William:
> Please spare us another messy foray into a marginalized zone of
psuedo-aesthetics.
Actually, this looks like a good book to read. At least the ten or fifteen
pages I've perused.
> The "scientific label" was a later prefix in the 16C and is perfectly
descriptive since it refers to a principle that exists separately from any
subjective, empirical, observation. And that is the fundamental fact of
scientific investigation: to describe what exists independently of our knowing
and believing it.
In the Middle Ages and Renaissance, "scientia" referred to systematic
knowledge of a topic, generally on a par with how the word "philosophy" ("love
of knowledge or wisdom") was used at that time. Beginning in the 16th century,
what we call the "scientific method" emerged. During the same period, "natural
philosophy" was used to refer to the study of nature and "moral philosophy"
referred to other matters, like logic, metaphysics, epistemology, etc.).
Later, "moral philosophy" came to be synonymous with "ethics," and "science"
began to refer more exclusively to the rigorous knowledge derived from
empirical studies.
> There is a good reason why these marginal "scholars" you dredge up are
marginalized. They don't contribute to the discourse but instead try to find,
usually erroneous or trivial -- by means of relabeling -- issues that they
purport will topple the whole domain. Revisionism of course is always an
opportunity ad even a demand, but it must be substantial, conceptual,
historically valid, born of a new world-view, as it were.
I think you are reacting to Miller, not to the author, Norris Smith, who was
an art history professor at Washington University in St. Louis, well-known for
its art department, and the book was published by Columbia University press,
not a slacker outfit either.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Michael Brady
