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THE MIDDLE AGES:

THE AGE OF ANTIQUITY From the Pythagoreans to Vitruvius the Roman Architect & Engineer: An introduction to the objectivity vs. subjectivity of beauty in philosophical aesthetics. THE MIDDLE AGES:.

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THE MIDDLE AGES:

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  1. THE AGE OF ANTIQUITYFrom the Pythagoreans to Vitruvius the Roman Architect & Engineer:An introduction to the objectivity vs. subjectivity of beauty in philosophical aesthetics

  2. THE MIDDLE AGES: When the philosophers and theologians of the Middle Ages stated “X” was beautiful were they acknowledging a quality that X inherently possesses or did they confer “beauty” upon it?

  3. Consider the question this way: A bouquet of Tulips • When you claim that X is beautiful, do you simply mean that you find it pleasing? • Would you say that all things are by themselves aesthetically neutral, neither beautiful or ugly?

  4. Consider the following questions: • Would you agree with Plato: “There are things which are beautiful always and by themselves? • Would agree with Protagoras: “Man is the measure of all things: nothing else but the pleasures of the eyes and ear”? Plato ; School of Athens by Raphael

  5. Consider the following points. A bouquet of Roses • It is naïve to believe that the theory of beauty was “objective” until the impact of modern thought • Rather, the subjective theory of beauty has always existed in Western thought (e.g., the Sophists). • The objective theory of beauty was simply predominant in Ancient and Medieval thought.

  6. Middle Ages: • The Middle Ages continued the two views of the Antiquity with the objective view still dominant but more united than times past. • In sum, the Middle Ages believed that beauty is an objective property of things, but conceded that it is perceived by man by subjective means. Eleanor of Aquitaine

  7. Middle Ages: • Another notable difference is that while ancient philosophers considered objective beauty to be self-evident, the scholastics thought it was an arguable point. Eleanor of Aquitaine

  8. Middle Ages: “I have to ask whether something is beautiful because it pleases, or whether it pleases because it is beautiful. And I will receive, no doubt, the answer that it pleases because it is beautiful.” De vera rel. XXXII 59. St. Augustine: 354-430 A.D.

  9. Pythagoreans: Beauty is the property of the universe. • Argument: Aesthetic view of objectivity was cosmocentric: beauty is the property of the universe; man doesn’t invent beauty; he discovers beauty. • Pythagoreans, a named after the Pre-Socratic Philosopher Pythagoras (570?-495?) B.C. the most famous pre-Socratic philosopher, the “father of numbers.” They believed that everything was related to mathematics and that numbers were the ultimate reality. • Harmony, proportion, and number are the objective basis of beauty because harmony derives from order, order from proportion, proportion from measure, and measure from number. • “Order and proportion,” they said, “are beautiful and useful while order and lack of proportion are ugly and useless.” ~ Stobias, Ecl. IV. 1.40 H, frg. D 4, Diels.

  10. Next time:THE RENAISSANCE

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