Sarah's Thesis Revisited Again

It is in the mail - my newest trade. It took a while for it all to happen. But according to UPS I should be getting the painting on Friday. Yay!

I must admit that I'm incredibly excited. But I must also admit that I have a residual feeling of consternation. I had hoped that by trying to trade up to a Van Gogh I would gain some insight into the nature of aesthetic value; but I can’t say that I have.

In my last post, I discussed Platonism, which is the view that certain properties, e.g. order, symmetry, unity and diversity, are objective features that works of art can instantiate to greater or lesser degrees; and paintings are the more beautiful the more perfectly they instantiate them.

In contrast to Platonism is the Humean view (named after David Hume, an 18th century Scottish philosopher) according to which beauty is subjective, or to use an oft-quoted maxim, in the eye of the beholder. According to the Humean view, if enough people end up really liking some work of art, it ends up getting a reputation for being beautiful (or at least important.) And if a work of art is deemed important throughout the ages, it becomes a classic.

Although something about the Humean view rubs me the wrong way, it does seem to explain how one could call both Michelangelo’s David and Andy Warhol’s Tomato Soup Cans important works of art. They seem to have very little in common other than the fact that lots of people like both.

In addition to making sense of the wide variety of so-called ‘beautiful art’, the Humean view would also make Sarah’s Thesis potentially true. If the Humean view is correct, then Dominic’s Face With a Line Through It could be getting more beautiful as this project goes on for no other reason than that more people are looking at it and thinking to themselves: I like Dominic’s drawing.

There is on final view worth discussing, namely the Kantian view (named after Immanuel Kant, an 18th century German philosopher.)

But I am feeling too excited right now to write much more. I just can't wait for my new painting. As I said already: Yay!

So I will end by making a very simple request of the universe:

I want my newest painting to arrive sooner rather than later.
I want my newest painting to arrive sooner rather than later.
I want my newest painting to arrive sooner rather than later.