Skepticism in Aesthetics

In previous chapters, we discussed epistemology, ethics, and politics. In this chapter, we discuss another field in which skepticism is applicable: aesthetics. We left it to the last because there are fewer objections to skepticism in aesthetics than elsewhere, due to a combination of two factors: (1) nihilism being regrettably a respected contender in aesthetics, and (2) the confusion of nihilism with skepticism that is the root of the prevalent hostility to skepticism. Perhaps there is also less dogmatism about beauty than about other matters, possibly because, regrettably, thinkers do not take beauty sufficiently seriously. It is serious all the same. It influences our lives. People make great investments in it – in the arts and in personal grooming. We argue about paintings to hang in the museum or in the home and what kind of building to construct and which cosmetics fit which person best. In what follows, we offer a new fragmentary and tentative theory of the judgment of beauty. We suggest that this fragment is applicable to discussions about beauty in order to increase its rationality and reduce its unpleasant emotional aspect.

Traditional aesthetics comprises the traditional studies of the following question: What kinds of aesthetic judgments are valid – that is, certain or at least plausible? This question arises because people argue about aesthetics, and such arguments imply that there are aesthetical criteria, explicit or not, and that they are open to discussion.