Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'On Motion', 'Aesthetica' and 'An Ontology of Art'

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5 ideas

21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 1. Aesthetics

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'.

21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 2. Art as Form

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.

21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 7. Ontology of Art

20444	If paintings could be perfectly duplicated, it would be a multiple art form [Currie, by Bacharach]
	Full Idea: Currie claims that, in principle, all art forms are multiple. A superxerox machine, duplicating a painting molecule by molecule, would show that paintings are singular only contingently.
	From: report of Gregory Currie (An Ontology of Art [1988]) by Sondra Bacharach - Arthur C. Danto 3
	A reaction: This strikes me as correct. An original painting would then have the same status as the manuscript of a poem, giving it an authority, and being moving by its personal contact with the artist. But worth far less than current original paintings.

22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / b. Types of good

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.

27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / a. Special relativity

12709	Motion is not absolute, but consists in relation [Leibniz]
	Full Idea: In reality motion is not something absolute, but consists in relation.
	From: Gottfried Leibniz (On Motion [1677], A6.4.1968), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3
	A reaction: It is often thought that motion being relative was invented by Einstein, but Leibniz wholeheartedly embraced 'Galilean relativity', and refused to even consider any absolute concept of motion. Acceleration is a bit trickier than velocity.