Why are things beautiful?

[volatile]

It is not arbitrary or saying "symmetry is beautiful", much of the scientific research of what people do consider beautiful involves symmetry. It is simply an aspect of beauty that perhaps can be statistically demonstrated.

But it wouldn't be "an aspect of beauty". It would be "something that many people consider beautiful". Do you understand the difference?

72 degrees is always 72 degrees “by definition”, but my girlfriend finds that temperature hot, I find it comfortable (particularly when I’m just in my underwear). What one finds hot or not is subjective even though we have an objective measure of temperature.

Yes, exactly. So, what's the objective measure of beauty? What's the beauty equivalent of "72 degrees"?

When you talk about beauty, you're conflating the objective and subjective and calling them the same thing.

It is the scientific aspects that the OP claims he wants to address here.

No it isn't. He just explained that. It's the evolution of a sense of beauty, perhaps, but not the "scientific aspects of beauty", as that would be impossible. Because "what is beauty" is not a scientific question.

 

[porch]

Simple question: Why are things beautiful?

I wonder, are there creatures out there on some other planet who wake up, go outside, and find the universe unbearably ugly?

Now, let me point out that I'm posting this in the science forum rather than the philosophy forum. I'm not posing a philosophical question. (As some of you know, I have no patience for philosophy.)

From a scientific point of view, why is it that we should find our world so often beautiful, even overwhelmingly so, even at times when it is attempting to destroy us? Storms, eruptions, and catastrophes are often awesomely beautiful.

I try to make time every day, weather permitting, to sit out on my porch and watch the clouds and the birds and the trees. It's quite fulfilling.

But why?

I'm not looking for a definitive answer, tho I'd love it if someone provided one. Just interested in a dialog, and hopefully some nice linkies to interesting studies.

I hope others are interested in this topic as well.

I'll take a guess at this.

Pleasure and pain are useful survival tools. I imagine that early humans and their recent ancestors found great beauty while walking through the world. I also think that they would have been terrified by their environment a lot of the time. Perhaps a combo of the two, that we could call awe, would have been a common state. Any of these states would promote overall attention.

Attention is what my pet theory rests on. I think an individual whose default emotional state was one of neutrality could get by pretty well, only perking up when a distinct sign of danger or reward was present. The advantage would go, however, to someone who spent more of their waking time constantly scanning their surroundings. So maybe having a sense of aesthetics is just what it's like to be a complex organism that constantly scans. Experiencing pleasure, wonder, and a bit of fear in our environment at large would probably also be useful when it comes to curiosity which can then lead to exploration and invention. I highly doubt that a three-toed sloth has a rich aesthetic life, but that's not part of their survival strategy.

You're lucky to live somewhere with a nice view from your porch. You may notice that in a lot of large cities, people seem to lose that sense of wonder with their surroundings. Subway commuters often slip insides themselves, just staring at one spot on the floor. These are not environments that we have evolved to pay attention to. The artist and architect Hundertwasser had the idea that environments with repetitive, geometric shapes with straight lines and sharp angles caused a dissonance in people, since these are not shapes our ancestors would have adapted to. Personally, I'd like to see a greater consideration for aesthetics when it comes to the design of cities. I think having beauty, and maybe a little bit of awe, in our daily lives contributes to the health and well being of both the individual and society. I don't think I could ever prove it, though.

 

[quarky]

Strange thread.

The perception of ugliness is equally peculiar. There's a balance in it, which has beauty.
I grew up around microscopes, and was fascinated by how changing magnification could turn something beautiful into something ugly; and then 10x more magnification; beauty again...and so forth.

Overall, there's something beautiful about this.

 

[The Man]

I think Piggy’s fundamental question (correct me if I am wrong Piggy) seems to be why did we evolve a perception of or for beauty. Personally I think perfection or the perception of perfection (thus beauty) has evolutionary advantages thus a pleasurable reward response (release of endorphins) when we perceive perfection or beauty.

 

[Doubt]

Well, we do appear to be getting somewhere.

"What is beauty?" is philosophy. And to the degree that philosophy is pointless, it is among the most pointless questions. (However, there are many useful parts to philosophy. Logic, being one example.)

"Why do we find X beautiful?" is a question we can tackle with science. (Define X as needed.)

But once we try to assemble the things we investigate to answer the first (philosophical) question, we are back to the subjective again. And yes, this sucks. Maybe someday we will develop the tools needed to get past the subjective nature of the question. Maybe not.

 

[roger]

Can you think of similar ways to test the "aliens think things are ugly" hypothesis without first developing a philosophically-coherent statement of what "ugly" means?

Trival. "Do you think this apple is ugly? do you think this tree is ugly? Do you think that cloud is ugly? How about this big canyon? The sun? Your three moons? My finger? Your finger? Your wife? etc"

Greater than 50% yes answers means that alien thinks things are ugly. Greater than 50% of all aliens questioned thinking things are ugly means the species thinks things are ugly.

All without defining ugly or beauty.

 

[porch]

Why do people profess that they "hate philosophy" or "think philosophy is worthless" whilst at the same time pondering intrinsically philosophical questions?

I think Piggy's a good philosopher. For some reason he reserves the name "philosophy" for bad philosophy, that's all.

 

[volatile]

Trival. "Do you think this apple is ugly? do you think this tree is ugly? Do you think that cloud is ugly? How about this big canyon? The sun? Your three moons? My finger? Your finger? Your wife? etc"

Greater than 50% yes answers means that alien thinks things are ugly. Greater than 50% of all aliens questioned thinking things are ugly means the species thinks things are ugly.

All without defining ugly or beauty.

You don't think you'd have to define the concept of "ugly" to get meaningful answers to those questions? Do you think this apple is murblethruble? Yes or no?

Further: if greater than 50% of people think apples are beautiful, but I happen to think they're ugly - am I wrong? Empirically wrong?

 

[blue sock monkey]

Because "what is beauty" is not a scientific question.

Why not? You can measure how the brain reacts to what the subjects have self-defined as "beautiful" and "ugly", in experiments like this: http://www.cns.nyu.edu/~vessel/pubs/Vessel_VSS2009.pdf

I think it would be very interesting if, in expanded studies, brain reactions are similar despite the cross-cultural differences in what we find beautiful.

 

[volatile]

Why not? You can measure how the brain reacts to what the subjects have self-defined as "beautiful" and "ugly", in experiments like this: http://www.cns.nyu.edu/~vessel/pubs/Vessel_VSS2009.pdf

I think it would be very interesting if, in expanded studies, brain reactions are similar despite the cross-cultural differences in what we find beautiful.

Interesting studies, but they do not answer the question "what is beauty". They study, as you said yourself, how the brain reacts to what the subjects have self-defined as "beautiful" and "ugly". That's a question one removed from the question of what beauty is.

What beauty is comes prior to the types of question such studies investigate. And it's an irreducibly philosophical one.

 

[roger]

Anyway, my guess (and its nothing than a guess) is that it is sexual, nothing more or less.

As soon as an organism has enough receptors to be selective about mates, being selective about mates means an evolutionary advantage. So, preferences about what these receptors receive will evolve. However, there is no evolutionary pressure (in general) that these preferences be particularly limited to specific types of input. If you like symmetry in A, you'll like it in B. Fine tuning a mechanism to filter out specific inputs is generally going to require specialization, specialization that is not going to just appear without reason. So, you like the female/male of your species, you are also going to like other things in your environment, just because those "liking" circuits get stimulated.

Pleasure and aversion are extremely strong motivators in our survival. It's inevitable that it slops over into areas that aren't specifically an evolutionary advantage (love of taking heroin, dislike of brussel sprouts, love of watching thunderstorms, taking joy in running for the heck of it, etc)

 

[volatile]

Anyway, my guess (and its nothing than a guess) is that it is sexual, nothing more or less.

As soon as an organism has enough receptors to be selective about mates, being selective about mates means an evolutionary advantage. So, preferences about what these receptors receive will evolve. However, there is no evolutionary pressure (in general) that these preferences be particularly limited to specific types of input. If you like symmetry in A, you'll like it in B. Fine tuning a mechanism to filter out specific inputs is generally going to require specialization, specialization that is not going to just appear without reason. So, you like the female/male of your species, you are also going to like other things in your environment, just because those "liking" circuits get stimulated.

Pleasure and aversion are extremely strong motivators in our survival. It's inevitable that it slops over into areas that aren't specifically an evolutionary advantage (love of taking heroin, dislike of brussel sprouts, love of watching thunderstorms, taking joy in running for the heck of it, etc)

How does this hypothesis account for vast differences in perception of what is perceived as beautiful across individuals, cultures and time? I still think you're confusing the capacity to sense beauty (which I think can be supported through reference to an evolutionary hypothesis) and finding specific things beautiful (which can't).

If we're "evolved" to find symmetry beautiful, how do you account for people or cultures who don't find it beautiful at all? How do you account for the shifts in aesthetic tastes far faster than a genetic cause would require? I don't doubt that the development of an aesthetic sense is bioloigcal; I do doubt, however, that specific tastes (the "what is beauty" question) are to the same degree.

 

[Philosaur]

I'm going to attempt to present my thought on the question in scientific terms, but I agree with the others here who've said that there is an inherent, unavoidable philosophical core to the question posed.

First, I totally agree that our perception of beauty is an evolved reaction to those things we find beneficial to survival. The waterfall in the forest is beautiful because it represents a good place to settle. A symmetrical face indicates successful embryological development, smooth skin indicates health, etc.

Now, Piggy posits an interesting situation: that there could be aliens who find the universe unbearably ugly. There are a couple of ways to interpret "the universe" in that supposition.

1. By "the universe" Piggy means only "most things in the universe". These aliens are simply a lot more discriminating, which would mean that there are far fewer places, situations, fruits, animals, whatever, that are beneficial to survival. They probably have a harder time of things, because they're so picky, but they manage, and they may even thrive because they'll only settle for the best.

2. By "the universe" Piggy really means "everything in the universe". These aliens are repulsed by everything, and therefore, find no place worthy of settling, no food good enough to eat, no individual attractive enough to mate with. But this seems to lead to the conclusion that these aliens could not have actually evolved, because they'd never eat, mate, or settle anywhere. The "everything's ugly" psychology would be weeded out by natural selection.

Someone may argue that they still would eat and mate--they just wouldn't enjoy it. That may be, but that doesn't change the fact that the aliens are rating the things around them in terms of benefit. They'd just be doing what Americans do when we vote for the lesser of two evils for President. Furthermore, this possible counter-argument gets into the problem of "what things are like" in other minds--which is squarely in the realm of philosophy.

Finally, Piggy references the awesome beauty of storms and other natural disasters. I think here we might be doing violence to our notion of "beautiful" as it's used elsewhere in the question. I think "awesome" or "sublime" is a more precise word to describe such phenomena. Heidegger and other contintental philosophers have written lots about this stuff. (Sorry, philosophy creeps back in.)

 

[roger]

You don't think you'd have to define the concept of "ugly" to get meaningful answers to those questions? Do you think this apple is murblethruble? Yes or no?

Further: if greater than 50% of people think apples are beautiful, but I happen to think they're ugly - am I wrong? Empirically wrong?

No, I don't need to define it. Did your mother define, in rigorous philosophical terms, what beautiful is before you added it to your vocabulary? Or did you pick it up by example and common reactions?

As in "yo, alien, when you look at something, do you get a strong pleasurable or unpleasurable reaction"
"blurg!" (yes)

"Is it pleasurable"
"blarck" (no!)

"does looking at it make you happy?"
"Blarck"

"Okay, we call that 'ugly' in our language"

As to your second paragraph, where are you coming from? The question was whether we can find out if aliens find things ugly or not. What's right/wrong have to do with it?

You are the one lading the discussion with philosophical considerations. Right/wrong was never mentioned. In general, humans describe sunsets as "beautiful" and seek out the experience. Zopatods call them "ugly" and try not to look at them at all costs. Facts. Science. No philosophy.

 

[Monketi Ghost]

No comments on my awesome post?

Don't hate me because I'm beautiful!

 

[porch]

Maybe there are aliens who act as if they have a sense of beauty, but don't actually have a sense of beauty. Let's call these aliens b-zombies . . .

 

[The Man]

But it wouldn't be "an aspect of beauty". It would be "something that many people consider beautiful". Do you understand the difference?

In what way is an aspect like symmetry “that many people consider beautiful" not an "an aspect of beauty"?

Yes, exactly. So, what's the objective measure of beauty? What's the beauty equivalent of "72 degrees"?

When you talk about beauty, you're conflating the objective and subjective and calling them the same thing.

I am not conflating anything, you are and then trying to posit that conflation upon me. A measure of symmetry may well be an objective measure of an aspect of what some might find beautiful. Just as temperature might be an objective measure of an aspect of what some might find comfortable, but just as some people might not find a particular temperature comfortable, so too might some people not find a particular symmetry or level of symmetry as beautiful.

No it isn't. He just explained that. It's the evolution of a sense of beauty, perhaps, but not the "scientific aspects of beauty", as that would be impossible. Because "what is beauty" is not a scientific question.

What, so now examining what are the common attributes of beauty thus what scientifically constitutes or "what is beauty" in a scientific sense as a “scientific endeavor” is now “impossible”? Again the only conflation of the objective and subjective appears to be yours, that you wish to ascribe conflation to me does not make it any less of your conflation.

 

[blue sock monkey]

Interesting studies, but they do not answer the question "what is beauty". They study, as you said yourself, how the brain reacts to what the subjects have self-defined as "beautiful" and "ugly". That's a question one removed from the question of what beauty is.

What beauty is comes prior to the types of question such studies investigate. And it's an irreducibly philosophical one.

I should have carried my comments in my earlier post further. Hypothetically, our aesthetic sense is basically physiological. If we find common brain reactions across cultures, then we start looking for what the beautiful things of the different cultures have in common--I'm guessing there are some. The explanation of why this should be so presumably traces back to evolution. All creatures need to determine if objects are edible/poisonous, locations are safe/dangerous, people are good/bad mating possibilities. With our relentlessly burgeoning brains, humans developed conscious labels for innate instincts.

This process would result in defining the aesthetic sense pragmatically. That doesn't exclude the desirability of looking at aesthetics philosophically; I think each approach complements the other.

 

[Philosaur]

Maybe there are aliens who act as if they have a sense of beauty, but don't actually have a sense of beauty. Let's call these aliens b-zombies . . .

I think "bimbos" is a better term.

 

[volatile]

No, I don't need to define it. Did your mother define, in rigorous philosophical terms, what beautiful is before you added it to your vocabulary? Or did you pick it up by example and common reactions?

Neither; that's a false dichotomy. But one does develop a personal aesthetic sense as one grows, by contemplation, by education and by common convention. But the fundamental qualities of beauty are not fixed, and what beauty itself is is not an unconententious question. If you want to ask someone what they find beautiful, you are relying on their philosophical conception of what beauty is. This is quite clearly not an empirically scientific question. It can't be.

As in "yo, alien, when you look at something, do you get a strong pleasurable or unpleasurable reaction"
"blurg!" (yes)

"Is it pleasurable"
"blarck" (no!)

"does looking at it make you happy?"
"Blarck"

"Okay, we call that 'ugly' in our language"

So, despite "not wanting to define it", you actually go ahead and do so -"do you get a strong pleasurable or unpleasurable reaction".

That's a definition, and, I'd hasten to add, a pretty unsatisfactory one. Not everything pleasurable is beautiful.

And so again, we're stuck. We might learn what makes Blarg "feel pleasure", but we have not aphilosophically demonstrated what is, and what is not, beautiful.

As to your second paragraph, where are you coming from? The question was whether we can find out if aliens find things ugly or not. What's right/wrong have to do with it?

Because you're asking a subjective question and expecting an objective answer.

You cannot define "beauty" in the terms you're trying to. You can define "what most people find beautiful", but that is, quite clearly, not the same question, or even order of question.