On Fri, Mar 23, 2012 at 9:23 AM, Gary Richmond <[email protected]>wrote:
> I want to conclude this note with a passage near the end of the book > which I very much liked and have been reflecting on since. Forster > writes: > > On [Peirce's] view, human beings are not cogs in a vast cosmic > mechanism, but rather are free, creative agents capable of > transforming the world though the active realization of intelligent > ideals. The ultimate fate of the world is indeterminate and there is > no guarantee that the forces of reasonableness will triumph. > Nevertheless, the potential for victory is there. All it requires, he > thinks, is a community of individuals who devote their energy to the > pursuit of truth and goodness, a community united, not by mutual > self-interest, but by a common love of reasonableness" (Forster, op. > cit., 245). > > Cathy, this brought to my mind the discussion of Peirce's esthetics > following Tom Short's fine talk in the Robin session at SAAP. Any > thoughts on that in this connection? > *** > > Yes that discussion was interesting - I wish we had had the time to pursue > it further. This might not mean so much to people who were not at the talk > (perhaps Tom Short might be persuaded to post a copy of it here). But > anyway, Tom claimed the subject matter of Peirce's aesthetics was not the > beautiful but the *admirable*. To test this, and because I was worried that > the talk had mainly spoken at the general level, I asked about a specific > example - the Mona Lisa, and whether a Peircean aesthetics as described by > Tom might have anything to say about that work, and if so, what. > I was worried it looked like I hadn't really understood the very point Tom > was trying to make, and Tom suggested that a painting of a beautiful woman > is not the sort of thing Peirce has in mind, but Felicia Cruse said she > wanted to hear what Tom had to say about it, and artworks in general. > Then Rosa Mayorga pointed out that Peirce himself describes the subject > matter of aesthetics as 'the growth of concrete reasonableness' (here is > the connection Gary is pointing out) so we should work with that. > So I guess the question is whether a painting by Leonardo da Vinci might > somehow contribute to the growth of human concrete reasonableness. Doesn't > seem to me it couldn't. That painting in particular, apparently people have > been known to stand in front of it for hours and not necessarily be able to > articulate why. I hope I have captured an accurate enough snapshot of the discussion as memory of such things is inevitably selective. Regards to all, Cathy --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- You are receiving this message because you are subscribed to the PEIRCE-L listserv. To remove yourself from this list, send a message to [email protected] with the line "SIGNOFF PEIRCE-L" in the body of the message. To post a message to the list, send it to [email protected]
