Students of philosophy may come across the notions of good, truth, and beauty. These notions are related to the philosophical branches of ethics, ontology, epistemology, and aesthetics; and are initially somewhat simple. Each notion is, in a sense, innate to all humans. Evolution has provided many of the structures needed to develop biological beings. In as far as survival is concerned, most of what is considered good is given. The good may appear mundane or unnoticeable after time has passed. Individuals may take their abilities for granted until someone without such abilities is presented, then pity and gratitude may hopefully generate, and not some opposites. The good is contained in the pleasurable and the ethical, though the pleasurable and ethical don’t necessitate each other. Pleasure would appear of lesser complication than ethics.
Beauty is good when presented to an agreeable mind, for beauty is contained in pleasure. As such, beauty isn’t always compatible with the ethical good, sometimes not even truth. It attempts to go beyond a necessary good to a state of bliss, a desire which permeates one’s lifestyle and notion of an ideal world. Individuals attempt to mold a world particular to themselves. Depending on how closely their epistemology is related to the ontology, they may succeed or fail. Success leads to comfort, and individuals may fail to act on behalf of ethics because of it. Thus beauty may relate to the good through pleasure, yet not intersect with the ethical good. The fairness of any exchange of what is good or beautiful is perhaps resolved in economics or social law.
Beauty and the good appear dependent on truth, which is ultimately ontology, whereas the truth isn’t dependent on good or beauty for its existence. The beautiful, as an innate biological function and not the study of aesthetics, is very much concerned with understanding the pleasures and pains of the self; and the ethical good is an extension of that understanding to others. The full spectrum of truth consist of one’s own understanding and the understanding of others. It consist of one’s ignorance, known and unknown, as well as others. Truth contains its logical negation, even if the negation isn’t physically possible. And lastly it includes the truth as a thought presented to the awareness and/or communicated ideas, both of which are limited by time and individual cognitive capacities. Everything appears to be related to the truth, whereas the good and beauty are more so related to the pleasures and pains of the self and others.
No comments:
Post a Comment