Comments | lhynard: More on Value

lhynard

More on Value

Feb 01, 2006 13:49

A long time ago in LJ Land, when I was working out my thoughts[1] on how there are three types of beauty[2], I talked about an idea by my great buddy, mallon04008, regarding value and what it is:J. [mallon04008] is interested in law and economic-types of stuff and such, things low on my list of interests -- but he is very bright. (Outside our fields though, we share a ( Read more... )

value, books, lewis

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mallon04008 February 3 2006, 11:21:56 UTC

I am glad you have posted again on this topic. When you first did, I was not yet actively reading your LJ and the discussion had already wound down at that point so it seemed ill timed to jump in ( ... )

shadewright February 5 2006, 16:03:25 UTC

I tend to agree. I'm not sure what word I would use to describe what sadeyedartist had to say, but the word value is closely tied to the market, where it is absolutely defined by the opinion of people, and not anything inherant in the object itself. Look into buying a house, and you'll see what I mean.

shadewright February 5 2006, 16:08:35 UTC

...In addition, I think Lhynard might be on to something. There are works of literature that many people consider very highly, and which I think are nearly worthless. Lhynard's statement allows that these books may in fact have value to more enlightened minds, but that they do not necessarily have value in and of themselves (i.e, there's a small chance my opinion might be correct).

lhynard February 6 2006, 20:12:27 UTC

That was more Lewis' idea than mine.

lhynard February 6 2006, 20:11:48 UTC

Which word would you then use for an intrinsic "quality, characteristic, or feature of an item"?

shadewright February 7 2006, 07:04:58 UTC

I don't know. That's part of the problem I have with this question.

Lewis argues, and I *want* to agree that things have or lack intrinsic worth. (That's a complete synonym with value, but I'll use it differently for clarity.)

I want to agree with him--but as soon as we start asking who gets to decide about this worth, we get thrown back into a pool of opinions. Some opinions are popular, others are suppossedly authoritative--but how can we know? If it's really just a majority opinion, than what I'm calling worth is no different from the economic value. If there is something else at work, then we need reliable impersonal standards for everything kind of like Lewis established for literature. (Although I would say that his standards were still very subjective.)

I guess I distrust the inherent worth arguement--even though it makes the most sense to me--because of the books and artwork I mentioned above, and because any music that is popular is automatically disdained, as if it must therefore be inferior art.

lhynard February 7 2006, 09:58:47 UTC

What I love about Lewis' experiment is that it can be tried with other media besides books. It is all based on the function of the thing. In some cases, the function may just be something blatantly simple, such as to look pretty. There is lots of scientific evidence for what things the brain just finds "pretty". But so much more of art of any form is about communicating idea -- usually an emotional idea. It is those things that are successful at communicating that have worth I think.

And of course there is the balance issue. IF a movie has great filmography and sound but crappy plot, does it have worth? I, for one, tend to break the movie down into parts and judge each separately, but then I always get accused of missing the forest for the trees. Grrr.

mallon04008 February 7 2006, 09:42:11 UTC

NOTE: I composed this response before I saw shadewright's posting. It appears that we are on the same line of reasoning :-)

Not to sound trite, but quality, characteristic, or feature are exactly the words I would use. Again, my goal in my first post is just to help create a distinction in terms for the purpose of this discussion, because, in the vernacular, value, quality, worth, characteristic, etc., are used more or less interchangeably. In reexamining my above post, it may (and kind of does) look like I am trying to exclude and combat sadeyedartist's argument by my definition. That was not my purpose.
Now, you may be saying to yourself, "He has not answered my question. I asked for what he would call an intrinsic quality, characteristic, or feature." There is a very good reason I have not answered so. I am not prepared at this point to identify anything as "intrinsic" in this discussion. I think it is a highly loaded word that, especially when applied to abstracts, tends to be used in the context of a subjective opinion ( ... )

lhynard February 7 2006, 10:20:19 UTC

ah, crap -- lost my first attempt at replying to this

Anyhow, yes, I agree that "intrinsic" is a tough word. (And I have been pondering it in previous posts as to whether there is any sort of intrinsic aspect of femininity or masculinity or even humanity.) This is true especially of abstract things.

But I think that Plato was on to something in his search for ideals. And the Bible seems to confirm this when it starts John 1 by saying that Jesus is the ideal.

I really think that function plays an important role in this discussion -- at least for created objects. I think that what I am calling value is a measure of the intrinsic success of the thing to perform its function. Jesus was the ideal human in that He performed his function perfectly. A "good" book is accurately written and expresses fully the idea intended and gains the response intended for the intended audience.

intrinsic success mallon04008 February 7 2006, 22:58:04 UTC

Wow...that is interesting word pairing. I will have to give it some thought

Re: intrinsic success lhynard February 8 2006, 09:13:38 UTC

Well for humans it is interesting because we can adapt and change and learn and grow. However, for a picture, from the moment it is finished, it's success is in a sense locked intrinsically.

Re: intrinsic success mallon04008 February 8 2006, 19:44:55 UTC

I was thinking it was interesting for a different reason. Let's give your definition of value the "Amplified Bible" treatment :-) and I then I will explain what I found interesting ( ... )

Re: intrinsic success lhynard February 8 2006, 20:28:41 UTC

I'm still letting the rest of what you said here and in the other reply sink in and flit around a bit before replying, but for starters:Thus, if they did not all value it the same, then (essentially) the thing does not exist.
Alternatively -- and this is how I've always thought of it -- humans make value judgments, that is, subjective estimations on the value of objects. Humans, being at the same time unique and imperfect, will never agree entirely on the value of any object. So then, if there is such a thing as intrinsic value, there is no reason to think that all humans would agree on it, or as you say, "value it the same ( ... )

Re: intrinsic success mallon04008 February 9 2006, 05:11:11 UTC

This is a far longer comment than I intended, and it is late. I'll try to be more coherent later....
I know what you mean. This topic was all I could think about last night. It was driving me crazy!

Re: intrinsic success mallon04008 February 8 2006, 20:18:00 UTC

However, for a picture, from the moment it is finished, it's success is in a sense locked intrinsically.

Two questions come to mind when reading this: 1) What is the end or goal to which the painting is (at least at some level) successful? 2) How does this success become intrinsically locked into the picture?

Re: intrinsic success lhynard February 8 2006, 20:42:16 UTC

For now, let me focus on 1):

We have to start with a bunch of definitions.

If one holds to a definition of art as a medium for communicating an emotional message to another,...

I would say, a work of art is successful if a perfect "measurerer" (who falls in the intended audience) "measuring" it (that is viewing it) would receive the intended (by the author of the work) messageBecause humans are subjective measurers, they will rate the level of success (the value) differently, especially as the level of precision gets greater ( ... )

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