Before doing the readings and having the class discussions for this section, I would have been the first to tell you that there is good taste, and there is bad taste. For example, one can assume its fair to say that the furnishings in houses like Graceland and Prince Mongo’s are - while entertaining due to their celebrity - not what is considered good taste. In fact, they are quite tacky, though lovable and dear to the hearts of many Memphians. In the same way, I think most people will agree that most fashion fads that died in the 80’s and 90’s - Britney and JT’s denim debacle of the late 90’s - are in fact considered to be bad taste. But is this really enough to claim that there are universal and necessary laws that dictate what is good taste and what is bad?
Hume begs this question and forces us to consider things that might prove there is no such thing as good taste, or as he calls it a standard of taste. He mentions the variety of what is considered good taste. Consider the idea that Prince Mongo can like a couch that I dislike. Or consider that Britney thought a denim dress was pretty, and I thought it to be hideous. We remember Kant’s answer to a similar concern is the idea of subjective universality. This, of course, means that although we do not all have the same opinions and aesthetic judgements, does not hinder us from the expectation that someone should have the same opinion and aesthetic judgement as we do. This is one of the four “moments” of aesthetic judgements in Kant’s writing. There is the disinterested pleasure, subjective universality, purposiveness without purpose, and necessity. ___ The bottom line here, is that for Kant, to make an aesthetic judgement, or in other words to make a good judgement of taste, you must adhere to these conditions. Otherwise you are doing something improper; you are doing something entirely different and calling it a judgement of taste. In the same way, Hume feels that achieving certain goals - unity, the fulfillment of its purpose to please, and plausibility - is the correct way to make a judgement of taste which he calls his standard of taste.
But who’s to say any of this holds weight? Who’s to say that these standards and goals to meet when making an aesthetic judgement of taste hold any significance? Afterall, they are simply something that has been theorized about and thought up by these philosophers. In fact, the fact that they differ in what makes this standard or what makes good taste could be proof in its very significance. In fact, the next philosopher to come into our conversation essentially says this. Dickie takes all the distinctions between and separation from the good and agreeable and the useful and the moral and erases it. Dickie says that there is, in fact, no difference between an aesthetic judgement of taste and a moral or cognitive judgement. He thinks that the aesthetic judgement is simply a mystification of judgements of what is and what should be, that is cognitive and moral judgements. Similarly, Mothersill challenges us to find an aesthetic judgement that is law like, interesting, and something we actually believe. She seems to think this is something we are in capable of. In any case, these two philosophers stray away from Kant and Hume’s ideas that there can be a clear cut standard of good taste and that it would be useful. Dickie’s claims especially seemed to resonate with me, in thinking about how in this day and age of science and neuroscience specifically, that it would make sense to relate all aesthetic judgements back to more easily explicable judgements. I would not say I could fully agree with any of these individuals, but I will say that I do fall most closely to Kant. The main selling point for me, is the 4 moments, particularly the first two. The idea of the independent and disinterested pleasure - inexplicable by normal means of the good and agreeable resonates with the way in which aesthetic judgements seem to me to be inexplicable on some level. Subjective universality seems to explain very clearly our irrational expectation that other people should agree with our aesthetic judgements of taste. Whether or not it is useful, I couldn’t say I feel strongly about in either direction. I wasn’t truly convinced of any sort of usefulness in “good taste”.
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