亚历山大Nehamas是一个优秀的客人。非常感谢亚历山大本周出现在节目中。

我想进一步应对亚历山大的中心主张之一。他说,美与他所谓的“幸福的承诺。”To find something beautiful is to perceive in it a promise of happiness. He even says that when you have exhausted what a thing has to offer you in the way of happiness, you will no longer find it beautiful. This line does explain a lot about what I'll call positive beauty, for lack of a better term. I'm not sure, however, that it works for what I'll call negative beauty.

我认为,这样的美丽地方。这是电影的美丽《梦之安魂曲》。想象一个艺术作品致力于无所事事但扮演邪恶的心理,而不是以这样的方式赞扬或谴责,不代表它作为其他陌生和难以理解,但只是让我们看到它。在我们的集邪恶的,彼得·范·宣称邪恶的心理对我们来说是难以理解的。但我不认为我同意。我不会走这么远,说它潜伏在我们所有人,但我确实认为我们高估了自己的距离。这一点在托马斯·内格尔对道德运气的美丽的文章。但回到我们想象的艺术描写纯粹的邪恶。让我在你想象一个工作不代表邪恶注定会失去,最后,邪恶的好——就像很多表示。我想工作,让季不乐观,我们都非常想体验。这样的工作可能是真正的困扰。如果真正的邪恶的存在在世界上是一个令人难忘的现实,那么的美丽表示的现实可能至少一样的现实本身。

现在你可能会问:“为什么吸引一个假想的艺术品?”First, I can't off-hand think of a work that has just the features I'm after -- though many come close. But more philosophically, I myself always find the space of possibilities more philosophically interesting than the space of actualities. The actualities represent some sample of the possible, often an interesting sample of the possible. It is a certainly a deep and important question to ask why, of all the possibilities, just these been actualized. But here I think the answer in many cases won't be deeply philosophically interesting or illuminating. The answer will depend on the contingencies of human history and culture and sometimes just on pure accident or the mechanisms of distribution currently at play. If we have free market capitalism we might expect this or that kind of art to get produced. If we have a high degree of state intervention and subsidy of the arts, we might expect another kind. In the case of negative beauty, I can't think of many mechanisms that would cause a lot of it to be produced. People just do not enjoy that which haunts in the same way as they do that which promises happiness. We don't seek out the haunting. Indeed, we typically seek to rid ourselves of that which haunts. That's why it can drive us to the therapist's couch.

每个人都同意,我认为有令人难忘的现实。听比尔·克林顿谈论在卢旺达种族灭绝。他仍困扰着自己的决定不进行干预。可能在莱温斯基事件也会困扰他的余生。但有可能想知道如果一个人能让美丽的现实。如果你接受Nehamas线美丽只有哪里有幸福的承诺,那么也许不是。当然你可以代表那些有潜力成为能够克服在一个美丽的艺术品。但在这种思维方式的表示这是能够克服将是至关重要的。怪物击败,黑暗中可能织机,但太阳不是熄灭,即使闺女它照耀的那么明亮。指环王是接近,在某种程度上,不给我们这种缓刑。 Though the darkness is overcome, the effects of having confronted it never go away. Frodo never manages of his own will to destroy the Ring of Power. Only accident saves him. He will be haunted for the rest of his days by his inability to give up the Ring when it most needed to be given up. He will never be the self he once was.

实际上,我认为,没有必要联系幸福和美丽是不可预知的,外在的,而不是内在。美丽可以困扰,承诺幸福,或邀请我们一些上面两种声音的混合。我们更喜欢积极的美-美,但是他们是同一属的物种。

你可以把我的线作为友好修正案亚历山大的。他所说的对美、风格和个性仍然可以表示。只是有两个方面。我不仅被定义,我找到幸福的承诺,还被我发现的。我们可能更倾向于寻找承诺我们幸福,但是如果我们将全面了解自己完全也许我们最好打开尽可能多的令人难忘的力量-美丽的幸福做出积极的力量美。