Art

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One of the secrets that philosophers like to keep from themselves is that they practise an art - an art that has changed little from the time when there was no real distinction between art and science. It is a vestigial formulation, for an ancient endeavor. The Greeks invented it, which is why Nietzsche was so wise to return to them to reinvent it once more.

The paintings on the walls at Altamont are still beautiful.

Art has always tried to emulate science - it had always been some manner of alchemy. This is vanity turned backwards, or at least sideways, but it might still produce something of value - art is messy that way. But there is as much truth in saying that science has always tried to emulate art. Science can be pretty messy, too, at times.

There is beauty in logic, as there is beauty in a renaissance garden or a skyscraper. There is a logic to music, for it is only audible mathematics. Art may seek the truth, but must never find it, and Hegel wrote a great symphony, even if it didn’t ring true. Kandinsky kept the same shade of red throughout his career, a constant among the variables. He was true to it, even as it was true to him.

Philosophers don’t change the world - even great ones don’t.

They change the way we see it.

Philosophers dance around the truth, for that is the only thing truth is good for. It’s quite good enough.

For what it is worth, this post was inspired by Dan~, who is the great artist of these environs.

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So philsophers paint perceptions? Philosophers dance around truth, but they do not have an accurate perception of what truth really is (seeing as how it’s impossible)?

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I don’t know Faust… I just don’t think philosophy can be spoken of as a whole. You can talk about logic (about as much an art as binary is) or metaphysics or ethics etc separately, and some might be more artful than others, but it’s impossible to say “philosophy is an art” or “philosophy is not an art” because Philosophy is a cake with slices in different flavours.

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Obw - any generalisation is vulnerable. There are things you can say about music that you can’t say about sculpture. But remember, I am using the term “art” in it’s ancient meaning - much broader than today. It is just a flavor I am trying to convey. If you take me too literally here, you might wind up disagreeing with something I didn’t say. Which is okay.

Spoonful - I’ll go along with that.

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But by that meaning, science is also an art, correct?

I’d think the primary claim against your position would be that philosophy is a science, but if you’re using the Latin definition, that position would be included in yours: You’re basically saying that people practice philosophy using skills by arranging things. While this does remind us of an inherent incapacity to reach absolute truth, it doesn’t give much reason for philosophers to shy away from the title “artist” given its old meaning.

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Alun - I am giving a stipulative definition - but it is really a return, yes. You have read me correctly. I think that philosophy allows for this “original” meaning. And that some may find it useful to remember this meaning, and to employ it.

And, yes, nothing about philosophy reminds me of absolute truth.

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Do you mean that some philosophers believe they can discern absolute meaning?

Do you think some scientists do? A little off-topic–but given old meanings, as you said, science is philosophy.

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I don’t think it’s off-topic at all. Many philosophers have thought this, including Plato. Descartes, the father of modern philosophy, so we are told, thought this. Kant thought this, depending upon which page or sentence of Kant that you read.

Sure.

I think that scientists less and less think this, as science itself matures. But many of the scientists that write extensively about the philosophy of science, including many who get involved with the ID debate, seem to. But the scientists that we pay most attention to in our day-to-day lives are those that provide us with technology. Their philosophy is moot in that context.

The thing is, whenever they comment on absolute meaning, they are philosophers of science. The dividing line between the two is surely blurred in the ID debate. Which supports my point.

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Hi Faust,

Thank you for the interesting post. I trust that you’ll accept the following as constructive criticism.

The Lascaux cave paintings are the earliest known works of art (circa 13,000 B.C.). The advent of the scientific method is rather recent by comparison. Given that humans created art well before science, how could it be that art always has always tried to emulate science?

“If it [theory] disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. In that simple statement is the key to science. It doesn’t matter how beautiful the theory is, how smart you are, or what your name is - if it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong.” Richard Feynman

Are aesthetic creations judged on the basis of truth? That is, could a Mozart piano concerto be judged in some way, as true? In what way could art be said to seek truth? What truth?

“Truth” is a word that we often take on-board without examining its metaphysical baggage. The very concept of truth itself is as elusive as the non-tautological propositions that we commonly accept as truths. Karl Popper’s epistemological thesis was that empirical science consists not of indubitable truths, but of conjectures (doxa). Again, to quote Feynman

“People search for certainty. But there is no certainty. People are terrified - how can you live and not know?..You only think you know…I’m not absolutely sure of anything…But I don’t feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in a myseterious universe without any purpose, which is the way it really is so far as I can tell. It doesn’t frighten me.” The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

It’s not only us philosophers who can only dance around the truth. And yet I agree with your closing statement, faust; what we have is good enough. In fact, it’s wonderful. I don’t want to know as much as I want to find out. The answers to my questions are only useful inasmuch as they might allow me ask more insightful questions. The answers in themselves are rather boring. They would have to be, wouldn’t they? We explain something by showing why we shouldn’t find it suprising. Can you imagine the misery of a philosopher born to a world in which everything was already explained? We know far more than nothing and yet far less than everything. So, yes, I agree unreservedly with your conclusion, faust. This world is a philosopher’s paradise.

“The candle that is set up in us shines bright enough for all our purposes.” John Locke

Best,
Michael

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Hi, Polemarchus - What I was thinking of here is the supposed evocative meaning of those paintings. We cannot be sure, of course, but the prevalent theory about those paintings is that they were meant to help with the hunt - that they were a sort of shamanistic technology. I admit that they might just have been made by someone killing some time with a pleasant pursuit. But science, in the broadest sense, the sense that i use it, may have been invented long before you claim. I am not using the modern definition, which I had intended to make clear. Science produces technology, and we have a limited sense of technology if we go back far enough in time. I was speculating, of course. I do that, sometimes.

Art seeks psychological truths - the only kind I subscribe to. If I’d known I was going to be micro-analysed, the post would have been longer. My thinking contains no metaphysical element. You clearly haven’t read every post I have ever made, here and elsewhere.

I jest, of course. I was trying to wax a bit poetic, which is something that I should always avoid - don’t really have it in me.

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What the fuck? Did I say “Altamont”?

Sorry. It was the last post of the night. I’d edit it, but it might be good good for a laugh.

I meant Daytona, of course.

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While I’m sure faust will have his own answer (edit-as a matter of fact he does, and it was posted while I wrote), I thought I’d jump at this question. Aesthetic creations are judged on the basis of truth; they aim to run parrallel to our sensibilities. If you don’t see the beauty in it, then it has failed to match your perception of what beauty is. This is, naturally, not an ultimate or scientific truth, but an internal truth. (Fine/Creative/Aesthetic) Art theorizes about what we feel; if it’s wrong, then we don’t relate to it, and thus don’t feel in response.

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Yes, Alun - this is what I meant by truth, more or less - that it is internal. Art is expression - it communicates something from within the artist. There are many renderings of what that something is. “Truth” is what i chose this time, for this purpose.

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Alun wrote

Hi Alun,

Are you seriously (non-poetically) suggesting that an abstract painting that you don’t aesthetically care for could coherently be determined to be false? What would that even mean? And suppose that upon seeing a bright rainbow in the sky I nodded my head and said that it was true. Watching my response, wouldn’t you be puzzled? Wouldn’t you wonder, “What’s true?”

Purely aesthetic objects are judged qualitatively in terms of good or bad. Whereas, truth is a property of statements. An unambiguous truth requires, at a minimum, an unambiguous statement. And yet art, or poetry is purposefully ambiguous. Art evokes rather then says. One of art’s virtues is that what it suggests might be vastly different than what the artist had in mind when he or she created it. If artists wished to make unambiguous statements they would, presumably, employ journalism, mathematics or logic as their medium. Then, we could judge their works as true or false.

Regards,
Michael

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“Philosophy” and “philosopher” are big words, not to be lightly re-labeled. As science is based on observation, philosophy is partially a science. [Observation of thought, psychology is an example].

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What on earth is an “internal truth”?

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A truth about oneself verified by oneself–internally. Edit - or just the broader interpretation synonymous with ‘subjective truth’ sirswedishmike is talking about.

Polemarchus, perhaps there is a bit of silly wordplay here. Nevertheless, I’ll maintain my position stubbornly until we’re at least talking about the same thing :slight_smile: While I agree that the activity is “evoking” rather than “stating”, the object is still the truth. The subject isn’t what’s true (or false) about art. The rainbow isn’t what is true, which is why I would likely be confused if you told me so; however, the rainbow can spark an emotion by reminding you of a truth. If the object of a work of art is untrue to an observer, then he/she wouldn’t say so out loud, or isolate the contradictory elements like a logic problem; the observer just wouldn’t feel anything from it.

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Something we experience and . . . then call an internal truth . . .Whether we believe it is universally true or subjective truth depends on the one having the experience.

You should know that Obw, I don’t understand why you would ask such a nitty picky question which you probably already understand.

If you don’t believe in an internal truth . . .then that is YOUR internal truth, something you believe to be true because of what you have experienced (with data, personal experience or whatever)

We all have internal truths of various kinds

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Thanks for your reply, Alun,

Indeed, it’s important that we agree on the meaning of the words that we use. You wrote

But how does this statment square with your initial claim?

In other words, how would one begin to judge an aesthetic creation on the basis of truth if the asethetic creation itself is not what’s true, it only reminds you of a truth?

Wouldn’t that be a bit like your scoring a game of cricket according to the rules of baseball, because cricket reminds you of baseball?

Michael

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You’re judging it as a fine art; thus, you judge it on the basis of the truth it inspires, not just on what it is. What it is–its inherent qualities–doesn’t yield a programmed judgement, because the judgement is based on the response of the observer, which ought to be an inspiration of truth. “Reminds” isn’t the best word. I was using that for a rainbow since the response is a lot less defined and probably more heavily linked to associations; the way someone responds to one isn’t entirely similar to art, in that art is created by another person with the intent to evoke a response, and won’t always be calling on memory.

If you were judging it as a craft, you’d be judging it on how well it was made; what it is. In that case, there would be no truth as a basis. Sometimes the craft of fine art can hinder the truth it evokes, so it can be relevent, but not always.