Do you believe in miracles?

[ThisYouWillDo]

Wagner's Overture to Tannhäuser is a particular favorite.

Even you have redeeming qualities!

I suppose listening to a piece of music like that is a bit like reading a chapter from a book in isolation: while it might be brilliant prose, it is out of context. Likewise, I think sometimes operatic pieces suffer when not heard in a full performance. (I, personally, could listen to this one over and over without seeing the whole performance, however).



I think can agree with you that, while the ability to appreciate beauty might have to be taught, the act of appreciating it is a subjective one. So, while I might think my wife is ugly, and you consider her beautiful, there is a quality of "beauty" out there somewhere that we both subscribe to: an idea of what beauty is. Science cannot explain what that is.

TYWD

[Ozme52]

I think can agree with you that, while the ability to appreciate beauty might have to be taught, the act of appreciating it is a subjective one. So, while I might think my wife is ugly, and you consider her beautiful, there is a quality of "beauty" out there somewhere that we both subscribe to: an idea of what beauty is. Science cannot explain what that is.

TYWD

Actually science can explain that. Turns out to mostly be about symmetry. Ask a large sampling of men and women to arrange a large sampling of faces from most handsome/beautiful to least and then take measurements of all the faces and the most symmetrical faces are beautiful and the least symmetrical faces are ugly.

So the point is that we are governed by things that science can explain. And you can ask all you want about big bang and atoms... Your attitude is very arrogant in the sense that your argument presumes we know everything there is to know... and anything we don't know must be because of some omnipotent omniscient being.

[ThisYouWillDo]

[QUOTE=Ozme52;523329]Actually science can explain that. Turns out to mostly be about symmetry. Ask a large sampling of men and women to arrange a large sampling of faces from most handsome/beautiful to least and then take measurements of all the faces and the most symmetrical faces are beautiful and the least symmetrical faces are ugly.

Are you saying beauty is about symmetry or that it is symmetry. The experiment seems to suggest the latter, and I reject that. Also, it doesn't account for the fact that I think wifey is ugly and Thorne thinks she's beautiful. And it seems to me that handsome men have more asymmetrical faces while pretty women have symmetrical ones.

So the point is that we are governed by things that science can explain. And you can ask all you want about big bang and atoms... Your attitude is very arrogant in the sense that your argument presumes we know everything there is to know... and anything we don't know must be because of some omnipotent omniscient being.

No, no, no! That's quite wrong (apart from the "arrogant" bit) - I am arguing that science does not know everything. I am trying to counter the suggestion that everything can be explained by science now, or at some time in the future. Currently (I am told), science regards atoms as "unknowable".[/QUOTE]

[Ozme52]

Are you saying beauty is about symmetry or that it is symmetry. The experiment seems to suggest the latter, and I reject that. Also, it doesn't account for the fact that I think wifey is ugly and Thorne thinks she's beautiful. And it seems to me that handsome men have more asymmetrical faces while pretty women have symmetrical ones.

Neither, I'm saying that science is able to correlate beauty to some things that are in fact measurable. I'm making the point that some of the things we attribute to the human experience, music and art and the concepts of beauty, can in fact be correllated to factors in the physical world that science can attempt to explain. Countering the specific statement you made that science couldn't explain beauty.

You may call your wife ugly and someone else may say she's beautiful and you would likely both place her in the same relative position on a continuum of faces. The words are qualitative, not quantitative. But regardless of the word, you probably would both rate her relatively similarly in comparison to other faces.

And... familiarity breeds contempt. LOL. And variety is the spice of life... so of course one tires of the same face after a while. Another reason you might use different adjectives.

No, no, no! That's quite wrong (apart from the "arrogant" bit) - I am arguing that science does not know everything. I am trying to counter the suggestion that everything can be explained by science now, or at some time in the future. Currently (I am told), science regards atoms as "unknowable".[/QUOTE]

I will always disagree with the one statement 'or at some time in the future.'
That's religion masquerading as philosophy trying to deny science.

"Science" has regarded stuff we understand very well today as unknowable in the past. That particular statement, that atoms are unknowable, is itself pretty old... before we understood protons and neutrons and electrons, let alone quantum mechanics.

[Thorne]

Are you saying beauty is about symmetry or that it is symmetry. The experiment seems to suggest the latter, and I reject that. Also, it doesn't account for the fact that I think wifey is ugly and Thorne thinks she's beautiful. And it seems to me that handsome men have more asymmetrical faces while pretty women have symmetrical ones.

I think you will find that the majority of people tend to find things which are symmetrical to be more beautiful than things which are not. But this is by no means definitive. That's why I say it is subjective. And yes, men and women, perhaps because of gender differences or differences in upbringing, do tend to have differing concepts of beauty.
As for your wife (and I apologize in advance to the lady), if you were to show me a picture of her, or even if I were to meet her socially somewhere, I might indeed find her attractive, even beautiful. But I am looking solely at her appearance, while you are seeing her with the eyes of familiarity. And it is true that "familiarity breeds contempt." You have had to live with her for some number of years, perhaps you've had to deal with her lackadaisical housecleaning, or dealt with her foul language, or are just plain sick of smelling her farts all night long, as I'm sure she is sick of smelling yours! I'm sure that at one time you must have considered her beautiful, or you wouldn't have married her. You had to "learn" to think of her as ugly. (Again I apologize to her. I don't know her, have never seen her, everything I said is for illustrative purposes only, there's not a grain of truth in it. I'm sure she never farts.)

No, no, no! That's quite wrong (apart from the "arrogant" bit) - I am arguing that science does not know everything. I am trying to counter the suggestion that everything can be explained by science now, or at some time in the future. Currently (I am told), science regards atoms as "unknowable".

It's true, science does not know everything. Probably never will know everything. But religion knows nothing, cannot prove anything, and is based upon supposition and guesswork rather than facts. And calling something a miracle just because science cannot explain it doesn't make it so.

[Thorne]

Even you have redeeming qualities!

Just don't tell anyone! It'll destroy my reputation.

I think can agree with you that, while the ability to appreciate beauty might have to be taught, the act of appreciating it is a subjective one. So, while I might think my wife is ugly, and you consider her beautiful, there is a quality of "beauty" out there somewhere that we both subscribe to: an idea of what beauty is. Science cannot explain what that is.

Although I do not even KNOW your wife, this basically has been my point. And it is not science's task to explain what beauty is, or even what may be beautiful. It is science's task to try to remove the superstition and myth which permeates people's views of their world. And I, for one, find a certain amount of beauty in that.