There are 15 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1.1. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
From: Randy Frueh
1.2. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
From: J. 'Mach' Wust
1.3. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
From: Padraic Brown
1.4. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
From: Adam Walker
2.1. "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
From: Jörg Rhiemeier
2.2. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
From: Patrick Dunn
2.3. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
From: And Rosta
2.4. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
From: Adam Walker
2.5. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
From: Mechthild Czapp
3.1. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
From: Mia Harper (Soderquist)
3.2. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
From: Tony Harris
3.3. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
From: Jesse Bangs
3.4. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
From: Roger Mills
3.5. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
From: Adam Walker
4.1. Re: Speedtalks and briefscripts (was: Hemingway story
From: Padraic Brown
Messages
________________________________________________________________________
1.1. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
Posted by: "Randy Frueh" cthefox...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:24 am ((PDT))
Runic letters were adapted to a currsive form in old english. The rune
-thorn- was still used to represent (th) until the Norman invasion. In it's
original form it did have sharp angles but in cursive it was rounded much
like the letter P with an extended stem crowning it.
In fact for my own personal handwriting I use thorn. It's a simple enough
change and it adds uniqueness to my penmanship.
In the area I live they don't even bother to teach cursive to children
anymore. If a parent wants their kids to be able to write they have to show
them. :-(
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
1.2. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
Posted by: "J. 'Mach' Wust" j_mach_w...@yahoo.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:33 am ((PDT))
On Thu, 19 Jul 2012 14:58:08 +0100, R A Brown wrote:
>> and I doubt that its use of word stretching was anything
>> nearly as regular as in the Arabic script.
>
>No one has argued that it is. The reasons for the
>development of calligraphy as a major art form in the
>Islamic world have already been given. No one AFAIK has
>denied that calligraphy has played a far more dominant role
>in Islamic art that it has done in western art.
Then I have misunderstood you. The far more dominant role of calligraphy in the
Arabic sphere (and in the Sinosphere) has been a central part of my point.
>What I still maintain is that the development of Arabic
>calligraphy is not due to the Arabic abject but to other
>cultural effects, and that any creative calligrapher can
>produce comparable effects in other scripts.
I have never denied that. The difference is that in the Arabic culture, there
is a tradition of producing these calligraphic effects, while in the West,
there is not. Where we differ (if I have understood you correctly) is that I
see these calligraphic traditions as something inseperably related to the
script, while you see them as something totally unrelated. OK then.
>> I am not aware of any Western tradition of using quirky
>> lines at all, such as for instance in Taʿlīq style
>> Arabic script:
>> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ta%27liq_script_1.jpg
>
>I do not find the example particularly beautiful
>or attractive (de gustibus again, I guess). The best I
>could come up with in a quick search was:
Thanks for the links. For two reasons, I think they are not comparable to the
Arabic example:
1. None of them show what I had in mind, but that is due to my poor English.
What I had in mind is writing where the one-dimensionality is broken and not
all characters sit (or, in other scripts, hang) on the base line. A curved line
is still a one-dimensional base line. In the link I posted, you will find that
the lines have a macrostructure that goes from right to left (with an upwards
curve), but within these macro-lines, there is a microstructure that puts
sometimes as much as three words on top of each other. Alternatively, you could
interpret this as tiny curved base lines that group together in order to form a
single second order base line. Mind you that this is not the same thing as
subscripts/superscripts or as calligramms (like the heart calligramm you
posted). While the link I posted is an extreme example, vertical microstructure
within a horizontal macrostructure is not uncommon even in simpler varieties of
the Arabic script. Even in what at first sight looks like a pretty linear
rendering of the name Muhammed, the mīm character in the following sample is
not placed on the base line at all but on top of the ḥÄʾ character (without
being a superscript):
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Muhammad_Salat.svg
2. I was specifically referring to a *tradition* of using such techniques. I
also know a cousin of mine who uses in-word stretching, and there are even
stylistic sets of the Zapfino font that feature some stretched letters, but
this is far from being anything as traditional or regular like Arabic in-word
stretching.
---
On Thu, 19 Jul 2012 08:14:15 -0700, Padraic Brown wrote:
>--- On Thu, 7/19/12, R A Brown wrote:
>> On 19/07/2012 01:55, Adam Walker wrote:
>> > I do not, however, accept that some scripts are
>> > inherantly "calligraphic." Arabic has been touted, in
>> > this thread, as being particularly
>> calligraphy-friendly.
>> > Runes have been denigrated as particularly ill-suited
>> to
>> > being beautifully written. I balk at both
>> assertions.
>>
>> As do I.
>
>As do I! I don't think I went as far as saying that runes can't be written
>beautifully! But I do maintain that their straight lines and angles don't
>lend themselves well to common calligraphic styles.
My point exactly. But in addition to that, in my ears the assertion that "[the
rune's] straight lines and angles don't lend themselves well to common
calligraphic styles" is but a complicated way of saying that runes are
inherently less calligraphic. I'll try adopting the former way of expressing
the idea in order to avoid confusion. For practicing this hopefully less
ambiguous way of expressing the idea, I will try to apply it to my original
statement about shorthands:
I believe that the shorthand systems' (English-geometric or German-cursive)
uneven base line and overloaded formal repertoire
doesn't lend itself well to common calligraphic styles (even worse than in the
case of runes, and independent of writing speed). This is most evident in
comparison to the Arabic script which may allow similar writing speeds even
though its forms lend themselves very well to common calligraphic styles
(additionally, there is a rich tradition of Arabic calligraphic styles, whether
this has affected the Arabic script's forms [as I believe] or not).
>This of course doesn't mean that some sort of runic calligraphy could not
>be developed. It just probably won't have the flowing curves we tend to
>associate with calligraphy. It would look quite different -- either that
>or we'd need to make new, curvy runes to fit usual calligraphic
>conventions.
I think I have seen curvy runes, but I don't recall whether these were isolated
samples or instances of a tradition (or whether we just don't know).
BTW, I recently asked a teacher friend of mine and she confirmed that in this
place, children are still to taught to write with a proper fountain pen (after
an initial pencil stage). However, the calligraphy drills we still had in the
early 1990s have been discontinued.
--
grüess
mach
Messages in this topic (104)
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1.3. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
Posted by: "Padraic Brown" elemti...@yahoo.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 10:50 am ((PDT))
--- On Thu, 7/19/12, R A Brown <r...@carolandray.plus.com> wrote:
> >> The various features that both Mach & Adnan
> have shown
> >> calligraphers make use of with the Arabic
> script are
> >> common to cursive forms of the Roman script (and,
> >> surely, cursive forms of Cyrillic & Greek).
> >
> > With all respect, but this I deny. Do you have any
> > samples or sources? I know that word stretching was
> > occasionally used in early medieval insular script,
> but
> > that is a tradition that has been discontinued for
> more
> > than a thousand years,
>
> Odd that, as it is still (occasionally) used by Padraic. I cannot
> believe that he alone may use this in his cursive script.
I certainly don't claim to be unique in this regard!
> > and I doubt that its use of word stretching was
> anything
> > nearly as regular as in the Arabic script.
>
> No one has argued that it is.
Indeed not. Just because a thing cán be done in any art form, doesn't mean
it must always be done. It's a matter of potential v. convention. Bach
còuld have written jass organ -- but he didn't. The potential was there.
He had all the notes on his instrument, but the convention of his art was
different. And just because he didn't write jass organ music doesn't mean
music was any less an art for the supposed defect.
> The reasons for the development of calligraphy as a major art form in the
> Islamic world have already been given. No one AFAIK has
> denied that calligraphy has played a far more dominant role
> in Islamic art that it has done in western art.
Indeed not. I think everyone thus far has agreed that calligraphy is more
prominent an art in middle eastern culture than in western.
> What I still maintain is that the development of Arabic
> calligraphy is not due to the Arabic abject but to other
> cultural effects, and that any creative calligrapher can
> produce comparable effects in other scripts.
Abject? Do you mean abjad?
Yes, I think it's also pretty clear that any effect one can do in Arabic
calligraphy, one could or even does do in English calligraphy.
> > I am not aware of any Western tradition of using
> quirky
> > lines at all, such as for instance in Taʿlīq style
> > Arabic script:
> > http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ta%27liq_script_1.jpg
To me that looks like swooping lines of text. I've seen similar curving
pieces of English calligraphy.
> As for quirky lines, writing in spirals goes right back to
> the ancients; we certainly find it among Romans, Greeks &
> Etruscans - and it's still done ;)
>
> That strikes me as a pretty long western tradition.
Truly!
=========================================================================
"Randy Frueh" <cthefox...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Runic letters were adapted to a currsive form in old english. The rune
> -thorn- was still used to represent (th) until the Norman invasion. In
> it's original form it did have sharp angles but in cursive it was
> rounded much like the letter P with an extended stem crowning it.
Yep -- and we still use it, though mispronounce it anymore. If you've ever
seen a shop sign with deliberately archaic spelling -- Ye Olde Appothecarie
Shoppe -- the Y is actually what's left of a printed thorn.
> In fact for my own personal handwriting I use thorn.
As have I. A cursive one at that. Haven't used it in a while, though.
Maybe I'll start again! I've also used a cursive wynn from time to time.
Makes a nice initial letter.
> It's a simple enough change and it adds uniqueness to my penmanship.
> In the area I live they don't even bother to teach cursive to children
> anymore. If a parent wants their kids to be able to write they have to
> show them. :-(
Sad. I don't even know what they teach hereabouts...
Padraic
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
1.4. Re: Calligraphy (was: Speedtalks and briefscripts)
Posted by: "Adam Walker" carra...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 10:57 am ((PDT))
Resending without attachment, but including link.
On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 12:40 PM, Adam Walker <carra...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 10:14 AM, Padraic Brown <elemti...@yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>> > On 19/07/2012 01:55, Adam Walker wrote:
>>
>> > > I do not, however, accept that some scripts are
>> > > inherantly "calligraphic." Arabic has been touted, in
>> > > this thread, as being particularly
>> > calligraphy-friendly.
>> > > Runes have been denigrated as particularly ill-suited
>> > to
>> > > being beautifully written. I balk at both
>> > assertions.
>> >
>> > As do I.
>>
>> As do I! I don't think I went as far as saying that runes can't be written
>> beautifully! But I do maintain that their straight lines and angles don't
>> lend themselves well to common calligraphic styles.
>>
>> This of course doesn't mean that some sort of runic calligraphy could not
>> be developed. It just probably won't have the flowing curves we tend to
>> associate with calligraphy. It would look quite different -- either that
>> or we'd need to make new, curvy runes to fit usual calligraphic
>> conventions.
>>
>>
>>
>
> Well, there are a couple of things here. First is the seeming assumption
> that calligraphy (i.e. beautiful writing) must needs equate with
> curvilinearity, which does not hold. One of my favorite calligraphic
> styles is that represented by the Old English/Black Letter family of hands
> which eschew rondness and curves to the point that even o is not round, but
> angular and pointed. I find these hands capable of producing fabulous
> art. Now, I'm not sure that you meant to make the assertion I have
> responded to, but I wanted to address it, because it is so easy to read
> your statement in such a way.
>
> Secon is the idea that runes somehow cannot be curvy. The elder runes and
> the Anglo-Saxon runes do tend to be strictly anular, but the younger runes
> (both long branch and short branch) admit curved lines, as do the staveless
> runes, the "mdeieval" runes and the Dalecarlian runes.
>
> Now, to demonstrate that the younger runes can be written in a curvy
> calligraphic style that features nesting of caracters and flourishes, I am
> XXXXXXXXX linking a bit of what I did yesterday.
>
>
http://pinterest.com/pin/229613280972426761/
> Adam
>
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
2.1. "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
Posted by: "Jörg Rhiemeier" joerg_rhieme...@web.de
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:29 am ((PDT))
Hallo conlangers!
On Wednesday 18 July 2012 21:13:57 And Rosta wrote:
> R A Brown, On 18/07/2012 17:39:
> > Pointless, I think. It is quite clear to me that Mach & I
> > are not going to agree over this; and IME continuing an
> > exchange between two people who are clearly not going agree
> > becomes very tedious for other list members.
> >
> > The maxim "de gustibus non est disputandum" is so very true.
>
> I remember previous discussions in which you and Joerg took this line and I
> was taking a position like Mach's. While of course one need not
> participate in discussions one isn't interested in, to curtail debate of
> aesthetic matters simply on the grounds of de gustibus is to abandon the
> quest for understanding -- understanding of aesthetic responses and
> understanding of intersubjective patterns among aesthetic responses. It's
> good to understand why someone (including oneself) has an aesthetic
> preference for X over Y, and it's instructive to discover which
> preferences tend to be shared across a population. I suppose one could
> consider these questions to belong principally to cognitive psychology.
Sure.
> I myself would go further, and argue that patterns of intersubjective
> aesthetic agreement can be translated into an approximation of absolute
> value.
I doubt that. Seriously. Beauty is a subjective notion; it
lies in the eyes of the beholder, as it is said so often.
Sure, there are things that people *tend to* consider
beautiful more often than others, such as symmetric shapes;
but the variation is sufficient to doubt that anything like
"absolute beauty" exists. Some people consider luxurious
gold embroiderings on clothes beautiful; others (including
me) consider them pompous and ugly.
> For example, _Sight and Sound_ has periodically published
> collections of film critics' ten favourite films. There's a very large
> amount of agreement between them. There are individual oddities -- for
> example, Citizen Kane is in almost all top tens, but not mine, whereas
> Scaramouche is in my top ten but in nobody else's I've ever seen, but
> overall there is huge overlap -- e.g. Bicycle Thieves and Seven Samurai
> are in my top ten and most others.
There are certain conventions in the western world concerning
what makes a good film and what not, and it is these conventions
that show in such lists to a large degree. Especially among film
critics, who are accustomed to these conventions as they have
studied them professionally. This explains why the film critics
agree most of the time.
There are similar conventions in many other bodies of artistic
criticism, and sometimes the conventions change radically. One
example of such a sudden reversal was in 1977 when progressive
rock music was suddenly declared gauche and pompous with the
advent of punk rock. So who was right, the pre-1977 critics
who hailed progressive rock as the "classical music of the
future", or the post-1977 critics who condemned it as "not
true to the proletarian spirit of rock'n'roll"?
A much more serious reversal happened in Germany in 1933 when
the Nazis got into power and declared that everything in the
fine arts that had previously been considered modern and
progressive was now to be considered _entartet_ 'degenerate'
and banned. (Only to be followed by a second reversal in
1945, when the monumental art of the Nazis was, in my opinion
rightly, declared overblown and ugly, and the modern art that
had been banned by the Nazis was reinstated.)
> From a utilitarian perspective, the
> world would be far more impoverished by the loss of Bicycle Thieves than
> by the loss of Police Academy 27, and ergo is far more enriched by Bicycle
> Thieves than by Police Academy 27. And while you may not agree with that
> philosophical position, its logic is robust enough to legitimate
> disputation about taste.
Balderdash. I agree with you that the _Police Academy_ films
are rubbish, so it is not much of an achievement to be "better"
than that (I haven't even *heard* of _Bicycle Thieves_ yet,
unless it is known by some completely different name in
Germany, as is often the case with Hollywood films). But that
is just my personal opinion; *some* people are attracted by
_Police Academy_ films, otherwise they hadn't made so many of
them. Isn't it a dangerous move to say that your taste was
"better" than theirs? It is a slippery slope from aesthetic
prescriptivism to art censorship. The various totalitarian
régimes which banned modern art as "degenerate", "bourgeois",
"formalist" or whatever all laid claims on "absolute beauty"
which they considered being manifested in the centuries of
pre-modern art tradition. You seem to wish to revert to times
when art was not free.
--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
"Bêsel asa Éam, a Éam atha cvanthal a cvanth atha Éamal." - SiM 1:1
Messages in this topic (104)
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2.2. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
Posted by: "Patrick Dunn" pwd...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 10:24 am ((PDT))
On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 11:29 AM, Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhieme...@web.de>wrote:
> Hallo conlangers!
>
>
> > I myself would go further, and argue that patterns of intersubjective
> > aesthetic agreement can be translated into an approximation of absolute
> > value.
>
> I doubt that. Seriously. Beauty is a subjective notion; it
> lies in the eyes of the beholder, as it is said so often.
> Sure, there are things that people *tend to* consider
> beautiful more often than others, such as symmetric shapes;
> but the variation is sufficient to doubt that anything like
> "absolute beauty" exists. Some people consider luxurious
> gold embroiderings on clothes beautiful; others (including
> me) consider them pompous and ugly.
>
>
Well, there are a handful of us Platonists still knocking about, who think
that there might very well be an absolute Beauty. It's clear that taste
figures into it, as does social custom. But we still share the experience
of beauty, even if it's sparked by different things.
The fact that you know what I mean when I say "I find that beautiful" is --
to me -- some evidence that beauty exists as more than a purely subjective
quale.
As far as scripts go, I find them all beautiful in different ways. I love
language, written and spoken. While I personally like some scripts more
than others, some sounds more than others, the beauty of them all strikes
me as undeniable, almost axiomatic.
It's an interesting experience, too, to become more and more familiar with
a script. I can't decipher Arabic at all, so it always looks like a line
to me, however ornate. And ancient Greek, while I could sound it out,
looked alien. Now that I've studied ancient Greek long enough to be able
to read it somewhat, without sounding things out, I often forget which
alphabet I've been reading in! I don't even see the letters anymore, half
the time, and I've run into transliterations of Greek words that I know
very well, and not recognized them in the Latin alphabet. I just wonder
how much familiarity turns the script invisible, unless it's deliberately
defamiliarized.
--
Second Person, a chapbook of poetry by Patrick Dunn, is now available for
order from Finishing Line
Press<http://www.finishinglinepress.com/NewReleasesandForthcomingTitles.htm>
and
Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Second-Person-Patrick-Dunn/dp/1599249065/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1324342341&sr=8-2>.
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
2.3. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
Posted by: "And Rosta" and.ro...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 11:48 am ((PDT))
Jörg Rhiemeier, On 19/07/2012 17:29:
> On Wednesday 18 July 2012 21:13:57 And Rosta wrote:
>> I myself would go further, and argue that patterns of intersubjective
>> aesthetic agreement can be translated into an approximation of absolute
>> value.
>
> I doubt that. Seriously. Beauty is a subjective notion; it
> lies in the eyes of the beholder, as it is said so often.
> Sure, there are things that people *tend to* consider
> beautiful more often than others, such as symmetric shapes;
> but the variation is sufficient to doubt that anything like
> "absolute beauty" exists. Some people consider luxurious
> gold embroiderings on clothes beautiful; others (including
> me) consider them pompous and ugly.
But my argument is that this datum is of only small evidential value,
insufficient to falsify a claim that gold embroiderings are beautiful. (By
"absolute" in my original "absolute value", I meant value to mankind in general
rather than relative value to different individuals.) To ascertain whether gold
embroiderings are beautiful, canvas the views of mankind in general, and make
due allowance for the distortions of fads and fashions.
>> For example, _Sight and Sound_ has periodically published
>> collections of film critics' ten favourite films. There's a very large
>> amount of agreement between them. There are individual oddities -- for
>> example, Citizen Kane is in almost all top tens, but not mine, whereas
>> Scaramouche is in my top ten but in nobody else's I've ever seen, but
>> overall there is huge overlap -- e.g. Bicycle Thieves and Seven Samurai
>> are in my top ten and most others.
>
> There are certain conventions in the western world concerning
> what makes a good film and what not, and it is these conventions
> that show in such lists to a large degree. Especially among film
> critics, who are accustomed to these conventions as they have
> studied them professionally. This explains why the film critics
> agree most of the time.
Whereas I think that the proof of the sagacity of the critics is that I tend to
agree with them...
Note that I was talking about lists of best films of all time; the more
contemporaneous the artwork is, the more that ostensibly aesthetic judgements
are distorted by extraneous factors such as fashion, the allure of the new, the
pleasure of mere novelty, and so forth.
> There are similar conventions in many other bodies of artistic
> criticism, and sometimes the conventions change radically. One
> example of such a sudden reversal was in 1977 when progressive
> rock music was suddenly declared gauche and pompous with the
> advent of punk rock. So who was right, the pre-1977 critics
> who hailed progressive rock as the "classical music of the
> future", or the post-1977 critics who condemned it as "not
> true to the proletarian spirit of rock'n'roll"?
A certain amount of time has to pass before one can answer this. From the
vantage point of 2012, it looks as tho neither was right, both because neither
movement yielded much of value and because works of greatest value rise above
any movement they belong to, and, on the whole, there is little aesthetic value
to movements per se. (I haven't bothered checking this, but I reckon that if
you consulted lists of top hundred albums or top hundred songs, neither prog
rock nor high punk would figure prominently.)
>> From a utilitarian perspective, the
>> world would be far more impoverished by the loss of Bicycle Thieves than
>> by the loss of Police Academy 27, and ergo is far more enriched by Bicycle
>> Thieves than by Police Academy 27. And while you may not agree with that
>> philosophical position, its logic is robust enough to legitimate
>> disputation about taste.
>
> Balderdash. I agree with you that the _Police Academy_ films
> are rubbish, so it is not much of an achievement to be "better"
> than that (I haven't even *heard* of _Bicycle Thieves_ yet,
> unless it is known by some completely different name in
> Germany, as is often the case with Hollywood films).
It's called _Fahrraddiebe_ in Germany
(<http://www.amazon.de/Fahrraddiebe-2-DVDs-Vittorio-Sica/dp/B0016420QG/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1342722120&sr=1-1>).
_Ladri di Biciclette_ is the original title.
> But that
> is just my personal opinion; *some* people are attracted by
> _Police Academy_ films, otherwise they hadn't made so many of
> them. Isn't it a dangerous move to say that your taste was
> "better" than theirs?
The point I'd been trying to make is that a rational theory of aesthetic value
is possible without it being based merely on an assertion that my taste is
better than theirs. Rather, it's a Utilitarian theory.
>It is a slippery slope from aesthetic prescriptivism to art censorship.
In my previous message I wasn't advocating aesthetic prescriptivism; aesthetic
prescriptivism had nothing to do with what I was talking about. All the same, I
am happy to advocate aesthetic prescriptivism in situations where it is better
than the absence of it (e.g. educational curriculums, public architecture,
public art galleries). It is a slippery slope from government to
totalitarianism, but lover of liberty tho I am, that does not make me embrace
anarchism.
>The various totalitarian
> régimes which banned modern art as "degenerate", "bourgeois",
> "formalist" or whatever all laid claims on "absolute beauty"
> which they considered being manifested in the centuries of
> pre-modern art tradition. You seem to wish to revert to times
> when art was not free.
I share and commend your hatred of totalitarianism, but don't let your fear of
totalitarianism lead you to abandon rational thought on matters of philosophy
or -- if you can manage not to (and if you can't I accept that limitation as
innocent and as part of who you are) -- to impute to me wishes that are neither
mine nor expressed or implied in my email.
--And.
Messages in this topic (104)
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2.4. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
Posted by: "Adam Walker" carra...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 12:02 pm ((PDT))
For once, I find myself agreeing with And. I do believe there is such a
thing as objective beauty. It may be difficult or even impossible to
define, but I do not believe that makes it any less real a thing.
Adam
On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 1:48 PM, And Rosta <and.ro...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Jörg Rhiemeier, On 19/07/2012 17:29:
>
>> On Wednesday 18 July 2012 21:13:57 And Rosta wrote:
>>
>>> I myself would go further, and argue that patterns of intersubjective
>>> aesthetic agreement can be translated into an approximation of absolute
>>> value.
>>>
>>
>> I doubt that. Seriously. Beauty is a subjective notion; it
>> lies in the eyes of the beholder, as it is said so often.
>> Sure, there are things that people *tend to* consider
>> beautiful more often than others, such as symmetric shapes;
>> but the variation is sufficient to doubt that anything like
>> "absolute beauty" exists. Some people consider luxurious
>> gold embroiderings on clothes beautiful; others (including
>> me) consider them pompous and ugly.
>>
>
> But my argument is that this datum is of only small evidential value,
> insufficient to falsify a claim that gold embroiderings are beautiful. (By
> "absolute" in my original "absolute value", I meant value to mankind in
> general rather than relative value to different individuals.) To ascertain
> whether gold embroiderings are beautiful, canvas the views of mankind in
> general, and make due allowance for the distortions of fads and fashions.
>
>
>
>> For example, _Sight and Sound_ has periodically published
>>> collections of film critics' ten favourite films. There's a very large
>>> amount of agreement between them. There are individual oddities -- for
>>> example, Citizen Kane is in almost all top tens, but not mine, whereas
>>> Scaramouche is in my top ten but in nobody else's I've ever seen, but
>>> overall there is huge overlap -- e.g. Bicycle Thieves and Seven Samurai
>>> are in my top ten and most others.
>>>
>>
>> There are certain conventions in the western world concerning
>> what makes a good film and what not, and it is these conventions
>> that show in such lists to a large degree. Especially among film
>> critics, who are accustomed to these conventions as they have
>> studied them professionally. This explains why the film critics
>> agree most of the time.
>>
>
> Whereas I think that the proof of the sagacity of the critics is that I
> tend to agree with them...
>
> Note that I was talking about lists of best films of all time; the more
> contemporaneous the artwork is, the more that ostensibly aesthetic
> judgements are distorted by extraneous factors such as fashion, the allure
> of the new, the pleasure of mere novelty, and so forth.
>
>
> There are similar conventions in many other bodies of artistic
>> criticism, and sometimes the conventions change radically. One
>> example of such a sudden reversal was in 1977 when progressive
>> rock music was suddenly declared gauche and pompous with the
>> advent of punk rock. So who was right, the pre-1977 critics
>> who hailed progressive rock as the "classical music of the
>> future", or the post-1977 critics who condemned it as "not
>> true to the proletarian spirit of rock'n'roll"?
>>
>
> A certain amount of time has to pass before one can answer this. From the
> vantage point of 2012, it looks as tho neither was right, both because
> neither movement yielded much of value and because works of greatest value
> rise above any movement they belong to, and, on the whole, there is little
> aesthetic value to movements per se. (I haven't bothered checking this, but
> I reckon that if you consulted lists of top hundred albums or top hundred
> songs, neither prog rock nor high punk would figure prominently.)
>
>
>
>> From a utilitarian perspective, the
>>> world would be far more impoverished by the loss of Bicycle Thieves than
>>> by the loss of Police Academy 27, and ergo is far more enriched by
>>> Bicycle
>>> Thieves than by Police Academy 27. And while you may not agree with that
>>> philosophical position, its logic is robust enough to legitimate
>>> disputation about taste.
>>>
>>
>> Balderdash. I agree with you that the _Police Academy_ films
>> are rubbish, so it is not much of an achievement to be "better"
>> than that (I haven't even *heard* of _Bicycle Thieves_ yet,
>> unless it is known by some completely different name in
>> Germany, as is often the case with Hollywood films).
>>
>
> It's called _Fahrraddiebe_ in Germany (<http://www.amazon.de/**
> Fahrraddiebe-2-DVDs-Vittorio-**Sica/dp/B0016420QG/ref=sr_1_1?**
> s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1342722120&**sr=1-1<http://www.amazon.de/Fahrraddiebe-2-DVDs-Vittorio-Sica/dp/B0016420QG/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1342722120&sr=1-1>>).
> _Ladri di Biciclette_ is the original title.
>
>
> But that
>> is just my personal opinion; *some* people are attracted by
>> _Police Academy_ films, otherwise they hadn't made so many of
>> them. Isn't it a dangerous move to say that your taste was
>> "better" than theirs?
>>
>
> The point I'd been trying to make is that a rational theory of aesthetic
> value is possible without it being based merely on an assertion that my
> taste is better than theirs. Rather, it's a Utilitarian theory.
>
>
> It is a slippery slope from aesthetic prescriptivism to art censorship.
>>
>
> In my previous message I wasn't advocating aesthetic prescriptivism;
> aesthetic prescriptivism had nothing to do with what I was talking about.
> All the same, I am happy to advocate aesthetic prescriptivism in situations
> where it is better than the absence of it (e.g. educational curriculums,
> public architecture, public art galleries). It is a slippery slope from
> government to totalitarianism, but lover of liberty tho I am, that does not
> make me embrace anarchism.
>
>
> The various totalitarian
>> régimes which banned modern art as "degenerate", "bourgeois",
>> "formalist" or whatever all laid claims on "absolute beauty"
>> which they considered being manifested in the centuries of
>> pre-modern art tradition. You seem to wish to revert to times
>> when art was not free.
>>
>
> I share and commend your hatred of totalitarianism, but don't let your
> fear of totalitarianism lead you to abandon rational thought on matters of
> philosophy or -- if you can manage not to (and if you can't I accept that
> limitation as innocent and as part of who you are) -- to impute to me
> wishes that are neither mine nor expressed or implied in my email.
>
> --And.
>
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
2.5. Re: "Absolute beauty" (was: Calligraphy)
Posted by: "Mechthild Czapp" rejista...@me.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 12:09 pm ((PDT))
To steer the discussion into to con-area again: How can you justify the belief
in absolute beauty when conspecies with vastly different sensorical organs and
signal processing are imaginable? Doesn't beauty per se depend on the signal
processing of the brain/brain-equivalent?
Am 19.07.2012 um 20:02 schrieb Adam Walker:
> For once, I find myself agreeing with And. I do believe there is such a
> thing as objective beauty. It may be difficult or even impossible to
> define, but I do not believe that makes it any less real a thing.
>
> Adam
>
> On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 1:48 PM, And Rosta <and.ro...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Jörg Rhiemeier, On 19/07/2012 17:29:
>>
>>> On Wednesday 18 July 2012 21:13:57 And Rosta wrote:
>>>
>>>> I myself would go further, and argue that patterns of intersubjective
>>>> aesthetic agreement can be translated into an approximation of absolute
>>>> value.
>>>>
>>>
>>> I doubt that. Seriously. Beauty is a subjective notion; it
>>> lies in the eyes of the beholder, as it is said so often.
>>> Sure, there are things that people *tend to* consider
>>> beautiful more often than others, such as symmetric shapes;
>>> but the variation is sufficient to doubt that anything like
>>> "absolute beauty" exists. Some people consider luxurious
>>> gold embroiderings on clothes beautiful; others (including
>>> me) consider them pompous and ugly.
>>>
>>
>> But my argument is that this datum is of only small evidential value,
>> insufficient to falsify a claim that gold embroiderings are beautiful. (By
>> "absolute" in my original "absolute value", I meant value to mankind in
>> general rather than relative value to different individuals.) To ascertain
>> whether gold embroiderings are beautiful, canvas the views of mankind in
>> general, and make due allowance for the distortions of fads and fashions.
>>
>>
>>
>>> For example, _Sight and Sound_ has periodically published
>>>> collections of film critics' ten favourite films. There's a very large
>>>> amount of agreement between them. There are individual oddities -- for
>>>> example, Citizen Kane is in almost all top tens, but not mine, whereas
>>>> Scaramouche is in my top ten but in nobody else's I've ever seen, but
>>>> overall there is huge overlap -- e.g. Bicycle Thieves and Seven Samurai
>>>> are in my top ten and most others.
>>>>
>>>
>>> There are certain conventions in the western world concerning
>>> what makes a good film and what not, and it is these conventions
>>> that show in such lists to a large degree. Especially among film
>>> critics, who are accustomed to these conventions as they have
>>> studied them professionally. This explains why the film critics
>>> agree most of the time.
>>>
>>
>> Whereas I think that the proof of the sagacity of the critics is that I
>> tend to agree with them...
>>
>> Note that I was talking about lists of best films of all time; the more
>> contemporaneous the artwork is, the more that ostensibly aesthetic
>> judgements are distorted by extraneous factors such as fashion, the allure
>> of the new, the pleasure of mere novelty, and so forth.
>>
>>
>> There are similar conventions in many other bodies of artistic
>>> criticism, and sometimes the conventions change radically. One
>>> example of such a sudden reversal was in 1977 when progressive
>>> rock music was suddenly declared gauche and pompous with the
>>> advent of punk rock. So who was right, the pre-1977 critics
>>> who hailed progressive rock as the "classical music of the
>>> future", or the post-1977 critics who condemned it as "not
>>> true to the proletarian spirit of rock'n'roll"?
>>>
>>
>> A certain amount of time has to pass before one can answer this. From the
>> vantage point of 2012, it looks as tho neither was right, both because
>> neither movement yielded much of value and because works of greatest value
>> rise above any movement they belong to, and, on the whole, there is little
>> aesthetic value to movements per se. (I haven't bothered checking this, but
>> I reckon that if you consulted lists of top hundred albums or top hundred
>> songs, neither prog rock nor high punk would figure prominently.)
>>
>>
>>
>>> From a utilitarian perspective, the
>>>> world would be far more impoverished by the loss of Bicycle Thieves than
>>>> by the loss of Police Academy 27, and ergo is far more enriched by
>>>> Bicycle
>>>> Thieves than by Police Academy 27. And while you may not agree with that
>>>> philosophical position, its logic is robust enough to legitimate
>>>> disputation about taste.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Balderdash. I agree with you that the _Police Academy_ films
>>> are rubbish, so it is not much of an achievement to be "better"
>>> than that (I haven't even *heard* of _Bicycle Thieves_ yet,
>>> unless it is known by some completely different name in
>>> Germany, as is often the case with Hollywood films).
>>>
>>
>> It's called _Fahrraddiebe_ in Germany (<http://www.amazon.de/**
>> Fahrraddiebe-2-DVDs-Vittorio-**Sica/dp/B0016420QG/ref=sr_1_1?**
>> s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1342722120&**sr=1-1<http://www.amazon.de/Fahrraddiebe-2-DVDs-Vittorio-Sica/dp/B0016420QG/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1342722120&sr=1-1>>).
>> _Ladri di Biciclette_ is the original title.
>>
>>
>> But that
>>> is just my personal opinion; *some* people are attracted by
>>> _Police Academy_ films, otherwise they hadn't made so many of
>>> them. Isn't it a dangerous move to say that your taste was
>>> "better" than theirs?
>>>
>>
>> The point I'd been trying to make is that a rational theory of aesthetic
>> value is possible without it being based merely on an assertion that my
>> taste is better than theirs. Rather, it's a Utilitarian theory.
>>
>>
>> It is a slippery slope from aesthetic prescriptivism to art censorship.
>>>
>>
>> In my previous message I wasn't advocating aesthetic prescriptivism;
>> aesthetic prescriptivism had nothing to do with what I was talking about.
>> All the same, I am happy to advocate aesthetic prescriptivism in situations
>> where it is better than the absence of it (e.g. educational curriculums,
>> public architecture, public art galleries). It is a slippery slope from
>> government to totalitarianism, but lover of liberty tho I am, that does not
>> make me embrace anarchism.
>>
>>
>> The various totalitarian
>>> régimes which banned modern art as "degenerate", "bourgeois",
>>> "formalist" or whatever all laid claims on "absolute beauty"
>>> which they considered being manifested in the centuries of
>>> pre-modern art tradition. You seem to wish to revert to times
>>> when art was not free.
>>>
>>
>> I share and commend your hatred of totalitarianism, but don't let your
>> fear of totalitarianism lead you to abandon rational thought on matters of
>> philosophy or -- if you can manage not to (and if you can't I accept that
>> limitation as innocent and as part of who you are) -- to impute to me
>> wishes that are neither mine nor expressed or implied in my email.
>>
>> --And.
>>
Messages in this topic (104)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
3.1. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
Posted by: "Mia Harper (Soderquist)" gloriouswaf...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:48 am ((PDT))
Amanda Babcock Furrow wrote:
>
> Yes! I remember you in the ea-luna days!
>
> (Actually when I read that I got a sense-memory of checking my CONLANG
> email from the job where I was working in 1995. 3-d surround nostalgia.)
>
> tylakèhlpë'fö,
> Amanda
>
I always remember those days as downloading and uploading mail in our
living room. That was several homes ago now, but I do get that
sense-memory thinking about those days too. I spent hours a day reading
and posting back in the day, so that might not be surprising.
You're one of the two conlangers on this list that I've met IRL. The
other is Jeff Burke, to whom I am very attached. There are a couple of
more that fell into a strange place between online and IRL called "snail
mail"-- a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I exchanged
letters with Thomas Leigh, and a few with Claudio Gnoli.
I like meeting people IRL. I should do more of that.
Mia.
Messages in this topic (33)
________________________________________________________________________
3.2. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
Posted by: "Tony Harris" t...@alurhsa.org
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:51 am ((PDT))
I would love it if we could do more IRL meetings, actually.
I've met several people, both from this list and the ZBB, in real life.
On 07/19/2012 12:48 PM, Mia Harper (Soderquist) wrote:
> Amanda Babcock Furrow wrote:
>>
>> Yes! I remember you in the ea-luna days!
>>
>> (Actually when I read that I got a sense-memory of checking my CONLANG
>> email from the job where I was working in 1995. 3-d surround
>> nostalgia.)
>>
>> tylakèhlpë'fö,
>> Amanda
>>
>
> I always remember those days as downloading and uploading mail in our
> living room. That was several homes ago now, but I do get that
> sense-memory thinking about those days too. I spent hours a day
> reading and posting back in the day, so that might not be surprising.
>
> You're one of the two conlangers on this list that I've met IRL. The
> other is Jeff Burke, to whom I am very attached. There are a couple of
> more that fell into a strange place between online and IRL called
> "snail mail"-- a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I
> exchanged letters with Thomas Leigh, and a few with Claudio Gnoli.
>
> I like meeting people IRL. I should do more of that.
>
> Mia.
Messages in this topic (33)
________________________________________________________________________
3.3. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
Posted by: "Jesse Bangs" jas...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 9:54 am ((PDT))
My only RL meeting with anyone from the list was the time I spent the
night in the Netherlands with Jan van Steenburgen and Christophe
Grandsire on my way to Romania. It was lovely, but so very brief.
I now live in Minnesota, not too terribly distant from Wm. Annis and
George Conley over there in Wisconsin. We should attempt to meet
sometime.
On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 11:51 AM, Tony Harris <t...@alurhsa.org> wrote:
> I would love it if we could do more IRL meetings, actually.
>
> I've met several people, both from this list and the ZBB, in real life.
>
>
>
> On 07/19/2012 12:48 PM, Mia Harper (Soderquist) wrote:
>>
>> Amanda Babcock Furrow wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes! I remember you in the ea-luna days!
>>>
>>> (Actually when I read that I got a sense-memory of checking my CONLANG
>>> email from the job where I was working in 1995. 3-d surround nostalgia.)
>>>
>>> tylakÄhlpÄ'fö,
>>> Amanda
>>>
>>
>> I always remember those days as downloading and uploading mail in our
>> living room. That was several homes ago now, but I do get that sense-memory
>> thinking about those days too. I spent hours a day reading and posting back
>> in the day, so that might not be surprising.
>>
>> You're one of the two conlangers on this list that I've met IRL. The other
>> is Jeff Burke, to whom I am very attached. There are a couple of more that
>> fell into a strange place between online and IRL called "snail mail"-- a
>> long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, I exchanged letters with
>> Thomas Leigh, and a few with Claudio Gnoli.
>>
>> I like meeting people IRL. I should do more of that.
>>
>> Mia.
--
JS Bangs
jas...@gmail.com
http://jsbangs.wordpress.com
"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle" -Philo of Alexandria
Messages in this topic (33)
________________________________________________________________________
3.4. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
Posted by: "Roger Mills" romi...@yahoo.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 11:06 am ((PDT))
Alas, I seem to be a relative late-comer.....only joined in 2000, after several
months on langmaker.
Messages in this topic (33)
________________________________________________________________________
3.5. Re: Happy Conlang Day!
Posted by: "Adam Walker" carra...@gmail.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 11:22 am ((PDT))
Ah, but you have made up for tardiness in quality of contribution!
Adam
On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 1:06 PM, Roger Mills <romi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Alas, I seem to be a relative late-comer.....only joined in 2000, after
> several months on langmaker.
>
Messages in this topic (33)
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
4.1. Re: Speedtalks and briefscripts (was: Hemingway story
Posted by: "Padraic Brown" elemti...@yahoo.com
Date: Thu Jul 19, 2012 11:15 am ((PDT))
--- On Thu, 7/19/12, J. 'Mach' Wust <j_mach_w...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> From: J. 'Mach' Wust <j_mach_w...@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [CONLANG] Speedtalks and briefscripts (was: Hemingway story
> To: conl...@listserv.brown.edu
> Date: Thursday, July 19, 2012, 5:45 AM
> On Wed, 18 Jul 2012 08:32:20 -0700,
> Padraic Brown wrote:
> >> If Arabic calligraphers want to use such
> techniques, then
> >> they have a choice: They can either use ad-hoc
> invention or
> >> they can follow tradition. There is no such choice
> for
> >> Western calligraphers. In this sense, I call
> Western
> >> calligraphy limited by comparison, and runes are
> even much
> >> more limited.
> >
> >In any event, I am still not sure why you call this a
> "limitation". It's
> >just a different tradition.
>
> I would have thought that a lack of options logically is a
> limitation when compared to having those options.
Lack of options? All of the things that have been said of Arabic
calligraphy thus far can be applied equally to English calligraphy.
It's simply a matter of style and artistic imagination -- there's nothing
inherent to the letters that either open up new options or reduce an
artist's options, as far as I can tell.
Even with runes, which I don't think lend themselves well to calligraphy,
I think it would be possible to develop a new calligraphic style that
works with the letter shapes. Keeping the angular nature of runes intact,
I've done a little experiment today and find that letter elongation,
ligatures, different letter heights and other effects make for some
interesting possibilities for runic calligraphy.
Obviously, reforming the futhark so that every letter is round will let
one do "ordinary" calligraphy with runes. I wanted to keep the runes
angular to see what might crop up.
> With regard to lines and spacing, traditional Western calligraphy
> offers the option of using straight lines and even spacing.
> Traditional Arabic calligraphy also offers the option of
> using straight lines and even spacing, but in addition to
> that, it offers other options of using quirky lines and
> variable spacing. Of course, you can add the option to break
> with tradition in either case.
Naturally -- it's really up to the artist how to set up the overall effect.
Western calligraphy can do all of the things listed above, including the
use of "quirky" or curved lines. This I would take to be part of the art,
not a function of the alphabet.
> >I would agree that calligraphy in the west is not as prominent an art as
> >music or literature
>
> What I am saying is that in the West calligraphy is a less
> prominent art than in the Arabic or Chinese cultural
> spheres.
Yes. Basically a different way of expressing the same idea!
> Compare for instance painting and calligraphy:
> Which of them is more prominent?
Anymore, painting. Tis a vogue and twill come round full circle again some
day!
> I believe there is little doubt that in the West, painting is much more
> prominent,
And music is even more so. Big deal! The people want music and movies more
than they want poems and calligraphy. I just don't see what the fuss is
about here. No one is saying that western calligraphy is as big a deal as
eastern calligraphy.
I certainly ám saying that it is not hampered or "limited" simply because
it makes less frequent use of certain conventions other calligraphies use.
For example -- brushes. Very big in far eastern calligraphy. Hardly used
at all in the west (unless an artist is experimenting) and I don't think
it's used in the Arabic tradition at all. Does this make both eastern and
western calligraphies "limited"? I don't think so. It's just a technique
that isn't used much in the west -- but it certainly could be!
Now here's a thing: brush painted runic calligraphy!
> while things are different in the Arabic or Chinese cultural spheres.
Yes, here I think is the heart of the matter: things are dìfferent in
different places. Not "limited" or hampered or nonexistent.
> On Wed, 18 Jul 2012 21:38:28 +0100, R A Brown wrote:
> >That
> >there are different calligraphic traditions in
> different
> >cultures and different parts of the world is, in my
> view,
> >due to whole sets of non-linguistic cultural
> considerations,
> >not to the scripts per_se.
>
> I think a separation between the "scripts per_se" and the
> "non-linguistic cultural considerations" is impossible since
> the scripts are deeply affected by them.
Whereas I think that such a separation is entirely possible. Roman letters
are used to write a very wide variety of languages in different cultures.
Some are big into calligraphy (American, British) others may be less so
(Quechua, Maltese). I think it's the "cultural considerations" that will
cause the language's letters to be used artistically and thus lead to
calligraphy as an art. It is also cultural considerations (typically
religious ones) that will send calligraphy to the heights (as religion has
done to painting, sculpture, music and calligraphy in the west; and
calligraphy in the east).
Padraic
> mach
Messages in this topic (104)
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