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Full Idea
The experience of natural beauty is not a sense of 'how nice!' or 'how pleasant!' It contains a reassurance that this world is a right and fitting place to be - a home in which our human powers and prospects find confirmation.
Gist of Idea
Natural beauty reassures us that the world is where we belong
Source
Roger Scruton (Beauty: a very short introduction [2011], 2)
Book Ref
Scruton,Roger: 'Beauty: A Very Short Introduction' [OUP 2011], p.55
A Reaction
To call it a 'reassurance' and 'confirmation' sounds like theism, anthropomorphism, or the pathetic fallacy. That said, this is certainly a heart-warming idea, and hence must contain a grain of truth.
| 18543 | Do aesthetic reasons count as reasons, if they are rejectable without contradiction? [Scruton] |
| 18542 | Defining truth presupposes that there can be a true definition [Scruton] |
| 18546 | The pleasure taken in beauty also aims at understanding and valuing [Scruton] |
| 18544 | Maybe 'beauty' is too loaded, and we should talk of fittingness or harmony [Scruton] |
| 18541 | Beauty (unlike truth and goodness) is questionable as an ultimate value [Scruton] |
| 18548 | Natural beauty reassures us that the world is where we belong [Scruton] |
| 18551 | Croce says art makes inarticulate intuitions conscious; rival views say the audience is the main concern [Scruton] |
| 18550 | Art gives us imaginary worlds which we can view impartially [Scruton] |
| 18553 | Beauty shows us what we should want in order to achieve human fulfilment [Scruton] |
| 18554 | Prostitution is wrong because it hardens the soul, since soul and body are one [Scruton] |
| 18556 | Beauty is rationally founded, inviting meaning, comparison and self-reflection [Scruton] |