[analytic-borders] Aesthetics 15: Current Definitions
ggos...@aol.com
This summary is based mostly on an article by Stephen
Davies about contemporary efforts to define art. Novitz's
article is critical, but it rests on a doubtful assumption that
art has an essence that can be defined.
There are many sorts of definitions, but the one that
interests Davies is the "real" definition, which would specify a
set of properties each of which is _necessary_ for something
to be art and which, taken are a group, are also _sufficient_
for something's being art. A real definition of art characterizes
what art and only art has in common. This is the famous
necessary and sufficient definition.
To make a long story short, no one has come up with
a convincing necessary and sufficient definition of art.
The reason, according to Morris Weitz (a reader of
Wittgenstein) is that art works are united by a web of
family resemblances, not by the kind of essence sought by a
real definition. Davies finds this unconvincing, on the grounds
that it isn't that "art is undefinable but, rather, that the
defining properties are non-perceptible, relational ones."
(Davies doesn't seem to fully grasp Weitz's position. I
suppose that Davies isn't saying that the properties that
define art are nonperceptible -- that would be meaningless;
instead he must be saying that the properties that define
art might be relational and not something you can directly
see or touch.)
Modern functionalists argue that art is designed to serve a
purpose, often a pleasurable aesthetic experience, and art is
art if it achieves its goal. Modern proceduralists hold that
something becomes art if it is made by following the
proper method. The Artworld, a totality of all who make art
or care about art, sets the standards for what is art. The
problem here, Davies points out, is that there are different
Artworlds on different continents, and if you combine
them, they start to contradict one another.
"Historically reflexive definitions have this recursive
form: something is an art work only in the event it stands in
the appropriate relation to its artistic forebears." Art of the
present is defined in relation to art of the past. This tells us
little about the characteristics of art, so it fails as a real
definition (and the problem of how the first art became
art is unsolved).
Davies ends by agreeing that none of these approaches work.
His tentative answer is that we should combine them into
a hybrid that will produce a possible definition. (I don't think
so, for GIGO reasons.)
Best,
Gary
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John
> His tentative answer is that we should combine them into
> a hybrid that will produce a possible definition. (I don't think
> so, for GIGO reasons.)
>
That of course depends on what he means by combining them. If he
believes combining them would achieve a "real definition" then I
quite agree.
On the other hand, would not the family resemblance account of Weitz
also suggest that we must combine insights from inadequate
definitions?
A conjunction of definitions which themselves included too little
would include even less. A disjunction would produce the opposite
problem if the initial definitions being combined were themselves too
accomodating.
Then of course we have the problem of criterion, which is
particularly pressing in a matter like art where there is so much
disagreement to begin with.
ggos...@aol.com
In a message dated 8/7/03 10:46:39 PM, sceptic...@yahoo.com writes:
Gary wrote:
>> Davies ends by agreeing that none of these approaches work.
>> His tentative answer is that we should combine them into
>> a hybrid that will produce a possible definition. (I don't think
>> so, for GIGO reasons.)
>
scepticalwhimsy replied:
>That of course depends on what he means by combining them. If he
>believes combining them would achieve a "real definition" then I
>quite agree.
I don't follow, not knowing why you have taken this
position. If Davies could have produced a "real" (necessary and
sufficient) definition by combining things, wouldn't he would
have done so?
John added:
>On the other hand, would not the family resemblance account of Weitz
>also suggest that we must combine insights from inadequate
>definitions?
Right. Davies objected to this approach to finding a definition.
But Weitz (I haven't actually read his paper) was probably not
attempting a definition. Morris Weitz was a Wittgensteinian, and I
assume he was attempting to deepen insights into the many
ways we use the term "art," not defining the term.
Thanks. Interesting comments.
Gary
What a beautiful thought I am thinking
concerning a great speckled bird. . . .
-- from "The Great Speckled Bird"
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John
point, i.e. that a combination would be no more likely to yield a
necessary and sufficient condition than any of the proposed
definitions by themselves.
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ggos...@aol.com
In a message dated 8/10/03 11:50:25 AM, sceptic...@yahoo.com writes:
>Ooops! I was unclear. That should have read: That of course depends
>on what he means by combining them. If he believes combining them
>would achieve a "real definition" then I quite agree with your GIGO
>point, i.e. that a combination would be no more likely to yield a
>necessary and sufficient condition than any of the proposed
>definitions by themselves.
Thanks! I was confused --
Best,
Gary
Gary will be away 8/13 -8/28