On Highbrowishness

[lhynard]

Mr. Lewis has come up quite frequently recently. It turns out that reading one of his books has triggered an entry that I would have posted on Thursday had my poor little gerbil not died

Comments

The value of sports

[ubersecret]

There is an aesthetic to sports just like there is to music and art. I don't get it, but I know it's there. There are patterns, degrees of beauty, and so on. I would submit that watching and truly comprehending sports can be as useful and valuable as looking at a nice painting or listening to a beautiful piece of music.

Also, it is undeniable that sports develop coordination and other physical and mental skills that are absolutely necessary in war. Even just watching sports can help develop a certain way of percieving situations that would be advantageous in battle. So if you ever have to go kill a bunch of people, better to take sports fans than philosophers.

Re: The value of sports

[lhynard]

I don't think there is an aesthic side to sports, but maybe I am just blind to it. Clearly, there is an aethetic side to artistic "sports" such as figure skating or certain types of gymnastics, but sports without this intentional artistry, I don't think have it. Also, an individual in a sport may be a demonstration of physical beauty of form, but that, too, is not really the sport as a whole.

Your 2nd paragraph has good insight.

Re: The value of sports

[ubersecret]

There is, indeed, an aesthetic to sports (even team sports, maybe especially team sports). This is why you hear guys in your office (okay, maybe not *your* office) going on about how a play was the most beautiful thing they've ever seen. Something is beautiful in sports when a player demonstrates that he had a grasp of the entire "playing field" (or court, or whatever) and capitalized on his implicit understanding of his situation and the abilities and limitations of his opponents to achieve some desired outcome. A team is playing beautifully when it is playing in harmony--when all the players are clearly anticipating where each will be at any given time, when they know how to move to get free of defenders, etc. It was when I suddenly found I had an implicit grasp of basic music theory after years of reading music that I first understood this about sports. All of a sudden I started seeing patterns, chord progressions, and so on, and suddenly I realized that true composers don't think in notation; they implicitly (usually

Re: The value of sports

[lhynard]

I always took the phrase "that was a beautiful pass" to be a sad corruption of a word I value very highly. I see no resemblance at all being the beauty of a pass and the beauty of a flower. I don't think I ever shall.

I don't think there is any inherent beauty there. If there is any beauty at all in it, I think it is attached value, not inherent. It is a "beautiful" pass because those who care enough to watch and analyse it know the complexity of the pass. So they therefore value that pass.

...Unless "beauty" is "harmony", which I don't think it is.

But this is an issue where I freely admit I may just be completely blind to it, and maybe you and J. are right.

[sadeyedartist]

I definately think that there are higher and lower entertainments, some of which are significantly more edifying than others. There can be a reverse pride as well, by people who "don't waste their time" on all that "high convaluted nonsense". In any case, its the pride, not the thing itself, that is the problem. Classics are inherently better than chic lit, just as diamnonds are inherently better than plastic rings. (Although one might argue that to get a girl a plastic ring would be better if the guy knew that was what his girlfriend truly wanted. But that's another story.)Higher educated pride is probably more of an issue because more educated people are snobby. But the thing itself is probably better.

[shadewright]

You are assuming that no matter what one's mental state, one could always benefit from a book that has the potential to educate one on life. That may be true for some people. But there are definitely people who reach a point of mental or physical exhaustion--a need for relaxation--that is comprehensive enough that they are unable to absorb any more education, no matter what the format. At that point, I should think that the quality of relaxation is the important criteria

oh sorry

[ubersecret]

Didn't read your whole post before I went into a big thing on sports above. But yes I agree.

[lhynard]

Well, the Bible does seem to make many references to wisdom and the training and renewing of the mind. It speaks against fickle pleasures. The word redendered "foolish" is more "ignorant" (oftentimes (Yay! I'm saying it again.) morally, but not always). So while I will grant you that different people have a different capacity for sucking in learning, that is not a proper excuse for always entertaining oneself with "lesser" pleasures