The fundamental starting point is to consider why something is 'generally agreed to be an artwork'. If all artworks are different then so are all experiences of it. It is pointless to seek common features in the so-called a.e. when it's impossible to find any features in common to all artworks and the experiences of them. The only way to discover an empirical status for art is to examine societal 'general agreement' about it.
The intentionality notion as the indicator of an artwork is invalid because it can't be falsified. The artist creates the work in process with or without recognized intentions; the beholder creates the work in reception with or without intentions. The intentions always differ moment to moment and are subjective. All consciousness engages intentionality. Intentions may be necessary to engage in a creative act but they are not sufficient to produce a work of art. No one can make a work of art on demand. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Fri, March 16, 2012 2:21:54 PM Subject: Re: descriptive / empirical aesthetics? In a message dated 3/16/12 12:52:18 PM, [email protected] writes: > It would be better to take as a starting point some object that is > generally agreed to be a work of art, and then examine why and how it > produces aesthetic experience. > My own plan, given world enough and time, would be to begin with aesthetic experiences. I mean a.e.'s from various genres -- visual "art", music, poetry, drama, dance. I start with the admittedly controversial premise that an a.e. is its own genus of experience, as distinctly its own as an olfactory or taste or tactile etc feeling. And I'd compare the a.e.'s from the different genres and see if I can justify calling them all a.e.'s. I'd ask what the hell is going when I get them? Why do I get them from some works in a given genre, and not from other works? Then I'd try to compare the nature of the a.e.'s from these so-called art genres with some seemingly comparable feelings from "real life". You would exclude any feelings from "natural" objects and events because the elements lack intentionality. I don't buy that. I'll cartoon that position by saying I can have a terrific taste experience from something prepared by a chef, but also from something picked right from a tree. I claim I've seen drama on a sporting field, and in life-and-death events being shown live on television. And so on. I know it's a project I'll never conclude.
