On Jun 30, 2009, at 10:48 PM, Frances Kelly wrote:
Now, where did I put that razor Bill Occam sent me?... It's around
here somewhere...
It seems to me that narrow formal qualities like noise sounds and
body gests and brush strokes and partial extracts are likely not
"marks" in the broader philosophic use of the term, although when
such qualities like sounds and gests and strokes and extracts do
indeed reveal the style and voice and school of a particular
producer, then they might be called "marks" in the wider sense of
identifying some sort of comparison, as with a member to its class.
It might therefore be best to define a "mark" in a more lofty way as
that aspect of form which identifies the differences between an
apposition and its opposition. For example, a "mark" could help
identify the difference between an ambiguous figure and an opposed
ground in a frame, ...
Why is it better to define a "mark" "in a more lofty way"? That's just
upping the ante without good cause.
But then you add "as that aspect of form which identifies the
differences between an apposition and it opposition. For example, ...
between an ambiguous figure and an opposed ground." What about the
paint touches made within that ambiguous figure? Aren't they marks? Or
are they something else?
You seem to be making a case for designating some paint touches as the
visual analogs of phonemes, that is, some marks differentiate visual
areas more or less as phonemes differentiate sounds that convey
lexical significance. The same can be said for all the touches within
the figure, which serve to identify that area of the painting as a
figure and not anything else. In fact, the figure can be said to
define the other side of the mark, so that the viewers see it without
ambiguity.
... or between the unmarked human as male or female and the marked
woman only as female.
Oh, you're talking about adding marks that are sui genetalis, right?
(or is that mui genitalis?)
If forms like sounds and gests and strokes and extracts fail to
sufficiently identify differences in opposition, then they would not
be "marks" at least in the broader sense.
What's the point of adding another nuance of "meaning" to a term that
currently gives us pretty unambiguously serviceable notions. Adding a
new and improved "broader sense" would impair that serviceability
without adding anything that we don't already have available to use as
a logical, lexical, or rhetorical tool
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Michael Brady
[email protected]
http://considerthepreposition.blogspot.com/
