I think the my own unreduced version, verbose though it was, captures the sequence of thought and its own justification, where yes in the end it was your point, but my reformulation addressed its raising less than the conclusion. Obviously I was not trying to disagree, but I read "Maybe there is something roughly comparable in the response of sexual attraction or excitation. I think it is a common for men -- and women too -- to be more sexually drawn to someone who is not generally accepted as the most "beautiful" person in the room" as carrying the tone that one might expect degrees of beauty, as I said, to relate to attractive interest. It might be that the sequence of my reactions was inflicted from the beginning what I read, and probably influenced also when William read the same, in Derek's comment about the claiming Goya as beautiful being bizarre that his usage invoked the appealing/beauty relation. So the analogy compared Derek's "I cannot tear myself away but this surely is not beautiful", where one would expect, opposed to the statement, its captivating aspect to be called its beauty, and "That woman is beautiful but not as attractive as less beautiful women" where one would expect, again from the qualification, that a more beautiful woman would indeed be more attractive. The terms of disputing the first I think are still well founded, though I am not averse to the usage of "beauty", as it can seem hegemonic in aesthetic discourses (there's another for you Derek) whereas the second is not as questionable, I think most people adequately understand attraction relative to a person's physical beauty (and further that it is widely applied differently than the designation of art beauty). I'm not sure that I have clarified where I saw the discrepancy, but in end of course we both acknowledged we agree.
-----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, April 29, 2008 12:18 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Beauty? I think not! Brian writes: > [Classically beautiful people are often] not found sexy. > But that formulation just misses the distinction in the observation, that > attractiveness is just not a function of beauty. What appeals to us > sexually in others is not degrees of outward beauty. > But Brian, reread my posting. That was exactly my point. And the parallel I was trying to draw with "works of art" is that our "interest", their compelling power, often has nothing to do with what we're inclined to call "beauty". ************** Need a new ride? Check out the largest site for U.S. used car listings at AOL Autos. (http://autos.aol.com/used?NCID=aolcmp00300000002851)
