u were beautiful yesterday, but not today

[YASIR NAWAZ]

sallam everyone,
it's a very old question, but seems to attract and tease us every time it appears.
is beauty absolute, or is it entirely subjective? say yes or no, please don't say in between. whether moon looks beautiful to everyone every moon-night or it looks good when u r in a good mood? i really want to make two parties here and fight.. he! he! i mean discuss over beauty!! what an interesting fight it would be!! go for your opinion. is a flower always beautiful or is it only beautiful when u r in a good mood? thousands of examples r there.....

[Ananya]

Yasir.. beauty is absolute, except when its subjective. oops (ducking behind couch)

[Roman]

Beauty is not a state of mind, happiness is.

[YASIR NAWAZ]

Ananya,
when i say absolute it means regardless of anything like mood or taste, so if absolute then not subjective. explain how can it be both absolute and subjective giving soome examples???

[YASIR NAWAZ]

Roman,
thats right, beauty is not a state of mind and happiness is, but it still doesn't answer that is beauty entirely subjective or is it absolute regardless of mood and taste????

Moon

[Ananya]

Yasir, i was just razzing with ya. On a serious note, i think beauty is very much subjective or relative... however you may want to put it. Even if we consider a non-changing object, say a piece of art... we can say that by itself its absolute. But what defines it as beautiful is the perception of person appreciating it. I believe in the saying 'beauty is in eye of beholder'. Beauty cannot be defined definitely as red/black or sweet/sour .... its an intangible feeling that changes with our levels of perceptions.

[YASIR NAWAZ]

Ananya,
thats quite right, i agree with it myself that beauty is very subjective, but sometimes it's absolute and no one can deny that the thing is not beautiful...agreed?
Roman,
speak louder, can't hear your opinion?????

Moon

[Nisar Malik]

beauty is the beauty every time.
It is your eye to see it or not.

[Hum Sa Ho To Samne Aaye]

The Beauty Is In The Eye Of The BeerHolder

[YASIR NAWAZ]

ha! nice one hum sa!

Moon

[Roman]

Ok, Yasir.

Beauty is absolute.

If I were to define beauty in simple words, I would say it is the quality of an object (tangible or intangible) that inspires us and makes us admire it.

Now, if we are talking in terms of an individual then it would appear that beauty is in the eye of the beholder (or beerHolder as correctly put by Hum Sa Ho to Samne Ayay ) since depending on "mood" of that individual, moon may appear beautiful to him/her or irritating to the eye due to its light (specially when you are trying to sleep on roof like people in Pakistan do... moon can actually get pretty irritating... I have personally experienced that )

Nonetheless, if moon does not appear beautiful to an individual then it does not mean so for a different individual or rest of the world. This will make the beauty to be absolute since it is that particular individual's "eye-sight" which can't see it, but many others can.

However, taking the example of mosquiteos which are not considered beautiful (generally speaking) by all humans, one can say that beauty is in the eyes of beholder since all the humans agree on mosquitos not being objects of beauty. They sure don't inspire us to admire them, right? And if all the humans decide that mosquitoes are not objects of beauty then that's what it would imply.

But then, if we look at it at the ultimate, broad level, that is, defining absoluteness itself conditioned by the very observation of "human eye", absoluteness itself becomes relative in this case. i.e. if human eye or thought is not there to observe, what would be the point of reference and existence of absoluteness? That leaves us nowhere.

This makes me amend my definition of beauty to get somewhere with this (and if I can back that definition with logic then the definition would hold true). In some other simple words, then, I would define beauty as the very existence of an object, phenomenon, or entity. In such case, absoluteness would be unconditional (which is very basis of absoluteness) to human observation and we would have some grounds to start with.

If you look at it, the very existence of an object in itself is beautiful. Take again mosquitoes, for example. Generally speaking, we don't see any beauty in mosquitoes. Nevertheless, objectively speaking, the very existence of mosquito is a work of beauty. Its flight, its biological mechanism, its place in our ecosystem etc. It's all unproduceable and unmimicable by us humans, and hence has the power of inspiration for us.

Now replace mosquito with any object or phenomenon in the universe in the above example and you will see the unique way of existence of that object (or workings of, in case of a phenomenon) and you’ll find the its irreplaceability and “fitting” in the universe. That, in turn, would be a reflection of beauty itself. In such case, whether or not we find something beautiful, it is still beautiful since it exists and hence makes the beauty absolute.

So yeah, beauty is absolute.

(This does not mean, of course, that if you will prove me wrong, I won’t change my definition of beauty again )

[This message has been edited by Roman (edited July 31, 1999).]

[YASIR NAWAZ]

Roman,
ha! ha! of course u know it well, don't u? u r contradicting yourself. first u define beauty as the quality of an object. then u say existence is beauty. then where did that "object" come from?? the object had an existence and hence it had beauty for the first time according to your second definition, so it can't have another "beauty" as its predicate. now, according to u, xistence is beauty, it means everything that exists is beauty, i agree!!! BUT(ha ha not a nice word) our experince in reality is different. of course u excellently made mosquitoes a beauty and in fact they r a beauty but ur argument carries beauty beyond shape as in shape they don't look beautiful, which can be really interesting. u agree that mosquitoes don't look beautiful, then u say mosquitoes have some unique qualitites that make them beautiful like their flight etc., okay now these qualities of mechanism don't have to do anything with shape?? no they do, becuase they require a specific shape (including wings and a tube-like structure) to fly. so shape is still the part of beauty,right?
lets move forward, we know that the shape of mosquitoes is not beautiful, but we also agree that their shape is a part of their beauty as it fits very well for their mechanisms(which r also part of beauty) so the question arises that something can not be what it is part of? like if twelve bananas make a "dozen banana" then, each banana makes a dozen as if only one banana is taken away, there would not be dozen. so in case of beauty of mosquitoes, their bad-looking shape is one part of their beauty and the other part is their beautiful mechanism or "fitting" in the world. so we agree that the beauty of mosquitoes is made up of their bad-looking shape and their beautiful mechanism, and like bananas if one is taken, the dozen is gone, if one part of the beauty of mosquitoes is taken, the beauty is gone and hence mosquitoes are gone as we know existence is beauty. but we have a problem, guess what??? mosquitoes still don't "look" beautiful in shape...rather they look ugly to our eye, why??? is it the fault of our eye?? nope, its the bad-shape. but we know its bad shape is the part of its beauty, so it has to be beautiful, but how, since it has bad shape. now speaking rationally, the problem is that its shape might be perfect for its mechanism, but it does not match our taste of beauty. we can not see any beauty in mosquitoes shape, but we can "UNDERSTAND" its beauty by understanding its mechanism, so it still holds beauty supported by its bad shape but its beauty is not absolute, as it has a bad-looking shape despite a beautiful mechanism. so, the beauty would be absolute if both of its part, the one that "APPEAR"
like bad-shape and the others that are "HIDDEN" like its beautiful mechanism are present. therefore mosquitoes r beautiful but they don't have absolute beauty. so, the thing is absolutely beautiful if it has both apparent and internal beauty, which i think is rare, i believe it only belongs to God.
beauty itself is absolute, but it may or may not appear in the shape according to our taste or our sense of beauty.
mind teasing, but i have got my thesis for my next philosophy class, the paper is due on thursday. enjoy thinking!!


Moon

[Ananya]

So Mosquito is also beautiful with its intricate winged mechanism and place in ecosystem, etc. But Mrs Mosquito might not think along the same lines. For her probably it's the goon-goon music that makes him irresistible. Mrs Cockroach on the other hand may want to know whether you find Mr Roach cuter; Madam Grasshopper may be entirely convinced that no other flitting being is a bigger casanova than her green beloved. And yet a person like me, with all due respect to the beauty of mosquito and its strategic place in ecosystem, feel no remorse in squishing it between my palms and save myself from being bitten. So many attributes, all inherent in the being and absolute in themselves… existence is absolute too, but you cannot define exactly which set of attributes would be beautiful for all… how much beautiful they make a being, how much more or how much less beautiful than another being… beauty very much depends upon perception, and is relative. If it were absolute we would be able to define just how beautiful something/someone is, in unambiguous terms.



[This message has been edited by Ananya (edited August 01, 1999).]

[Roman]

Yasir:

> u r contradicting yourself. first u define beauty as the quality of an object. then u say existence is beauty.

And hence the words "This makes me amend my definition of beauty" in my message

> our experince in reality is different

That's why the words "to the ultimate broad level", which would imply going beyong our experience of reality in this case.

> u agree that mosquitoes don't look beautiful, then u say mosquitoes have some unique qualitites that make them beautiful like their flight etc

They don't look beautiful to us. i.e. The beholder. But since beauty is absolute, just because the beholder can't see it does not mean it does not exist. Also, I used the words "objectively speaking" in my message to point out that finding mosquitoes not beautiful is a subjective thought of us humans, but objectively, mosquitoes in fact beautiful whether it's their shape or flight.

Ananay:

You made some very good points, however, my point of view is in regard to the ultimate level. That is, absoluteness unconditional to our observation. If I find a flower not beautiful at one point of time, but later on after observing its characteristics and uniqueness, do find it beautiful then beauty of the flower has not changed any bit... before or after. It's my perception that has changed. The beauty of the flower was there all along, I just did not perceive it in the beginning. I still don't find mosquitoes to be beautiful even though I described how, in fact, it is beautiful (in its unconditional way... the flight, the shape, the mechanism etc.) Our observation and perception of things create the relativity and hence subjectivity in opinions we form about other things. And there is nothing wrong with it. After all, if we are not there to observe whatever is going on in the universe, what is there left to be absolute or not? But I tend to have a bird's-eye view on a matter like this. That is, detaching myself for a moment as being part of the "beholder" and look at something as it is... as it exists. And from that point, mosquitoes look beautiful to me. But when I come down and become part of the "beholder", they don't.

If you both were to choose to be part of behoder (the human observation), then I agree, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But if you were to distant yourself to have a bird's-eye view, then beauty would seem absolute. Since absoluteness is something that is unconditional in its existence to any other phenomenon or occurence, we need to have a detachment from our human, relative view to see it.

[YASIR NAWAZ]

Ananya,
i agree with u, we r unable to solve this dilemma with just our(human) eye, so yeah it can be right, miss grasshopper might think of his beloved as the most astonishing beautiful thing that exists. good job ananya!

Roman,
i understood the first time what you were emphasizing, i was trying to get my thesis.
as far as as u say "aboluteness in its existence", i would like to tell that
1)existence is perfection
2) absoluteness is free from imperfection.
3) therefore, absoluteness is perfection.
4) hence, absoluteness is existence.
so, if absoluteness is itself existence, u can't say absoluteness is unconditional in "its existence". your sntence is true except the where it says about the existence of absoluteness. and yes, i agree that absoluteness is unconditional, therefore existence is unconditonal, and we have to detach from ourselves if we want to understand the reality. but can we actually do that?? yes, i believe this is the quality of humans i would say as "intellect". we have ability to detach from ourselves and see the world...but we have some limits for this ability to use. also u r right, our perceptions seem to have a lot of faults. if a farmer in Gujrat is shown a hologram of dracola on his way back to home at the night, he would definitely take him as a "bhoot" and he would think that it really exists, but it doesn't matter what he perceives, it matters what is in reality. and we know it is just a hologram and no bhoot. however, we can never deny the existence of hologram, we could see that and we can understand that, so for us the hologram exists in reality and understanding, while for poor farmer, it does not exist at all, infact a bhoot exists for him and no hologram is there for him.
btw, nice job, he! he! o bhai dubai kab bhijwao gay?????

Moon

[This message has been edited by YASIR NAWAZ (edited August 01, 1999).]