‘Key Questions in Meta-Aesthetics’ is a workshop funded by the British Society of Aesthetics and the Aristotelian Society and will take place on Tuesday, June 10th at the University of Nottingham.
This will also be a hybrid event, featuring talks from Alex King (Simon Fraser University), Clotilde Torregrossa (University of St Andrews), Jinhui Wang (University of Oklahoma), and Mark Silcox (University of Oklahoma).
Programme:
9:30-10:45 Celia Coll (University of Nottingham) ‘Cognitive Value and the Nineteenth-Century Novel
Abstract: There is a well-established tendency in the philosophy of literature to use a small set of paradigmatic cases in support of its theoretical commitments. For instance, in the debate about cognitive literary value, there is a marked tendency in its proponents to favour the ostensibly morally edifying novels of the nineteenth century as case-studies. Where works which fall outside of this paradigm are discussed within the context of this debate, these works are usually also novels from the apparently amoral twentieth century and treated as potential counterexamples to the account of cognitive literary value which ensues from employing the nineteenth-century novel as a case-study. We find an unusual exception to this tendency in Simecek’s (2024) case for the cognitive value of contemporary poetry. Her discussion suggests that the current use of case-studies in the debate about the cognitive value of literature as it stands threatens to unduly narrow our conceptions of this value and of the cognitive gains to be made from engaging with literature. If these conceptions are indeed unduly narrowed, then it follows that we are not presently in a position to make a full case for or against cognitive literary value. This paper aims first to argue that the overrepresentation of the nineteenth-century novel in the debate has indeed shaped our conception of cognitive value and has unduly narrowed it, and second, to offer some insight into how drawing from other forms of literature into our pool of case-studies, namely poetry, narrative works from other literary periods, and bad works of literature can help us better understand the possibility of cognitive literary value and what it entails.
10:45-12:00: Mark Silcox (University of Central Oklahoma) ‘Don’t be Didactic! Moralism and the Aesthetics of Edification’
Abstract: Any account of the axiology of artworks that tries to blur the distinction between aesthetic and moral value has to give some sort of explanation for why didacticism is generally regarded as a type of aesthetic demerit. If artworks possess value partly or wholly on account of their ability to improve us morally, why do we (often, perhaps normally) find it objectionable when we notice them trying to do this even a little bit too hard? I argue that, while this is a serious problem for many forms of aesthetic moralism and ethicism, the problem goes away entirely to the extent that one embraces moral fictionalism as a more general account of the nature of ethical thought and discourse. For the moral fictionalist, didacticism in art is a flaw when (and only when) it interferes with the coherence and immersivity of the fictional worlds that an artwork represents. For these features are crucial in exactly the same way both to the value of artworks as such and to the prescriptive authority of morality. I contrast my diagnosis of why the aesthetic moralist should condemn didacticism with Charles Repp’s detailed defense of the claim that didacticism is an aesthetic flaw because it is an indicator of epistemic unreliability in authors. My approach is superior to Repp’s insofar as it avoids any suggestion of the “intentional fallacy,” and by virtue of being less susceptible to counterexample. I close with a discussion some examples of borderline didacticism from a few well-known representational artworks in different media that bear out my analysis, including the final chapter of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina, Goya’s painting The Third of May 1808 in Madrid, and the credit sequence for Lars Van Trier’s film Dogville.
12:00-12:45: Lunch
12:45-14:00: Clotilde Torregrossa (University of St Andrews) ‘Aesthetic Experience and the Puzzle of Sequential Art’
Abstract: Theories of aesthetic experience can broadly be divided into externalist and internalist theories. The first set tend to identify aesthetic experiences by their contents. The second set, though, tend to identify aesthetic experiences by certain kinds of mental responses, e.g. a certain kind of aesthetic attention or attitude, pleasure, or a more complex mental state such as aesthetic appreciation. In this paper, I defend this classification of theories of aesthetic experience, and argue that neither type can comfortably account for our experience of sequential art, i.e. artworks which are not experienced ‘in one go’, but over time – ‘sequentially’. I delineate the key features of sequential art before outlining what I call the puzzle of sequential art.
14:00-15:15: Jinhui Wang (University of Oklahoma) ‘Hope of Second-Order Convergence: A Novel Approach to the Norm of Aesthetic Discourse’
Abstract: Nick Riggle (2022a; 2022b; 2024; forthcoming) argues that the norm of aesthetic discourse is not convergence but a distinctive form of community, according to which we vibe, appreciate each other’s individuality, and do not mind disagreements. Nat Hansen & Zed Adams (2024) object that Riggle’s theory does not take aesthetic discourse seriously and collapses into mere exchanges of preferences. Indebted to Stanley Cavell, they present an approach called Hope of Convergence that can avoid Riggle’s criticism of Convergence. In response to Hansen & Adams (2024), Riggle (forthcoming) argues that seriousness is not a reasonable requirement for aesthetic discourse. In this paper, I argue that Riggle is right that Hansen & Adams’s account of seriousness is problematic. However, it does not mean that we should entirely rule out the requirement of seriousness in aesthetic discourse. I present a novel approach called Hope of Second-order Convergence: When we speak with each other about the aesthetic value of an object, we hope that we will agree that we are both eligible aesthetic agents who can give, understand, and respond to aesthetic reasons, though we do not hope we can converge on first-order aesthetic judgments. In this way, we take each other’s aesthetic standing seriously and respect aesthetic diversity. I argue that my approach can avoid Riggle’s criticism of Hansen & Adams’s account of seriousness, while is constitutive of good aesthetic discourse in Riggle’s sense.
Afternoon Break: 15:15-15:30
15:30-16:45: Alex King, ‘What is the Aesthetic?’
Abstract: A recent movement in analytic aesthetics splits apart two questions: one which would demarcate the aesthetic domain from others, and the other which would explain the value to be found in that domain. Advocates of this approach tend to focus on the latter issue, hoping to be able to remain silent on the former. I wish to push back against this tendency. It can give us some of what we want, but it cannot underwrite a complete account of aesthetic value or normativity. This is so even when we focus solely on questions of value and normativity, because it cannot help us to understand anything that might be distinctively valuable in the aesthetic domain. Perhaps a better way to proceed is to face the talk’s titular question head-on, and build an account of aesthetic value on that foundation. In service of this, I propose a view on which the aesthetic has to do with sensation, not narrowly restricted to sense perception, but construed more broadly to include mental imagery as well as feeling and emotion, ideation, comprehension, and understanding, both conceptual and nonconceptual. I then examine which conclusions about aesthetic value and normativity should be drawn from such a framework.
Those interested in attending should email Jon Robson at Jonathan.Robson@nottingham.ac.uk to register their interest.