5 ideas
| 8130 | Qualities of experience are just representational aspects of experience ('Representationalism') [Harman, by Burge] |
| Full Idea: Harman defended what came to be known as 'representationalism' - the view that qualitative aspects of experience are nothing other than representational aspects. | |
| From: report of Gilbert Harman (The Intrinsic Quality of Experience [1990]) by Tyler Burge - Philosophy of Mind: 1950-2000 p.459 | |
| A reaction: Functionalists like Harman have a fairly intractable problem with the qualities of experience, and this may be clutching at straws. What does 'represent' mean? How is the representation achieved? Why that particular quale? |
| 8063 | Baumgarten founded aesthetics in 1750 [Baumgarten, by Tolstoy] |
| Full Idea: Baumgarten founded aesthetics in the year 1750. | |
| From: report of Alexander Baumgarten (Aesthetica [1739]) by Leo Tolstoy - What is Art? Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: He gave it a label, separated it off from the rest of philosophy, and made taste the main focus. The philosophy of art goes back to at least Plato's 'Republic' and 'Symposium'. |
| 8118 | Beauty is an order between parts, and in relation to the whole [Baumgarten, by Tolstoy] |
| Full Idea: Beauty is defined by Baumgarten as a correspondence, that is, an order of parts in their mutual relations to each other and in their relation to the whole. | |
| From: report of Alexander Baumgarten (Aesthetica [1739]) by Leo Tolstoy - What is Art? Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: This may be one aspect of what is beautiful, but rather more than a nice arrangement is probably needed for art. We must distinguish flower arranging from poetic drama. Some masterpieces are rather messily arranged. |
| 4375 | Evaluations are not disguised emotions; instead, emotion is a type of evaluation [Achtenberg] |
| Full Idea: The emotivist gets things backwards: evaluations are not disguised emotions; instead, emotions are types of evaluation. | |
| From: Deborah Achtenberg (Cognition of Value in Aristotle's Ethics [2002], 6.1) | |
| A reaction: A nice comment, though a bit optimistic. It is certainly a valuable corrective to emotivist to pin down the cognitive and evaluative aspects of emotion, rather than regarding them as 'raw' feelings. |
| 8117 | Perfection comes through the senses (Beauty), through reason (Truth), and through moral will (Good) [Baumgarten, by Tolstoy] |
| Full Idea: For Baumgarten, Beauty is the Perfect (the Absolute), recognised through the senses; Truth is the Perfect perceived through reason; Goodness is the Perfect reached by moral will. | |
| From: report of Alexander Baumgarten (Aesthetica [1739]) by Leo Tolstoy - What is Art? Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: At last, after many years of searching, I have found the origin of that great trio of ideals: Beauty, Goodness and Truth. Tolstoy sneers at them, but a person could do a lot worse than spending their lives trying to promote them. |