I used to think that art apreciation was completly subjective. But lately i was reading some studies, socio-biology studies, that claim that there are certain, lets say, patrons that the average human selects (unconseously) as "delightful" or "beautiful". I am not talking of art critics, with all their pretencious little words, but of the average human wich, after all, is the one that makes world go round. One of those studies (centered in paintings) claimed that colours and sceneries more oftenly chosen were those related to enviroments suitable for humans to thrive: blue and green were selected more often, as well as landscapes that included those colours. This is, a sense of fertility and humidity always seemed to prevail over the alternatives. It is no final truth, of course, but it is certainly interesting. We tend to forget, lately, how nature and biology condition our existence, with that arrogant claim that we are merely "social constructs".
It's subjective in the sense that it all art is subject dependent, rather than independent. But I suspect what you really mean by subjective here is "to each their own". But there is a physical restriction that means we're going to share art tastes in common, whatever they may be, and that restraint is our biology. We share the same species, with same functioning senses, same psychology, increasingly shared culture, upbringing in the same schools, same curiculum, and so on. Our brains are still physical, and will be conditioned to like whatever its environment conditions it to. We don't need to know the details of all the interlocking parts to recognize this. So in this sense, you could say art is "objective", though I like the word "universal" more. Whatever we value in art is increasingly becoming more and more deterministic based on these facts. An individual can of course always stray from the pack, and arbitrarily decide they like X art over Y art, maybe precisely because it goes counter to the norm, and no other reason, but there sure are becoming fewer of those free thinkers.
number of UA-cam Views is a pretty objective measure of weather a song is good or not.. above 3 million, its "officially good".. over 20 million, its some people's favorite song.. over 100 million its a world renowned classic song (or really recent and poppy)
@@jacobh2147 Exactly, maybe a view means I have heard this song is awful, and want to go check it out. And yes, it is awful. So a view, in this case, could represent 2 votes for this isnt a good song. So, to eek out a conclusion that high # of views automatically denote "officially good" is too far a leap. But, it does mean that this video has received a lot attention - so let me investigate.
its really weird to try to pinpoint what makes a hit song/movie or "good art" yet alot of separated people seem to agree.. you might say it arouses people's senses in a way people like.. or.. maybe it encapsulates some kind of truth, like it really accurately bottles up a feeling that we can feel through its stimulation of senses.. its WEIRD! i dont know :/ but alot of people seem to agree when a movie or song or painting is good.. also i wonder if the consensus of what people deem good is becoming more homogenized because of the internet :/
Is it really that weird people agree on good art / music? Would you say it's weird that everyone agrees feces don't taste good, and that pizza does? Of course not. It's obvious that we do so because we share the same species, with roughly the same bodies, and thus same taste buds (more or less). Don't even need to make an evolutionary argument for why we evolved the sense of taste to begin with. Same thing applies to our ears, we all have them. No one has 3 ears. No one can hear wildly different frequencies, mistakes high pitch noises from low ones, or loud sounds for quiet sounds. Why wouldn't say that's weird, that's just how we understand hearing. That we don't understand *exactly* what makes a song or art piece good isn't weird, it's just complicated. There's nothing surprising about the fact really. We just share similar bodies and biology.
These Hume episodes have been beautifully crafted. I never understood Hume very well; these enthusiastic lectures have helped a lot.
thank you so much for making this podcast on Hume have been struggling with his essay
I used to think that art apreciation was completly subjective. But lately i was reading some studies, socio-biology studies, that claim that there are certain, lets say, patrons that the average human selects (unconseously) as "delightful" or "beautiful". I am not talking of art critics, with all their pretencious little words, but of the average human wich, after all, is the one that makes world go round. One of those studies (centered in paintings) claimed that colours and sceneries more oftenly chosen were those related to enviroments suitable for humans to thrive: blue and green were selected more often, as well as landscapes that included those colours. This is, a sense of fertility and humidity always seemed to prevail over the alternatives. It is no final truth, of course, but it is certainly interesting. We tend to forget, lately, how nature and biology condition our existence, with that arrogant claim that we are merely "social constructs".
It's subjective in the sense that it all art is subject dependent, rather than independent. But I suspect what you really mean by subjective here is "to each their own". But there is a physical restriction that means we're going to share art tastes in common, whatever they may be, and that restraint is our biology. We share the same species, with same functioning senses, same psychology, increasingly shared culture, upbringing in the same schools, same curiculum, and so on. Our brains are still physical, and will be conditioned to like whatever its environment conditions it to. We don't need to know the details of all the interlocking parts to recognize this. So in this sense, you could say art is "objective", though I like the word "universal" more.
Whatever we value in art is increasingly becoming more and more deterministic based on these facts. An individual can of course always stray from the pack, and arbitrarily decide they like X art over Y art, maybe precisely because it goes counter to the norm, and no other reason, but there sure are becoming fewer of those free thinkers.
Bravo!
TIL Steven plays guitar(and piano)
number of UA-cam Views is a pretty objective measure of weather a song is good or not.. above 3 million, its "officially good".. over 20 million, its some people's favorite song.. over 100 million its a world renowned classic song (or really recent and poppy)
I would say they are a factor of what to review but not what is good
Views can be manipulated.
@@jacobh2147 Exactly, maybe a view means I have heard this song is awful, and want to go check it out. And yes, it is awful. So a view, in this case, could represent 2 votes for this isnt a good song. So, to eek out a conclusion that high # of views automatically denote "officially good" is too far a leap. But, it does mean that this video has received a lot attention - so let me investigate.
What about music that predates UA-cam? Is that not considered music? Why UA-cam as the source of musical authority?
What two cds would you listen to?
Creed “My Own Prison” and Nickleback “The State” obv. Overlooked and over criticized. 🙂
its really weird to try to pinpoint what makes a hit song/movie or "good art" yet alot of separated people seem to agree.. you might say it arouses people's senses in a way people like.. or.. maybe it encapsulates some kind of truth, like it really accurately bottles up a feeling that we can feel through its stimulation of senses.. its WEIRD! i dont know :/ but alot of people seem to agree when a movie or song or painting is good.. also i wonder if the consensus of what people deem good is becoming more homogenized because of the internet :/
Is it really that weird people agree on good art / music? Would you say it's weird that everyone agrees feces don't taste good, and that pizza does? Of course not. It's obvious that we do so because we share the same species, with roughly the same bodies, and thus same taste buds (more or less). Don't even need to make an evolutionary argument for why we evolved the sense of taste to begin with.
Same thing applies to our ears, we all have them. No one has 3 ears. No one can hear wildly different frequencies, mistakes high pitch noises from low ones, or loud sounds for quiet sounds. Why wouldn't say that's weird, that's just how we understand hearing. That we don't understand *exactly* what makes a song or art piece good isn't weird, it's just complicated. There's nothing surprising about the fact really. We just share similar bodies and biology.
It kinda sounds as if you can't objectively judge art, but you can objectively judge art criticism.