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Article 7005 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: oreinert@daimi.aau.dk (Olavur Heri Reinert)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: what is consciousness for?
Message-ID: <1992Sep21.192146.9242@daimi.aau.dk>
Date: 21 Sep 92 19:21:46 GMT
References: <1992Aug13.025506.2404@news.media.mit.edu> <1992Aug17.171723.5599@spss.com> <iordonez.715366473@academ01> <1992Sep1.183909.4018@spss.com> <iordonez.716751021@academ01> <1992Sep19.222725.26383@daimi.aau.dk> <exukjb.200.717033883@exu.ericsson.se>
Sender: oreinert@daimi.aau.dk (Olavur Heri Reinert)
Distribution: comp.ai.philosophy
Organization: DAIMI: Computer Science Department, Aarhus University, Denmark
Lines: 32

exukjb@exu.ericsson.se (ken bell) writes:

>>iordonez@academ01.mty.itesm.mx (Ivan Ordonez-Reinoso) writes:
>>>I think we have a notion of beauty, but I couldn't say what it is. I
>>>would even dare to say nobody has the least idea of what beauty is,
>>>since nobody has ever formalized the concept yet.

>>   The concept 'red' is not formalised either, would you claim that
>>none of us have "the least idea of" what red is?

>>   I would say what is beautiful or not depends on your cultural
>>background and personal taste. I don't think you'll ever find a single
>>thing about which all people in the world will agree "it's not
>>beautiful".


>And I think you haven't spent five minutes in a serious study of 
>esthetics. There certainly have been formalizations of the nature of
>beauty.  You may not agree with them but they'er there; and unless
>we had some general idea of what beauty is--something that could be
>given an explicit verbal definition--then how do I even know what
>you're talking about?  How do I know you're not talking about the Boston
>Tea Party instead of beauty?

   You're right, I haven't studied aesthetics. I'm using what I've learnt
about Wittgenstein. It's perfectly possible to be well aware of what
a conversation is about and to participate in it, without having to
formalise or give explicit verbal definitions of all concepts in use.
"Understanding is using".


/Olav


