Philosophy Stack Exchange
Philosophy Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [aesthetics]

Aesthetics is the study of the beautiful. It is one of the classical sub-disciplines of philosophy.

Aesthetics studies the creation and analysis of beauty and taste. It poses questions about the existence and nature of artistic expression, and evaluates different strategies for appreciating or generating beauty. Aesthetics is one of the classical sub-disciplines of philosophy alongside ethics, metaphysics and logic.

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Is it ever possible to objectively state that a piece of music or film, or a genre, is better, or more artistically valid than another?

I first found Adorno and Horkheimer's critique of pop culture in the Culture Industry very compelling. Their idea that pop culture was factory produced and induced mindless consumerism as opposed to legitimate and challenging art seemed very…
Alexander S King
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Does postmodernism in art criticism collapse into relativism? What's its merit?

Postmodernism rejects the idea of a universal truth and in context of literary art criticism it shifts the focus from the writer or the author to the audience and from constant meaning to unstable one - but then, what tools of art criticism does it…
Luna
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What does the philosopher Bruno Latour mean when he claims that we have never been modern?

I am trying to read Bruno Latour's paper "A cautious Prometheus? A few steps towards philosophy of design" but have no background in philosophy and so would be happy if someone could help me out understanding some basics, beginning with the question…
Luna
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Are there objective criteria for aesthetic judgment?

Are there objective criteria for judging whether or not artworks are good art? Should we at times appeal to moral values in assessing the quality of artwork? What major approaches are there for the purpose of evaluation of art?
user18096
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Is the laughable person beautiful?

All of us when see a laughable comedy star, for example: a fatty actor having a laughable face, i.e: physically laughable whose appearance makes us smile or laugh, we feel happiness and joy. Does this mean that the laughable is beautiful?. I…
salah
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Why did Adorno hate the movies?

Adorno stated: Every visit to the cinema, despite the utmost watchfulness, leaves me dumber and worse than before. Minima Moralia 5
user6917
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Would sublime landscapes give Coleridge "humble feelings" or "sublime feelings"?

Lately I've been reading and rereading The Abolition of Man, by C. S. Lewis. He opens by discussing "the well-known story of Coleridge at the waterfall" and the way that an English textbook he was reviewing had (in his view) butchered the story. For…
Mr. Bultitude
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What does Danto mean when he writes that artworks are "embodied meanings"?

In his paper "The Art World Revisited" Arthur Danto writes: The thesis which emerged from my book The Transfiguration of the Commonplace is that works of art are symbolic expressions, and that they embody their meanings. The task of criticism is to…
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The aesthetic education of man; translation

Can anyone recommend a good translation of The Aesthetic Education of Man by Friedrich Schiller?
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Where should I start reading about aesthetics philosophy?

I am totally new to philosophy (actually studying engineering) but the philosophy of aesthetics fascinates me. Which books should I start reading to study about the way socio-economic factors influence the concept of beauty? I heard that Kant is one…
Just an Engineer
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Beauty: objective or subjective?

What makes so many philosophers believe beauty is objective?
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Does Danto's 'The Disenfranchisement of Art' (1984) imply that if anything can be an art then nothing is?

An ex friend claimed that if anything can be an art then nothing is, and cited the following passage as a proof: When art internalizes its own history, when it becomes self-conscious of its history as it has come to be in our time, so that its …
luke
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Philosophers who view Aesthetics as an application of other fields of Philosophy?

I'm not looking to have a debate on stackexchange about wether aesthetics is a branch in itself. However, I am looking for sources, or just recommendations of writers of aesthetics, who view Aesthetics as an application of other parts of Philosphy,…
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Why did not former epochs distinguish between 'art' and 'craft'?

Source: p. 18 Middle, Beauty: A Very Short Introduction (2011) by Roger Scruton. That said, we should recognize that the distinction between aesthetic and utilitarian interests is no more clear than the language used to define it. What exactly…
user8572
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Why did Bertrand Russell say "art is anarchic and resistant to organization?"

The following is a quote by Bertrand Russell: Unavoidably, although the Government favours art as much as it can, the atmosphere is one in which art cannot flourish, because art is anarchic and resistant to organization. Source: The Practice…
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