CAN WE REALLY TALK ABOUT BEAUTY?
(First, a necessary Preamble. Bear with me, please.)
In my 73 years, I’ve had a writing goal:
“Understand the differences and distinctions of words.”
I am a writer.
I can’t write without words.
It becomes necessary for me to understand words in order to write effectively.
Unless I truly distinguish what I say and think accurately when using words,
- I am just making sounds that tickle the fancy.
What can we agree about words?
Some words describe real things. (Horse, dog, people).
Other words describe feelings about non-things. (Truth, Beauty, Courage.)
Still, other words create imaginary worlds in which deuces are wild.
Mixing those three very different categories leads to CONFLATION of “meaning.”
Define Conflation: Conflation is the merging of two or more sets of information, texts, ideas, opinions, etc., into one, often in error.
Mixing categories leads to Fallacy in our discussions.
Define Fallacy: “A fallacy is the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning, or "wrong moves" in the construction of an argument. A fallacious argument may be deceptive by appearing to be better than it really is.”
We don’t want to contradict ourselves by writing errors, confusing readers, misleading people with vagueness and empty opinions. Of course not!
But - (this is vitally important) if the speaker or writer doesn’t realize conflation has happened - the writer is bloviating and misleading others - especially if the writer has talent and skill or credibility otherwise.
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This brings us to why the tool and skill of Logic was invented in the first place.
LOGIC: the art of non-contradiction
We don’t have to be stuffy to be logical.
We just need to exercise care and precision as a matter of deliberate habit.
True Statements do not contradict reality.
If we give an opinion, we should fly that flag outright.
A careful writer who understands what he writes and avoids conflation, illogic, and fallacy does no damage to the thinking of the reader.
A confused and indoctrinated writer is dangerous at worst, persuasive and misdirecting at least.
End of Preamble (whew!)
Sorry about all that. It was absolutely necessary, however.
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Finally, CAN WE TALK ABOUT BEAUTY (without confusion)?
I wish to write accurately by distinguishing my thoughts from my feelings.
Let’s go!
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May I begin a discussion of BEAUTY by referencing the human face?
Every person with eyesight has an opinion about the human face - whether a particular face is ugly / beautiful or in-between. Agreed?
In a beauty contest, the Judges determine by vote who IS and who is NOT. (Winner).
Aha!
We are onto something!
A Comedian who doesn’t make people laugh is being JUDGED by his audience.
He isn’t funny until he makes them laugh. The practical test exemplified.
Careful! Be cautious before you say, ‘Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder.”
This can only mean no standard is possible except by consensus.
A different set of judges, a different audience, a different Critic often arrive at startlingly
contrary pronouncements.
What yesterday’s Experts declared to be GREAT - may be decried by today’s Experts.
What then?
Take a deep breath. This gets deep.
Ready?
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PLATO (428 B.C.)
The Philosopher Plato was very, very influential for thousands of years (even today)
Plato’s influence, like parasites in drinking water, has infected everybody who drank.
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What did Plato teach?
Plato's Theory asserts that the physical realm is only a shadow, or image, of the true reality.
Meaning?
The abstract, perfect, unchanging concepts or ideals that transcend time and space
TRANSCEND everyday contact with objects.
(*see below for an even more boring exploration)
So what?
Follow this trail of breadcrumbs with me …
Plato was Greek. He was the teacher of Aristotle.
Aristotle was the tutor of Alexander.
Alexander the Great (the greatest Greek!) conquered the world
taking Aristotle/Plato’s ideas to Jews and the Jew’s religious writings absorbed them.
New Testament Jews writing about Jesus founded the Neo-Platonic Greek view into Jesus’ and Paul’s teachings, concept-wise.
You may balk at this!
You may be offended by this. Or you may shrug it off.
Doesn’t matter. The evidence is there in text.
PLATO ruined objectivity by conflating it with Subjectivity.
Western Judeo-Christian minds had (unaware) accepted PLATO’s view - which is conceptually self-contradictory.
The consequence is HUGE!
Our greatest teachers, thinkers, religious writers CONFUSE non-reality with reality and inject immaterial “spirit” into concrete things - all the while insisting (Plato would be delighted) the physical realm is only a shadow, or image, of the true reality.
Particularly interesting to me is the language of Colossians 2:17, which reads:
“These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.”
This language of “shadow” (σκιὰ) and “substance” (σῶμα) mirrors the precise language used by Platonists (and later, neo-Platonists) to describe the human condition, imbued in shadows and seeking the true substance that can only be revealed by the enlightened.
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Where would Paul / Saul of Tarsus, absorb Neo-Platonic thinking?
The Apostle Paul was born in Tarsus.
The undefeated Grecian military leader Alexander the Great traveled through Tarsus with his massive army in 333 B.C.
Tarsus was a “free-city” without Roman interference.
It was well-known for its culture of Greek philosophy, literature and wealth. Its schools of learning rivaled and excelled even those found in Athens and Alexandria. Around 171 B.C. the city's library held 200,000 books, including a huge collection of Plato and Aristotle’s works.
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BUT WAIT!
What does this have to do with BEAUTY?
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ART
ART may carry with it the exact intentions of the Artist - but - without the Viewer
Who agrees, the Critic who nods, the collector who buys, and the AGREEMENT of those who write - where is the BEAUTY?
To argue that BEAUTY is “there” (Art for Art’s sake) echoes Plato.
"Art for art's sake" is the usual English rendering of a French slogan from the early 19th century, "l'art pour l'art", and expresses a philosophy that the intrinsic value of art, and the only "true" art, is divorced from any didactic, moral, politic, or utilitarian function.
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FINE ART
Certain phrases in German or French that are used to categorize the works of art that in English are called works of fine art. In German the phrase is schone kunst; in French is beaux arts. Where, then, does the phrase "fine art" come from? |
Works of fine art are final in the sense that they are not to be used as means to ends beyond themselves, but rather to be enjoyed as ends in themselves. |
(*Hebrews 8-10 Plato’s Allegory of the Cave)
According to Plato’s “Theory of Forms” non-material ideas have a more fundamental reality than objects available to our senses. The idea of the chair is more real than the chair itself. You might even say that the physical chair is a “copy” of the idea of the chair.
This philosophy is illustrated in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.”
In the allegory, prisoners are chained in a cave, forced to look at a blank wall.
Enough light shines into the cave to show shadows of the world outside the cave.
These “shadows” are the only experience of reality that the prisoners have.
In the allegory, the philosopher is the prisoner who escapes the cave to gain access to the real world, that is, the world of ideas.
They can then return to the other prisoners and free them, allowing them to see the world as it really is, not just as it is perceived by their senses.
The goal of the Greek philosopher was to understand the universals in the world of particulars.
The Jewish philosopher Philo harmonized Jewish and Greek philosophy, applying the concept of forms, ideas, and allegories to Old Testament text and his exegetical method (the way he interpreted the Bible) was fundamental to some of the early church fathers.
How influential was Philo? Could his philosophy have impacted any of the Biblical writers?
This question comes to bear on Hebrews 8 – 10. In it, the writer says “[The priests] serve at a sanctuary that is a copy and shadow of what is in heaven. This is why Moses was warned when he was about to build the tabernacle: ‘See to it that you make everything according to the pattern seen on the mountain” (8:5). He also says “When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not part of this creation” (9:11). And again, “It was necessary for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these sacrifices, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a man-made sanctuary that was only a copy of the true one, but he entered heaven itself, now to appear before us in God’s presence” (9:23-24).
So how did the writer of Hebrews use the language of “copy,” “shadow,” “true,” and “heavenly?” Was he making a distinction between the physical world of particulars and the more enduring realities of ideas?
PLATO had unduly influenced the intellect of the writer. Otherwise, we must accept that Plato’s guesswork was equally inspired by God four hundred years before Christ.
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All of the above amounts to a Philosophical discussion of implications
in language, thought and - cough cough - meaning when combined with Religion.