I didn't respond because it felt like the argument was just going to keep going in a circle. I'd be pretty shocked if I could convince an Art or English major that their chosen profession was, more or less, worthless over an internet forum.
How can you miss something that never existed? Imagine a world where everything exists not because someone thought it was pretty, but only exists due to function. If Art was put on a back burner and people focused on scientific or concrete progress, do you think the world would be completely empty? Let me ask you this, is art not subjective? Perhaps you would simply view the scientific creations as “beautiful” and “art”.
I suppose my feeling is that art shouldn’t be deleted as a whole, but it shouldn’t be someone’s profession. It should be a hobby, or a side-effect of a functioning accomplishment.
There is already a 50 page long thread on religion, so I’m not going to go into discussing religion and spirituality, but I can see your point on that, whether I agree with it or not.
I appreciate your taking the time to respond.
My ultimate opinion from experience, whether it’s insensitive or not, is that a lot of artists tend to be people that didn’t do well in math and science so they decided to take the easy way out and become “artists” because, unlike in math and science, there is no “wrong answer” in art.
You seem like an intelligent individual from my experience, and I’m going to outright say that I don’t believe that you personally fit into that. However, I’m sure that comment will spark some liveliness into this thread.
Edit: And we get all of Page 13 to discuss it.
[SIZE=2]I think you vastly underestimate the exploration of human experience to the sustained happiness and productivity of our society. But you are correct in saying that this particular argument will become circular, so let’s move on to some of your other claims.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]Your hypothetical about an artless world fails to consider the alternative, which I was surprised by. Imagine a world in which math had never been invented, for example. What would we not have? Well, plenty. We would be without a true conception of time (well…maybe), without conceptions of measurement or counting, maybe even without some of the tenets of deduction (deductive logic is, of course, not inseparable from mathematics). Would we miss it? Of course not; we would be unaware of its potential existence. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]But we can’t put math OR art on the “backburner” right now because we ARE aware of their existence and many of our basic, daily-employed concepts come from our knowledge of these fields. How many days have you ever gone without rating something as good or bad in a subjective way? I would guess none, since this covers everything from to whether your dinner was up to par to whether the new Slipknot CD sucks (it does). Can the world FUNCTION without subjective aesthetics? Of course. It can also function without mathematics or physics (by this I mean a knowledge of these fields, naturally). But what is the compelling argument for the deletion of any of these fields? I think you used a dangerous word when you asked if the world would be “empty” without art. Would it bring on Armageddon? Probably not. Would it be empty? I think that’s a perfect term for what it WOULD become.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]Don’t be so quick to assert that art is subjective. There is an entire field of philosophy (it’s called aesthetics) devoted to that, and it’s a very complicated question. Personally? I think specific expressions of art can be interpreted subjectively, and that’s about as far as I go. 80% of aestheticians wouldn’t touch the “art is subjective” claim with a 10 foot pole…and neither will I. I’ll just say that it isn’t a black and white sort of claim and leave it at that. I can point you in the direction of some material on both sides if you’re interested.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]I must say that I’m a little disturbed by your assertion about artists as failed scientists or mathematicians. Realistically, the majority of human beings fail to achieve what they first set out to do with their lives, no matter which field they decide to pursue. But to say that most artists are simply failures at other fields is an interesting sort of claim. I think you’re wrong (and am curious as to how you arrived at your conclusion), but it doesn’t really matter to the overall argument either way. If the majority of physics majors decided to pursue physics because they couldn’t deconstruct poetry (and there are a lot of people like that), that doesn’t invalidate physics as a profession or relegate it to the status of mere hobby. That step in your argument is the one I’d like to pursue, because arguing about whether or not most artists are failed scientists is a silly and unproductive sort of argument. Here’s what I will say. You made no qualms about arguing from experience. I have never met a single professional artist who fits your criteria of failed scientist-become-artist, so I will simply say that my experience is in complete contradiction to yours and that, by virtue of this sort of cancellation, we must find other ways to address this issue. On the off chance that you may actually just be arguing that a lot of people chose undergrad majors in the arts because they are easier, you can surely see how this fails to necessitate the relegation of art to a non-profession (not to mention that majors like psychology, criminal justice, communication studies, anthropology, sociology, and education are similarly popular and none of those fall within the boundaries of art).[/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]So, let me ask you this. You say that art shouldn’t be someone’s profession. I’m wondering how you came to this conclusion. One would ask, of course, should something like physics also be given the same non-professional status? My presumption is that you would say that it should not and you would use two claims to back this up: 1) a consequentialistic argument that physics is more beneficial to society than, let’s use a parallel example, poetry and 2) a claim about the amount of time and energy needed to successfully pursue physics versus that needed for the pursuit of poetry. I won’t talk about the first claim; I’ve already explained why I think it is a poor argument and you know my reasons. The second claim is the interesting one, and I think it speaks to a flawed understanding of art. When you say “there is no wrong answer in art,” you are making presumptions about the nature of art which I think are incorrect; namely, that art is a field which is without rules. This is a misconception brought about by post-modernist art, which strove to break the rules set in place by previous generations, and it’s a mistake that a LOT of people make. There are a lot of theories about how to determine what is and is not art, but one of the most popular (and I think the correct one) is Arthur Danto’s: art is any expression which is, at its foundation, the assignment by the artist of metaphorical significance to something, whether it be a set of words, a set of sounds or a set of visuals. This definition does, in fact, include wrong answers; coherent assignation of metaphorical significance can easily be argued for or argued against through nice, objective logic, just as a psychologist might argue that another psychologist’s data does not say what they have claimed it says but actually says another thing entirely. This is the first step, for Danto, of separating good art from bad: bad art does not contain logically coherent metaphorical significance.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=2]I also think that you’re under the impression that the creation of good art is much easier than it actually is (because, of course, someone who only creates bad art is not relevant to our discussion about whether art is a viable profession just as a biologist who only draws faulty conclusions from their data is not relevant to a discussion of whether biology is a viable profession), but I’m not going to try to tackle that one. If you’re ever really, genuinely curious to find out how difficult it is, I would suggest asking a faculty member at UNCC in any of the artistic fields to critique a piece of your own art until it is ready to be displayed professionally.[/SIZE]