It’s okay. The confusion is understandable. As I said before, there are so many terms that are being used in strange and wonderful new ways. Unfortunately, that is something you have to deal with every time you open a book by a philosopher. And just thank your lucky stars that I’m not Kant. Or worse, God forbid, Hegel. Even as far back as Aristotle with his phrase “the what it was to be”, which left Roman tranlsators scratching their heads and coming up with a whole new word, “essentia” (essential), to convey the phrase.
And here, I am saying that when you think of aesthetics, don’t think of beauty or taste; think instead of value or worth. And when you think of good and evil, don’t think of morality; think of aesthetics. And some of the remarks I’ve made about metaphysics have left Mr. Dibble eagerly awaiting the debate thread at the end of it all. I completely understand how even an intelligent person like yourself can become confused. I think the first time I read Nietzsche (a fellow autodidact, by the way), I had comprehended only a few of his ideas. I had to reread several times, especially passages where he defined his terms. And oh, yes! I forgot Wittgenstein. I mean damn. He spoke so simply, and yet so revolutionarily. It was absolutely essential, in understanding him, to get a grasp on what he meant by words like “grammar”, and so on.
And then, other people interested in philosophy write books about the books philosophers have written, and they spend a lot of time paraphrasing or even making up yet newer words (like “rationalism”) to convey ideas that they apparently believe the original philosopher failed to convey. Or we end up with a translation of the famous Razor (allegedly) by William of Ockham, that says, “The simplest way is usually the best.” That’s not even close to his intended expression, which was essentialy, “Do not multiply entities beyond necessity.”
While we’re discussing all this, let’s take a look at what a misapplication of a philosophy can do. Suppose we interpret Ockham’s Razor in the popular culture way, as seen, for example, in the movie Contact: 'The simplest way is usually the best." Let’s forget the “usually” for the moment (since almost everybody else does anyway). And let’s reduce the fraction 16/64. Well, obviously, the simplest way is just to cancel out the 6s, and voila! We have 1/4. But is that the correct why? Not hardly. It won’t work at all for a fraction like, 12/24. Cancelling out the 2s does not give us the correct answer.
And so, the study of philosophy begins with a completely open mind and a careful reading of the definitions. And as difficult as it may be, it is extremely important not to mix up what one philosopher means by “predicate” and what another means by “predicate”. Otherwise, you could find yourself reading Wittgenstein as though he were talking about ontology (as Kant would be), while he is actually talking about language versus the things language represents.
I’m sorry I am so long-winded about this. But you’re getting a couple of definitions mixed up, and it could be entirely my fault for not being clear enough. Even Immanuel Kant, when he had written Critique of Pure Reason, had to follow it up with another book, *Critique of Practial Reason *in order to mitigate some of the claims in his earlier book. (I’m not saying that’s the only reason he wrote it, but it’s one of them.)
Here, you are mixing up the meanings and nature of aesthetics and morality. It might not hurt for us to give these another shot right here right now, especially since you might not be the only one not quite getting it. (Again, probably my fault.)
Your moral judgments are judgments about someone’s internal rules of behavior (or even thought). For example, they believe that homosexuality is okay. And your judgment might be that they are sinful, based on bizzare Biblical interpretations, for example. On the other hand you might judge that they are not bad people, since maybe you sympathize with their cause, because you are yourself a homosexual or else homosexuality is no big deal to you.
Morality moves to ethics when it exposes itself outwardly. For example, if your guy approaches another guy with a sexual proposition, “How would you like a blow job?”. Often, societies codify a set of ethics that might prohibit (or might encourage) that sort of interaction. And if it becomes, “I’ll pay you $50 to suck your dick,” some socities have codified that into a subsect of ethics — namely, law. It is a solicitation for prostiution or some such nonsense.
Now, aesthetical judgment is very different, and has really nothing to do with your moral judgment. And if have said that, for example, one could be derived from the other, then what I meant is that one might value something that others consider to be morally wrong. Or vice-versa. For example, one might hold worthless that which others consider to be morally right. A homosexual (typically!) might see no value in a Defense of Marriage Act, whereas a Christian fundamentalist heterosexual might see great value in such an act.
This does not happen because morality and aesthetics are interchangeable terms, or because moral judgments are the same as aesthetical judgments; instead, this happens because what the person in question greatly values is morality. He has made an aesthetical judment about his morality — namely that it is of great value. Many Christians (and in fairness, people of many other religions, like Islam) make this same kind of aesthetical judgment. Judaism, for example, as practiced most strictly, greatly values ethics — rules of behavior between a man and his fellow man: the Ten Commandments, for instance. Chrisitan moral judgments, like salvation, are of no interest to a Jewish believer.
One can apply aesthetics to morality (or ethics) only that sort of sense: the sense that the moral code or ethical code has great value, and is something the person feels compelled to pursue. This may lead us to believe that aesthetics and morality are somehow automatically intertwined or almost synonymous.
But Jesus taught otherwise. I’ve already given the example of the religious leader who was praying, thanking God for not making him a sinner like the nearby tax collector, and bragging to God about how he (the religious leader) followed all the rules, like tithing and such. Meanwhile, the tax collector felt too unworthy even to look up, and prayed only that God would forgive him for taking money from the poor in order to give it to Caesar. Jesus made a point immediately upon telling this story. It was the tax collector, and not the religious leader, who had pleased God with his prayer. That’s because God, Jesus teaches, values attributes like humility and remorse for sin. The fact that the religious leader meticulously followed the moral code was of no significance to God.
Strange sounding, I know. But grasping an understanding of this difference is absolutely critical in grasping my witness. Feel free to continue asking all the questions you want. At some point, it will dawn on you, “Oh, yeah. I get it. When Lib talks about aesthetical judgments, they have nothing to do with moral judgments except by coincidence, when someone aesthetically values morality.”
I’'m hoping the above will help.
Yes. Certainly. Consider, for example, my rather violent conversion. Well, not violent, but certainly sudden and explosive. The very last thing I wanted to do was become a Christian, and then in the middle of translating John, lo and behold, I looked up and the whole world was new to me. Everything I had known before was suddenly and immediately changed. And I don’t mean things like how to ride a bicycle or who my mother was, I mean things like the aesthetic value of this ragtag group of hippies in our minivan and for that matter the aesthetic value of my mother.
Mr. EvilDoer might be standing on a bridge preparing to jump, but you save him against his will. He might be holding a hostage and threatening to shoot her, but you explain how much more valuable she will be to him alive. (That last example was a bit weak, but I’ve been typing for an hour.) Suffice it to say that the only entity that even has an aesthetical will is love. Again, that is clearly spelled out above, but I know how hard it is to read every post and catch every word. Mr. EvilDoer has free moral will, but no aesthetical will at all. What he treasures, he treasures because treasuring that particular thing is a part of his nature. This is going to be important when we discuss freewill shortly (here in the metaphysics thread.) It will be a discussion of existentialism vesus essentialism, when we’re ready to move on.
And finally, while we’re at it, let’s examine Mr. EvilDoer and Mr. GoodnessDoer just a bit closer. Few people, if any, have ever been completely evil or completely good (with the latter having one exception, of course). It is simply the case that Mr. EvilDoer has mostly evil states, meaning states that are void of goodness, and therefore are aesthetically the equivalent of nothingness. But he will almost certainly have some good states. (I’m sure you’ve heard a thousand times the comments on the news by neighbors, “He was such a good guy. Quiet. Kept mostly to himself.” etc.) And Mr. GoodnessDoer will almost certainly have some evil states. I, for example, have always strived to value greatly my fellow posters, but (not to blame my brain imbalances that psychiactric medicine is helping now to treat) I could come across as the most mean and vicious person who ever lived.
Examine this post carefully, and if necessary review the definitions without any preconceived notions of how the terms are defined, and you will “get it”. I know that you’re smart enough. The only question is whether I can explain it well enough.
