abstract paintings! It's also the same method that other Rand followers suggest when the topic is abstract art.

See, Tony, it's really not as hard to understand as you're trying to make it. I've simply taken your own suggestions and challenges regarding testing abstract art, and applied them equally to all alleged works of art! I've called your bluff.

[Jonathan]

13 hours ago, anthony said:

And - "WE" "don't have to verify" ... anything. Contemplating art isn't a collective effort. It is not empirical, testing for proof or consensus is superfluous.

then why do you propose empirically tested proof or consensus when in comes to abstract art? Why the double standard? I'm following your suggested method. Why are you fighting so hard against it now that I've turned the tables? Why are you so upset about your own proposed tests?

13 hours ago, anthony said:

One makes the call after rigorous if not infallible examination and takes the personal consequences - as,  I have made thematic calls of specific paintings that are open to anybody's thoughtful disagreement and counter-identifications...

That's exactly what I've done with abstract paintings, but then you demand that I prove, with double blind empirical experiments, that my interpretations match the artists' intended meanings! Even though I clearly explain how the evidence contained in the works has informed my interpretations, you say that that's not enough. I point to readily identifiable physical attributes in the works, such the colors of heat and intensity, rough textures, and upward-reaching angles, and you then just arbitrarily assert that it is the height of absurdity for me to conclude that those features, along with others, add up to bold, rugged masculinity and a heroic sense of life. You even admit that you and anyone else can see those features! But you say that they can't mean anything! Yeah, your position is that rugged textures can't convey ruggedness, and that heat and intensity can't convey an energetic state. Your mindset is double standards and pigheadedness.

 

13 hours ago, anthony said:

One makes the call after rigorous if not infallible examination...

The key words there are "not infallible." Miscommunication is a very common experience in human existence. Which is why something as unreliable as a non-verbal art form must be verified by verbal means outside of the art work before it can qualify as art by Rand's criteria, and by Tony's. Tony us absolutely correct in his demands, from months ago, that art must by scientifically double blind tested to see if viewers can identify artists' intended themes/meanings while being denied access to all outside considerations.

[anthony]

3 hours ago, Jonathan said:

Oh, and another thing that I forgot to mention in my last post is your tendency to just outright ignore parts of the challenge, such as Rand's requirement that the artist's theme/abstract meaning must be identified via only the content of the art and not via outside considerations. Heh. Your response is to go online and find and post paragraphs of detailed outside considerations, and then state that you just disregarded them. Heh. Imagine if I were to do the same with information about abstract paintings while claiming to have succeeded in identifying artists' themes via only the art!

Um, a truly objective demonstration would not be ditzy Tony self-reporting what he believes he has accomplished while ignoring almost all of the terms and conditions of the challenge, but of independent, unbiased researchers in a scientifically controlled environment conducting double blind experiments on individuals whom they don't know and who have not been allowed any previous acces to the works of art in question or to any information about them (outside consideration).

In other words, an objective demonstration would be exactly what Tony proposes as the means and standard that should be applied to abstract paintings! It's also the same method that other Rand followers suggest when the topic is abstract art.

See, Tony, it's really not as hard to understand as you're trying to make it. I've simply taken your own suggestions and challenges regarding testing abstract art, and applied them equally to all alleged works of art! I've called your bluff.

An absolute fabrication. Look it up. If you'd bother to read with an unbiased eye my evaluation of Turner's painting, you would find not a single thing I garnered from outside sources. I described it as one sees it, in complete isolation of extraneous information. I made no mention of an "army", what those human figures were attempting to do and why, nor where they were. Funny, but it was you who raised 'a narrative', transcending "Hannibal's army in the Alps" to its later safety after the storm, then victory, etc. thereby imagining what is NOT there  - outside the scope of the painting.

In other words, you must believe that a picture is a part of a plot-theme, as defined by its title. Like a novel. Strange, for an artist. Explains why you have often crossed genres here. There is a reminder (switch off, here) of how common it is for people to "believe" what they see in artificial imagery, unquestioningly, particularly if "words" are superimposed. They naively think there's literal truth in fiction, (movies, etc.)and equally, fiction in any facts. In the end many have lost the ability to distinguish 'given' fact from man-made fiction/art, and that means reality is severely compromised for them.

Proven then, this dangerous fallacy and subjectivity begins with and is fostered by art as it has been lately, and by art-intellectuals.

(And I added as an afterthought, that Turner has a similar recurring theme through many other works. His sense of life and life-view stays very constantly "bleak". Of course, this is relevant to one's knowledge, on another level  -- but separate to assessing the one painting alone).

[anthony]

J. One last time. 1. An empirical test (of objectivity!) is what you have nagged for. 2. I kept saying scientific validation was contradictory nonsense, in the case of perceiving art, objectively. You kept insisting. 3. I eventually turned the 'testing' around to you. So, I said - 4. Go ahead: "Prove the meaning" of abstract art pieces, with a controlled, double-blind experiment etc. according to the ~'empirical'~ standards you demand.

5. You have not. It would fail if you tried. 6. You know that.

[Jonathan]

1 hour ago, anthony said:

An absolute fabrication. Look it up. If you'd bother to read with an unbiased eye my evaluation of Turner's painting, you would find nothing I garnered from outside sources.

You've missed the point, which is merely that your self-reporting of your success in identifying an artist's theme while tainting yourself with outside considerations doesn't follow the scientific method that you yourself proposed. Rather than seeking to address the challenge, you went off and did other things while stating that you had successfully taken up the challenge and beaten it. In some ways, you did the opposite of the challenge. You're doing everything but following the terms and conditions, and then claiming that you succeeded.

It doesn't matter whether or not you think that you didn't garner anything from outside sources. The entire idea is to avoid them, not to expose yourself to as many as possible and then claim that you ignored and disregarded what you read.

The idea isn't to immediately taint the experiment, pretend to test yourself while ignoring the procedure, eliminate falsifiability, and then declare success.

You're trying way too hard to not understand the method that you yourself proposed.

 

1 hour ago, anthony said:

Funny, but it was you who raised 'a narrative', extending "Hannibal's army in the Alps" to its further safety and victory, etc. thereby imagining what is NOT there  - outside the scope of the painting. In other words, you must believe that a picture is a part of a plot-theme, as defined by its title. Like a novel. Strange, for an artist. Explains why you have often crossed genres here. There is a reminder of how common it is for people to "believe" what they see, unquestioningly, particularly if "words" are added. They naively think there's truth in fiction, (movies, etc.)and fiction in facts. In the end many have lost the ability to distinguish 'given' fact from man made fiction and art, that means reality is lost to them.

Proven then, this dangerous fallacy begins with and is fostered by art, as it has been lately.

(I added as an afterthought, that Turner has a similar recurring theme through many other works. His sense of life and life-view stays very constant. Of course, this is relevant to one's knowledge, on another level  -- but separate to assessing the one painting alone).

Yeah, in the above you're back to assigning me positions that I don't take, and willfully not grasping the idea that I haven't been advocating a method of generally viewing art, but instead am focused on applying your and Rand's (and Kamhi's, etc.) criteria equally to all art, and not just to abstract painting. After viewing a work of art, there are a few ways in which we might try to objectively determine if our interpretations of it match the artist's intentions -- determining if his work has succeeded in communicating his meaning. One such way would be to research whether or not he left behind any notes or interviews about what he intended the work to mean and to communicate. Another would be to explore the history of any events that we've discovered that he depicted, based on his choice of title.

Understand? No? Well, keep not trying!

[Jonathan]

1 hour ago, anthony said:

One last time. 1. An empirical test (of objectivity!) is what you have nagged for. 2. I kept saying scientific validation was contradictory nonsense, in the case of perceiving art, objectively. You kept insisting. 3. I eventually turned the 'testing' round on you. So, I said - 4. Go ahead: "Prove the meaning" of abstract art pieces, with a controlled, double-blind experiment etc. according to the ~'empirical'~ standards you demand.

You're outright lying in the above.

Here's the post where you made the proposal of empirical testing:

Here's the relevant section:

"For one to claim that a blurred hodgepodge image can be 'seen' by the educated and sensitive viewer, is doubtful. She may sincerely 'believe she knows'; she may be 'cheating' from what she's heard or read by the artist himself and his visual intentions in a specific painting; she may be dippy. Who knows? To know better, this intuitive insight should be empirically tested in several double-blind experiments, using unknown artworks by unknown artists. Claimants would state what they 'see', against the artist's testimony of what he 'meant', or at least what he was feeling at the time. (If he meant anything beyond a nice design)."

You were not responding to me, but to William. You were not adopting someone else's methods and standards, but proposing your own, and advocating for them. So, stop lying. 

1 hour ago, anthony said:

5. You have not. It would fail if you tried. 6. You know that.

Actually, I've seen fans of abstract art do much better at identifying artists' meanings in abstract paintings than Objectivists have done at identifying artists' meanings in representational realist paintings.

But, anyway, you need to make up your mind, and apply whichever standard and method that you finally settle on to all alleged works of art equally.

Do you want to require that art must communicate artists' intended meanings, and that the proof of it must be double blind experiments using "unknown artworks by unknown artists," and "claimants would state what they see, against the artist's testimony of what he 'meant'"?

Or do you want to go with the method that you proposed in which you look at a work of art and then state that you know the artist's intended meaning, and that there's no need to then verify that your interpretation matches the artist's intentions by comparing your view to the artist's testimony?

Which is it? One or the other. If you choose the first, then, fine, I will concede that, to my knowledge, no abstract work has ever been so tested, but then neither has any representational realist work. Nothing yet qualifies as art according to the first option.

As for the second, if you get to look at a painting and assign it an "artist's meaning," then I get to do the same with abstract paintings -- there's no need to verify if my interpretation matches the abstract artist's intentions, just as you say that there is no need to verify your interpretation of the realist artist's intention.

Which would you rather have: Nothing qualifies as art, or abstract paintings are among the things that qualify as art?

Clearly, you'd rather have nothing qualify as art.

[anthony]

1 hour ago, Jonathan said:

You've missed the point, which is merely that your self-reporting of your success in identifying an artist's theme while tainting yourself with outside considerations doesn't follow the scientific method that you yourself proposed. Rather than seeking to address the challenge, you went off and did other things while stating that you had successfully taken up the challenge and beaten it. In some ways, you did the opposite of the challenge. You're doing everything but following the terms and conditions, and then claiming that you succeeded.

It doesn't matter whether or not you think that you didn't garner anything from outside sources. The entire idea is to avoid them, not to expose yourself to as many as possible and then claim that you ignored and disregarded what you read.

The idea isn't to immediately taint the experiment, pretend to test yourself while ignoring the procedure, eliminating falsifiability, and then declare success.

 

1

"Taint the experiment". 

I "proposed" no "scientific method" for objectivity. I reject the notion!

I said - effectively - that's your 'thing': you like it, you try it (on abstract art). The objective "procedure" - from senses on, has been regularly explained in this thread. 

"The entire idea is to avoid them..." [outside sources]. No, it is not the idea. (I put this down to innocent misunderstanding and your empirical bent).

One cannot go along in life avoiding outside information about xyz, until comes the moment you choose to/need to address and evaluate xyz. What do you do? Disqualify yourself from judgment because you have foreknowledge about xyz? Crazy.

Instead, if and when one does choose to do so, one has to be able to mentally "isolate" an existent from possibly erroneous "known information" in order to identify and integrate it, independent of prior knowledge.

E.g. Let's say I've been hearing a lot about a girl I never met who's a friend of a friend. That is, other's hearsay. When I finally meet her, I isolate (temporarily separate)everything I heard previously (except the simple facts about her) in order to make my own independent observation, perceptions, character assessment and so on. After which one can compare the friend's previous information about the girl with one's evaluations and see if there are contradictions.

I knew a little about Turner, mostly forgotten, and had seen the picture before. You'll have to take my word that now, I was able to cut out anything I knew extraneous to the image itself, and freshly see its subject, contents, stylization, technique, value-judgment, emotions and so on and assess it fully, for the first time.

[anthony]

1 hour ago, Jonathan said:

You're outright lying in the above.

Here's the post where you made the proposal of empirical testing:

Here's the relevant section:

"For one to claim that a blurred hodgepodge image can be 'seen' by the educated and sensitive viewer, is doubtful. She may sincerely 'believe she knows'; she may be 'cheating' from what she's heard or read by the artist himself and his visual intentions in a specific painting; she may be dippy. Who knows? To know better, this intuitive insight should be empirically tested in several double-blind experiments, using unknown artworks by unknown artists. Claimants would state what they 'see', against the artist's testimony of what he 'meant', or at least what he was feeling at the time. (If he meant anything beyond a nice design)."

You were not responding to me, but to William. You were not adopting someone else's methods and standards, but proposing your own, and advocating for them. So, stop lying. 

 

.

 

DID you notice I was discussing 'abstract art' - and only 'abstract art'? What in hell do you think I meant by "blurred hodgepodge image" (and what followed)?

Claimants who "perceive" intelligibility in unintelligible art forms, should, indeed, prove their claims, or keep silent. The onus is on those who make irrational, indefensible claims. I would dearly like to see them put to the scientific test.

In the meantime, objectivity needs no scientific "proof". A contradiction in terms.

You got it wrong, are scraping the barrel to find an argument and owe me an apology. 

[BaalChatzaf]

10 minutes ago, anthony said:

DID you notice I was discussing 'abstract art' - and only 'abstract art'? What in hell do you think I meant by "blurred hodgepodge image" (and what followed)?

Claimants who "perceive" intelligibility in unintelligible art forms, should, indeed, prove their claims, or keep silent. The onus is on those who make irrational, indefensible claims. I would dearly like to see them put to the scientific test.

In the meantime, objectivity needs no scientific "proof". A contradiction in terms.

You got it wrong, are scraping the barrel to find an argument and owe me an apology. 

There is no scientific test for intelligibility in art.