/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.11596075]

Why do we find things beautiful?

[Anonymous No.11596082]

The soul.

[Anonymous No.11596083]

because they intimate the transcendent

[Anonymous No.11596087]

>>11596082
What the fuck kind of explanation is that

[Anonymous No.11596091]

real eyes
realize
real lies

[Anonymous No.11596096]

>>11596075
irregularities that release dopamine due to emotional stimulation, emotional stimulation being an evolved trait of the brain to make decisions quickly without having to think about them.

[Anonymous No.11596097]

>>11596087
The only kind that matters, friend.

[Anonymous No.11596100]

god

[Anonymous No.11596102]

>>11596075
before any dumbass says anything else, read this
ignore all posts until you've read it
I can promise you none of the undergrad incel brainlets who will flood this thread have read it
they haven't read anything other than wikipedia summaries
so just read pic related
do it

[Anonymous No.11596106]

>>11596096
ahahaha imagine being this spiritually castrated

[Anonymous No.11596117]

>>11596096
>doesn't believe in love
Literally the only point of contact with reality. Nothing else matters.

[Anonymous No.11596129]

>>11596083
Wrong; they emulate the ideal Forms.

[Anonymous No.11596132]

>>11596129
>Wrong; they emulate the ideal Forms.

didn't we just say the same thing? intimate, emulate, whatever, they point to the Beyond in the most eminent way possible

[Anonymous No.11596139]

>>11596075
Read Plato and then be done with aesthetics forever!

[Anonymous No.11596151]

>>11596096
Experiencing beauty feels a lot more complex than a release of dopamine, and I don't see why it'd be good as an evolutionary trait

[Anonymous No.11596154]

those who didn't died out
ala
beauty is objectively true

[Anonymous No.11596169]

>>11596151
Not every trait of ours is positive, that isn't how it works, we have a complex mixture of traits that has happened to result in a superiority likely lending to our consciousness, but we see also that our self awareness causes a lot of problems and is imperfect. On the experiencing beauty thing, I mean isn't experiencing beauty very simple?

[Anonymous No.11596183]

>>11596151
I agree, but experiencing beauty is an emotion that happens to tell us that we should want/experience whatever thing we find beautiful. Beautiful flowers are normally more edible than others. Many fruits evolved with us because humans found them visually attractive, so they grew to be more visually beautiful. The same with flowers that we keep around just for fun. Women have changed over time and been selectively bred for more beautiful features and characteristics because the beautiful ones get preggo. Land that is fertile and alive is more beautiful than one that is not. If we go by the definition of art is something that provides an emotional experience and elicits a reaction, one of those reactions can be beauty for more or less the same reasons.

[Anonymous No.11596185]

>>11596169
the existence of beauty non-deducible from a strict understanding of material processes, which is why this weird need to disenchant and reduce beauty to = x is so emblematic of everything that's wrong with (certain) philosophy today

[Anonymous No.11596192]

>>11596183
>things are beautiful because we want to eat/fuck them

yeah dude music is beautiful because it helps me get laid, got it. a blue sky is beautiful cause uhhh it reminds me of water and i drink water when im thirsty, platonists btfo

lord give me strength

[Anonymous No.11596195]

>>11596185
If you cant logically prove the existance of something, should it not be your duty to attempt to prove or disprove that thing? Otherwise it's just baseless belief in something. Which, at that point, whats the point of philosophizing at all?

[Anonymous No.11596206]

>>11596195
Prove this statement.

[Anonymous No.11596222]

>>11596192
The pleasure of western cannon came from an elaborate list of frequencies that signaled security or danger. A minor seventh sounds like dick on it's own, without the context of build up and resolution from the key it's in. A blue sky is beautiful because it represents another day I'm not dead, but you should kill yourself.

[Anonymous No.11596234]

>>11596222
epin

[Anonymous No.11596246]

>>11596185
But you think concepts of love and beauty have less worth if you understand them material, whereas I don't, so that's your problem to address and not mine

[Anonymous No.11596251]

>>11596246
*materially

[Anonymous No.11596255]

>>11596222
A minor seventh sounds great on it's own you insufferable faggot.

[Anonymous No.11596261]

>>11596246
no, they are more beautiful and miraculous precisely for being the effluence of material chaos, and is just what vindicates love as Love, because something like it exists in the void

[Anonymous No.11596315]

>>11596096
Ok what this anon said is horseshit, but I would genuinely like to know if scientists have come up with a substantially fleshed out theory as to why we find things beautiful (as in not just ladies with wide hips but sunsets, stars, mathematical equations, music, wildlife documentaries, etc etc) and what the physiological grounding of the beauty experience is.

[Anonymous No.11596325]

Simplicity, Unity, Harmony, Symmetry.
When it comes to abstract art, I am more perplexed.

[Anonymous No.11596332]

>>11596261
But we don't exist in a void and nor does anything else

[Anonymous No.11596333]

Because the beautiful thing shares in the form of beauty

[Anonymous No.11596341]

>>11596315
there will never, ever be one

>>11596332
relative to the aspirations of naïve theists, yes we do. there are only material processes and the ideality they constitute

[Anonymous No.11596344]

>>11596333
wheur du forms cum from?

[Anonymous No.11596347]

>>11596341
melkobukvenniy please

[Anonymous No.11596348]

Pleasantly refreshed at all the Platonists on /lit/ tbqh

Beauty is an intimation of the divine. Read Borges’s short story The Approach to Al-mu’tasim, apply the good people the protagonist meets to all instances of beauty, goodness, truth, etc. it’s all being filtered down from the highest level.

[Anonymous No.11596357]

>>11596315
Not quite what you were looking for but interesting nonetheless and applicable: https://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/01/health/science-of-awe/index.html

[Anonymous No.11596358]

>>11596139
Tbf the one serious mistake he made.

[Anonymous No.11596360]

>>11596075
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwS0FAjVDh0

idk but this song is fucking me up

[Anonymous No.11596365]

>>11596348
Platonism is legitimately some of the most retarded philosophy I've ever read

[Anonymous No.11596374]

>>11596183
>experiencing beauty is an emotion that happens to tell us that we should want/experience whatever thing we find beautiful
Then explain sea storms/hurricanes.

[Anonymous No.11596377]

>>11596344
Nous

[Anonymous No.11596384]

>>11596195
>If you cant logically prove the existance of something, should it not be your duty to attempt to prove or disprove that thing?
Thus the gigantic waste of time that has been trying to refute philosophical skepticism.

[Anonymous No.11596385]

>>11596365
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ you gotta be woke to get it, son

[Anonymous No.11596391]

>>11596222
>A blue sky is beautiful because it represents another day
Are you trolling?

[Anonymous No.11596394]

>>11596365
lol some trog on 4chan thinks he can step to plato

>>11596374
this is a great point, how would reductionists explain the sublime? that which poses an implicit, if not explicit, threat to one's being? there are men who have written about the terrible beauty of war you know.

[Anonymous No.11596400]

>>11596100
>>11596333
>>11596344
>>11596377
platonic forms are real and when discussed share in the form of the consecutive numbers >>11596348 platonism confirmed correct, rejoice brothers.

[Anonymous No.11596405]

>>11596325
>Simplicity, Unity, Harmony, Symmetry
Then why aren't rugs and wallpaper the most beautiful examples of visual art?

[Anonymous No.11596413]

why do we find small mammals cute,

and things like spiders, roaches, etc. abhorrent?

[Anonymous No.11596420]

So, I'm attracted to shemales because they partake of the form of beauty. Good to know.

[Anonymous No.11596422]

>>11596365
It's the worst philosophy imaginable until you try to do any better.

[Anonymous No.11596427]

>>11596413
spiders find spiders sexy. so do snails.
there must some link between beauty and sexual benefits.....................

[Anonymous No.11596430]

>>11596400
Goddamn son. Are we sharing in the form of beauty by getting dubs?

[Anonymous No.11596434]

>>11596427
biological attraction =/= metaphysical sexualization

[Anonymous No.11596479]

>>11596434
who wants to have metaphysical sex with me?

[Anonymous No.11596487]

>>11596183
>>11596374
Another point that is maybe worth mentioning besides the sublime and dangerous is the fact that notions of beauty differ widely from individual to individual while what is good to humans as a species (edible flowers, fertile land, etc.) should be universal

[Anonymous No.11596504]

>>11596420
Shemales are the Apotheosis of humanity.

They are the refining of the human form into perfectness.

Allow me to elaborate, the human species has a dual nature femenine and masculine each with strenghts and defects

Pain, suffering and effort add value when seeking a higher goal, this is a universal truth that ranges from christian martyrdom, islamic jihad, secular stoicism to japanese zen


Thus shemales combine the direct mechanical thought of men with the more subtle femine way of thinking

They saw everything in the whole range of human perspective giving them an understanging superior to any one

Their bodies have been re shaped through the suffering of hormones, diets and surgery, then their spirits battered by hate

And from this path they emerge, stronger in their spirit, perfect in body and mind

The true Ubermench Nietzche only dreamed of

The next step of human evolution

[Anonymous No.11596505]

>>11596422
>you can't do better so therefore it's good

[Anonymous No.11596507]

>>11596487
>flowers are beautiful because they're edible

Bruh you cant make this shit up. Unbelievable.

[Anonymous No.11596511]

>>11596096
>haha it's just CHEMICALS IN UR BRAIN dude... I bet you're a Christian lmao

[Anonymous No.11596515]

>>11596487
But that's silly. There's certain which I hate that you might like, and which is perfectly edible, and my not liking it theoretically inhibits my chances of survival - these things are complex and individual and that diversity is part of the strength of human beings and thing that makes us dominant

[Anonymous No.11596521]

>>11596487
And also that there are conspicuously selfless forms of beauty -- as in you can feel while finding something beautiful that you have no personal interest in the possession, consumption or exploitation of it whatsoever. Compare finding some thot attractive to admiring elegance of a jellyfish.

[Anonymous No.11596533]

>>11596400
I'd FUCK that dragon guy
That's real beauty

[Anonymous No.11596532]

>>11596521
In fact I would go even further -- the perception of beauty in a thing motivates you to value its subsistence for its own sake.

[Anonymous No.11596547]

>>11596532
To the extent that people will do things contrary to their wellbeing to preserve beauty, even if it is of a kind that could never materially benefit humanity -- preserving endangered species at great financial cost despite their uselessness to human endeavours.

[Anonymous No.11596557]

>>11596532
>>11596547
Couldn't that be a side-effect of the consciousness that has arisen for evolutionary purposes and which finds things beautiful for objectively useful reasons? Is there any way to find out anyway?

[Anonymous No.11596560]

>>11596075
why not lol

[Anonymous No.11596569]

>>11596096

[Anonymous No.11596576]

this explains it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHw4MMEnmpc

[Anonymous No.11596583]

>>11596557
>Is there any way to find out anyway?
Perhaps not. But ee can conjecture whether it could even be possible in principle, given infinite time and resources.

[Anonymous No.11596595]

>>11596505
imagine having the need to post something as shallow as this post
>so therefore
lmao

[Anonymous No.11596608]

>>11596533
You contemplate the form of beauty and dubs are bestowed. Clearly platonic forms are not only real but this is proof of the beauty of dubs.

[Anonymous No.11596619]

>>11596569
>believing the chemicals to tell you they are chemicals
I don’t get it. What’s the hypocrisy?

[Anonymous No.11596622]

>>11596183
Women are not beautiful, only men can be beautiful, and you are an incel.

[Anonymous No.11596631]

>>11596622
Women can be beautiful; men can be sublime.

[Anonymous No.11596632]

>>11596595
T H I C K O

[Anonymous No.11596634]

>>11596631
I stand corrected.

[Anonymous No.11596640]

>>11596619
What reason is there to trust a fucking chemical? Take mushrooms and discover the secrets of the universe, bro. Tldr: naturalism defeats itself.

[Anonymous No.11596649]

>/lit/ thread about aesthetics
>muh Playdoh
>Scotrum
>Simplicity, Unity, Harmony, Symmetry. (This shit is for real, it's got capital letters!)
>scientific fucking reductionism
You're like swine bathing time and time again in the same intellectual mud. Where do you find the willpower and the dull, brainless confidence to regurgitate all this bullshit? How are you not sick and tired of yourselves already?

[Anonymous No.11596673]

>>11596649
Ok then faggot let's hear your incredible theory of aesthetics. Buckle up kids because this one is gonna knock your socks off!

[Anonymous No.11596679]

>>11596649
>I am superior
>I see the world from a greater perspective than these cretins
What have you got to thrown into the mix, bucko?

[Anonymous No.11596683]

>>11596649
Who is Scotum?

[Anonymous No.11596690]

>>11596683
He means to say Scotus but is so entranced by his aesthetic knowledge that the tears of ecstasy he sheds make his keyboard slippery.

[Anonymous No.11596720]

>>11596673
>>11596679
>What have you got to thrown into the mix, bucko?
Absolutely nothing.

[Anonymous No.11596746]

>>11596720
Damn dude you sure showed us.

[Anonymous No.11596748]

>>11596075
Beauty is objective. Those who do not find beauty in the same things I do simply never have and never will experience it.
I posses the absolute truth. My GF is the prettiest girl on all of the universe

[Anonymous No.11596751]

>>11596075
because we want to resemble them

[Anonymous No.11596765]

>>11596751
Is this the reason behind "God I wish that was me"-posting?

[Anonymous No.11596771]

>>11596720
Then why bother coming into tgis thread?

[Anonymous No.11596794]

>>11596096
I feel like we have evolved past the point of living just of primal urges and solely being tied down by our nature. We are at a point where some people are able to simply overcome there biology through their contentiousness. This fact allows us to appreciate beauty in its myriad forms something i doubt would have an a place as an evolutionary niche.

[Anonymous No.11596845]

>>11596746
You seem pretty butthurt for someone who argues against a guy with no arguments. Sorry if I denigrated your great, precious thoughts that you posted itt.
I've been seeing these gay ass threads for years. You could copy-paste replies from the old into the new ones. It's always the same standard pseudry and same simplistic points and shitflinging. That's what I'm sick of. People can barely move beyond muh Greeks (except for the Catholics, who have moved all the way onto medieval theology). Where the fuck does beauty even manifest at all? People ITT are talking about art, women, cute animals and storms as if they were all assumed to be beautiful. What the fuck? It's just talking past each other, wankery that doesn't even give you an orgasm, you're just doing it.

>>11596771
I hoped that I'd come across someone who knows their shit and can actually put together a coherent, at least mildly enlightening and original post.

[December !!TY0+NRMplWe No.11596860]

90% of these posts are chatbots.

[Anonymous No.11596869]

>>11596097
Ora pro nobis

[Anonymous No.11596886]

>>11596860
Better a chatbot than a tripfag

[Anonymous No.11596897]

>>11596845
>you guys are all dumb and don't have any original ideas
>lol no of course i don't have any original ideas but you guys are dumb and i'm smart
>you guys should move beyond the greeks
>lol no i haven't read the greeks or have any arguments against them or know any alternatives but i'm smart and you're dumb for engaging with them.
>why? uhhh because ur pseuds and ur points are simple
>what no i don't have any complex points but ur still dumb
>you guys are dumb for talking about what you think is beautiful
>lol that's just talking "past" each other.
>what do you mean that's how imageboards work? people just drop in their two cents into a thread? that doesn't make any sense to me
>hehe look at all these dummies trying to have a conversation. unlike me, a man who sees past all the wankery
>let me just go ahead and make the most seething wanker post in this entire thread
>looks like someone is a lil butthurt hehe. i sure showed everyone how smart i am
where the fuck do retards like you even come from? did they make you in a lab?

[Anonymous No.11596919]

>>11596897
Based

[Anonymous No.11596951]

>>11596897
Absolutely btfo

[Anonymous No.11596965]

>>11596897
When did I say that I'm smart? I'm not smart, if I were I would give actual arguments regarding this topic, if I felt that something should be added to/said against the consensus.
>>you guys are dumb for talking about what you think is beautiful
But then different people will talk about vastly different concepts that they put the same name on. How is that a functional discussion?
>>lol no i haven't read the greeks or have any arguments against them or know any alternatives but i'm smart and you're dumb for engaging with them.
I have read the Greeks, there are many potential arguments against various Greek thinkers (like every thinker ever), and it is a problem when you engage only with them and act like the following centuries of philosophy barely exist.
>>what do you mean that's how imageboards work? people just drop in their two cents into a thread? that doesn't make any sense to me
A question like "Why do we find things beautiful?" cannot be answered in two-cent comments. I don't know about you but I don't want this board to be the place where you shit out the first thing that comes to your mind and call it a day.

[Anonymous No.11596969]

If Platonism was true a triangle would give me a greater sense of beauty than a mountain because it is closer to the divine form, being mathematically precise, yet it doesn't

[Anonymous No.11596971]

>>11596897
good job anon i just want to hurt the other dickheads massive,seething phallic ego.

[Anonymous No.11597038]

>>11596965
>When did I say that I'm smart? I'm not smart
don't worry I already know
>if I were I would give actual arguments regarding this topic, if I felt that something should be added to/said against the consensus.
ok. and yet here you are posting. mindlessly critiquing without any substance. saying that this is shit and that is shit but when asked the question "why?" you claim that you have nothing to say, your attempt to save face is noticed by everyone. since you admit you have nothing to add then you should leave this thread but of course you won't.
>But then different people will talk about vastly different concepts that they put the same name on. How is that a functional discussion?
wow dude it's almost like different people see beauty in different things.
>I have read the Greeks, there are many potential arguments against various Greek thinkers (like every thinker ever), and it is a problem when you engage only with them and act like the following centuries of philosophy barely exist.
you mean the following centuries of intense neo-platonism followed by medieval scholasticism influenced by plato? or how about the list of modern philosophers who touch on ideas plato raised? or how about the arguments plato raised against his own theory in parmenides? if you have any critiques then let us hear them. oh wait you won't because you don't know fucking shit and can't scrounge together even one tiny little argument. you could literally be copypasting points from plato's own works as counterpoints but even that is too complex for your pathetic brain.
>A question like "Why do we find things beautiful?" cannot be answered in two-cent comments. I don't know about you but I don't want this board to be the place where you shit out the first thing that comes to your mind and call it a day.
welcome to 4chan.org. if you look through this thread there are a lot of throwaway comments but also some effortposting. that's just how this website works sorry pal.

[Anonymous No.11597130]

>>11596969
You're confusing actual platonism with gnostics who merged neoplatonic and neopythagorean ideas together.

[Anonymous No.11597293]

>>11596619
>I trust SSRIs to tell me that I'm not sad

[Anonymous No.11598524]

>>11596683
Scruton I think, from the video that was posted (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHw4MMEnmpc)) and he meant to mock him by calling him Scrotum

[Anonymous No.11598539]

>>11596845
>People ITT are talking about art, women, cute animals and storms as if they were all assumed to be beautiful. What the fuck?
Are you retarded? The simple fact that people find them beautiful makes them beautiful, there's no other necessary criterion

[Anonymous No.11598558]

>>11596091
TUPAC

[Anonymous No.11599535]

>>11598558
I always thought that was attributed to Tom Waits...?

[Anonymous No.11600425]

?

[Anonymous No.11600470]

>>11596897
based

[Anonymous No.11600722]

>>11596511
Enjoy being a slave for the rest of your miserable life, kissless virgin. I bet getting cucked like the passive beta faggot you are in hopes of a better "afterlife" feels great.

[Anonymous No.11601616]

>>11596075
aesthetics
because we wish to be with them and have them and be them

[Anonymous No.11601678]

This site is genuinely garbage. None of you are even trying to be wise. You are into literature for reasons of ego, not reasons of genuine seeking. What a shame. I've been wanting to leave here for a while but haven't had the willpower to do so, but after reading this thread, and seeing what a shitstorm this thread is, when the topic is quite earnest and perenially relevant, has left me sickened. No wisdom in even a single comment of this thread. You should all feel ashamed of yourselves, none of you deserve to even have access to literature at all. Goodbye /lit/, I genuinely regret all the time I ever spent here. Your judgment of me no longer affects me, because I see that this whole time none of you were even intellectuals in the first place, only impostors pretending to be such. Goodbye, I will never spend another day in this rotten place.

[Anonymous No.11601697]

>>11601678
Farewell, Anonymous; for thee my heart is sore:
Adieu for ever, We shall see thee no more.

[Anonymous No.11601729]

>>11596075
>>11596096
>>11596100
>>11596129
>>11596183
Reminder, don't assert things that you don't know. And even better, know that you don't know anything and then don't assert anything. Don't expect an answer in this thread, OP.

[Anonymous No.11602009]

>>11601678
If you’re the same guy who was having a big sperg out earlier in the thread, you
should unironically kill yourself. You are one of the biggest pseuds wo simultaneously has no knowledge of anything. I’ve never seen anyone quite as fucking retarded as you. You’re like a reverse Socrates “the only thing I know is that I know everything”. The only blight on this board is you, compared to you every shitposter itt is a genius. Please think of your family and your friends who suffer because of your existence and fucking jump in front of a train.

[Anonymous No.11602153]

>>11596096
this but unironcially

[Anonymous No.11602936]

>>11596315
Probably because you can't be fucking all the time and you also can't be depressed all the time you aren't fucking. Plus there's plenty you need to do that isn't fucking. Also, the other, less utilitarian things present in a positive experience spurred by something more obviously utilitarian become associated with the positive experience (the opposite also happens with negative experiences), probably as a way to adapt and make it easier find that positive experience(or, avoid a negative experience for the opposite).

[Anonymous No.11602960]

>>11596075
there is no reason, our brain is done so that it makes that
>>11596096
based but bluepilled

[Anonymous No.11602963]

>>11596394
That can explained either by the point that there's no reason to expect a person's perception of beauty to be perfect, or just that things we see as inherently "negative" may have "positive" associations we either do not realize, or we refuse to mention for one reason or another. While violence is almost universally denounced as overall being bad, during most of man's time on earth and even to a degree today violence is a useful way of guaranteeing the continued propagation of your genes. While reproducing is one way to increase an organism's share of the gene pool, killing other organism's is another, and in fact a much more effective way of doing so given a lack of resources or access to them.

[Anonymous No.11602972]

>>11601678
>wisdom
glad you're gone you larping pseud

[Anonymous No.11603005]

>>11596091
>>11598558
>>11599535

I thought this was from Pink Floyd on TPATGOD (Take up thy sthetoscope and walk)

>Doctor kindly tell your wife that
>I’m alive
>Flowers thrive
>Real eyes
>Realize
>Real lieeeees