Beautiful and Ugly

What is the philosophy of beauty?
Why does beauty exist?
What does it mean for something to be ugly?

Share your thoughts

Beauty can only be defined by the lack of ugly, and ugly can only be defined by a lack of beauty. - my thoughts.

What does it mean for something to be beautiful, according to you, then?

Hello, Erik. Nice to have you back here. :slight_smile:

There are three most important branches of philosophy: (1.) aesthetics, (2.) ethics, (3.) logic. As Goethe said: “dem Schönen, Guten, Wahren” (“to the beauty, good, true”). This was meant as unit, thus as the classical philosophy. So I think that there are some aspects or things that can also objectively be considered as beauty: symmetry, shapeliness (well-proportioned aspects or things), certain geometrical figures, beings consisting of structures that are based on certain mathematical numbers (e.g.: the Fibonacci sequence or the golden cut).

[tab]Fibonacci sequence (1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,55,89,144,233,377,610,987,1597,2584,4181,6765…):

Golden cut (1,6178…):
[/tab]

But, when ugly is good it is beautiful. A black widow fits your description to a T. Is it beautiful? Some of the most deadliest creatures and plants are just fantastically beautiful to the eye but, if recognized the mind makes it ugly. Knowledge is what should give beauty or ugly to anything or anyone.

Ugly can be measured by it’s repulse. if it maes you want to look away, it is ugly, if it draw you in closer, it is beautiful.

of course, some things can be so ugly that we find ourselves consciously deciding to look closer, of course while fighting still our internal energies still being repulsed by it.

That is true for the ignorant and emotional. Uneducated and emotions describe beauty and ugly in such a primitive perspective as that.

Primitive=ancient=past=back to the basics.

You would probably give me some convoluted psuedo-explanation that is only half true.

Why are you so eager to prove? And put me down? It must be something you lack. Whatever you lack I have.

She’s probably ugly with ugly babies too.

To facilitate survival [there I go again on this] and continuation of the next generation, all humans are endowed with neural circuit to detect whatever is ‘beautiful’ and whatever is ‘ugly.’
Generally what is systematic, symmetrical, orderly, and other programmed patterns and characteristics are instinctively perceived as ‘beautiful.’

As with all aspects of nature, there are degrees variations, deviations and exceptions.
Thus in some cases due to bad connections in the brain, there is a minority of people who are different from the norm [majority] and perceive the opposite from the majority.

Normally a symmetrical face is deemed to be beautiful and in general this is denote the person is healthy.

Despite the counter views, I still believe the easier processing is ultimately related to health because the genes are processing in a healthy & balanced manner rather than producing say a twisted face.
Sufficiently big [not gigantic] nicely form breasts are beautiful because they are a healthy potential of milk supply for the youngs.
There are many features that are programmed to be perceived by the ‘beauty’ neural circuit as beautiful.
These are the fundamentals and instinctual. This beauty instinct trigger the bonding [primary emotion of love] and attraction/desire towards the beautiful object.

However in many cases, modern man has strayed from the instinctual and developed various tendencies to perceive what is beautiful based on the influence of ‘nurture’ and environmental factors.

Whatever [disorders] is perceived as ugly instinctively will trigger the disgust emotions and avoidance neural circuit set.

Thus to understand what is beautiful [or ugly] we need to first fall back fundamentally on the “survival and procreation on the next generation” instinct and its associated neural circuits in the brain that theoretically exist in all human beings.

As typical with nature we should expect variations, deviations and exceptions from the norm [majority].

Then we do research to understand why there are variations from the norms, it root causes, the neural and other machinery involved and the philosophical and other basis for such variations.

youtu.be/k3Fa4lOQfbA

Serge Gainsbourg remarked, ‘ugliness is superior to beauty because it lasts longer’. Maybe a thing of ugliness is a joy forever.

It seems obvious why he would think this way, but I tend to agree with him. In today’s society there is an obsession with beauty and a real fear of ugliness.

In biblical terms those noted for physical beauty were often great disappointments. Rebekah was “very beautiful” (Genesis 26:7), but she was also a deceiver and manipulator. Saul was a man of physical beauty, but his disobedience hurt the nation of Israel.

The word ugly comes from an old Norse word ‘ugga’ which translates as ‘aggressive’ and from this comes a sense of violence, but it also means there is much more variety and surprise in ugliness.

The word beauty is sedative, soothing and predictable rather than challenging.

Should women focus on the inner qualities, in order to obtain a gentle and quiet spirit to be truly beautiful or is a ravishing beautiful exterior sufficient to clarify the word Beauty solely on this merit alone, when it would seem people of one culture seldom see beauty in people of a different culture.

‘Beauty is, no big deal, but the lack of it is’…

yet undeniably, ugliness… fascinates.

It was not an insult. It was just a comment that people are going to see different based upon education and emotion. It is a primitive perspective

mannequin warned and temporarily banned.

So calling someone ignorant and uneducated was not an insult…right…

Symterry is not beauty, Harrison ford has an asymettrical face and is rated as handsome.

For those of you into girls, here are some pics

Notice how the point of her hair is to make her face asymetrical, and thus more beautiful.

Here is some symetrical trash 4 u.

If the intent was to insult then it would be an insult. It is not the words or their meaning , it is intent.

So if i call someone fugly alls i gotta do is say “i had no intent to insult” n im good?

Haha! :laughing:

I agree with Prismatic that beauty facilitates survival, but just curious if further edification is possible on this topic.

You are deliberately twisting, why? What are you getting out of it? Is it a knee jerk reaction to defend?
Your reply does not merit a comment from me not explaination. Have a fun day.

You should have just said