What Makes Art Good?

Art is like pornography.  We can't define it, but we know it when we see it.  Or do we?

There is a variety of viewpoints about whether something is art and whether a specific artistic endeavor can be called "art" or not.  Are there any guidelines to help determine art?  Must it be original?  Provocative? Beautiful? Must it invoke emotion?  Be intellectually challenging? Could different kinds of art do different things to a person?

Is art completely subjective?  Is art entirely in the eye of the beholder?  Or can art be held to any objective standards?  Can a movie be objectively "bad"?  What about a poem or painting?  Or can a four year old's drawing be "good" art to his mother, but to everyone else it is awful?

Can a four year old actually create art or only random scribblings?  What is the difference between Jackson Pollock and Marla Olmstead?

Is art better if it has a compelling story behind it, or is is only more popular?  Is there a difference between popular art and good at, except in the opinion of the individual?  Since everyone has an opinion about art, why should critics be paid for their opinion and others are not?  What makes a critic's opinion better than anyone else?

Religious Tolerance

Most people think that religious tolerance is a good thing.  We should live and let live and if a group wants to believe in something, even if it is weird, they should be allowed to do so.

But what if one's belief is that all other beliefs are wrong and that they would be severely judged if they continued to believe in the wrong thing?  Some might go to extreme measures (and many have) to convince others that they need to believe the same as oneself.  Does "live and let live" extend to beliefs that cannot accept a "live and let live" standard?  Frankly, any religion that holds itself exclusively (such as most monotheistic religionists) cannot accept tolerance as an overall standard, because their beliefs are too serious, too much a matter of life and death for it to be taken lightly enough to easily tolerate other beliefs.  Can all religions really be tolerant without compromising their faith?

And should all religions be tolerated?  Some worshipers of Kali acted on the belief that anyone not worshiping Kali should be killed.  How different is that from the 30 Years' War in Europe, when hundreds of thousands of people killed each other over which version of Christianity they accepted?  Or the Crusades, who killed people in the name of a belief?  Should such religion be tolerated?  

What about doing something less than direct killing? What if a religious practice (or a belief in general) doesn't trust modern medicine based on a scientific model?  What if they believe in an alternative model of medicine?  What if they insist upon faith healing and prayer without medicine?  Is our medicine so foolproof that we must demand that they take it?  Must we demand that they give it to their children, even against their beliefs?  Can we legislate lack of trust?  Can we afford not to?

And what about cultural tolerance?  Many religionists want to teach their children instead of sending them to public school, so they can promote their world view without outside influence.  Doesn't that warp the children for their whole lives?  Isn't that a form of enforced belief, even cult behavior?  Or are they right that legistlating public education is also a form of enforced acculturation, enforced belief?  If we don't know who is right and who is wrong, does anyone have the right to believe as we believe?

Does one cultural group have the right, ever, to enforce their beliefs on others?

Who is the Greatest Literary Artist?

A line in Time magazine says that to create lists of literary art is a great obscenity.  Yet, we do make lists of art.  I am constantly listing out my favorite films and books.

But if we are going to consider a great literary artist, we have a lot to consider.  Command of language.  Influence. Breadth of subject. Intricate themes.

There are also many questions: What is literary art?  How is this different from popular literature, or is there any?  Can we call one artist "greatest" or even discuss it?  Do we have the right to determine a personal favorite?  Is it okay to determine that Douglas Adams is the greatest novelist of all time?  Who should we consider?

On this last question, I do not have answers, but I have suggestions.  Here are eight literary artists who continue to influence many and whose literary art is of the highest standard, in my opinion.

William Shakespeare-- Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, King Lear, and numerous plays and sonnets.

Dante Alighieri-- The Divine Comedy (Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso), plus lesser works.

Homer-- The Illiad and the Odyssey

The Deuteronomist-- The editor of Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, I and II Samuel, I and II Kings.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky-- Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov, The Idiot and other novels.

Leo Tolstoy-- War and Peace, Anna Karenina and numerous novels and essays.

James Joyce-- A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses, Finnegan's Wake, and other novels and short stories.


Plato-- The Republic, Apologia, Symposium and many other dialogues. 


Who might you include on this list?

Who Is Poor?

This man is poor.  How do we know this?  Well we can see that he is crippled.  We see that his clothes are dirty, at least partly from lying down in the dirt. He has a beggar's dish, so we know he is begging.  How much does begging make?  Well, in India, where he is from, begging doesn't make very much.  There's a lot of competition.  We suspect that he has no choice but to beg.  So he probably doesn't have much money.

But what makes him poor?  We "see" he's poor, but what is the source of his poverty?  Is it that he is crippled? Does being crippled make you poor?  Well, no, there are many people who are disabled who are doing fine.  Is that he is crippled in India?  Again, there are people who are doing quite well being disabled in India as well. Is he poor because he doesn't have much money?  Is it possible to have all one's needs met without much money?  Is it possible to have a decent income and still be poor?

What is real poverty?  Is it simply a matter of economics-- if you are below this income line then you are poor? Can't people not make a single penny, but be a part of a wealthy family and so not be poor?   Or is poverty more about relationships?  If you don't have people to help support you, then if you have a bad time economically, you remain there?  Or is poverty how people see you?  If you are rejected or pitied by society for economic reasons, or because you "look" or "act" poor, then aren't you poor?

Can we make a universal definition of poverty, or is it dependent on society?  If a person lives without electricity in one nation they are poor, can another without electricity not be poor in another context? If a person chooses to live without electricity and has all their needs met are they poor?  What if they have their children taken away from them because they don't have electricity, are they poor then?   Is poverty an objective standard?

Is poverty a measure of need, but one's need is dependent on various issues including personal characteristics and culture?

What Does Justice Look Like?

Justice has not as much to do with individuals as a society.  It is certainly possible that in order to establish justice that some individuals must be separated out to the rest should be kept safe, but justice mostly has to do with how a society at large functions.  But justice cannot be seen as strictly punishing the wicked.  Punishing is a negative and justice is a positive and we cannot create a positively just society by negative action.

But what does a just society actually look like?  Does every person have what they need?  Or do they just have the means to obtain what they need? Is justice a society that considers itself safe?  How much safety is required for there to be justice?  Does a society have to both enforce their fears and their anxieties?  What is the cost of a society without fear?

What is the basic foundation of justice?  Many people consider that law is the foundation of justice.  What law?  Who can create a perfectly just law?  How should such a law be enforced?  And can law and enforcement, by themselves, create a just society?

Others think a just society is created by giving everyone basic rights.  What kind of rights?  Can freedom of speech give justice to everyone?  If someone has the freedom to threaten, then is that part of the foundation of justice? If some rights cannot be allowed, and justice is based on rights, then where is justice found?  What balance of rights can create justice?