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comment by Kaj_Sotala · 2020-01-14T19:32:33.809Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
I generally agree, but I think that there's also a sense in which aesthetics comes from facts. See Propagating Facts into Aesthetics [LW · GW] (which is exactly about that), Identities are (Subconscious) Strategies [LW · GW] (one's sense of identity often includes lots of aesthetic considerations as well), and Book summary: Unlocking the Emotional Brain [LW · GW] (the kind of emotional learning described there probably drives many of these aesthetics).
Replies from: Charlie Steiner↑ comment by Charlie Steiner · 2020-01-15T14:15:21.871Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
I thought "aesthetics come from facts" was going to go off into evolutionary psychology. Health being good for our genes is a fact that explains why (without explaining away) health is aesthetically better than sickness (for most people), etc.
Replies from: Kaj_Sotala↑ comment by Kaj_Sotala · 2020-01-15T14:29:13.846Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
Well there's that too. I liked this take on it:
Everything is experienced through a series of filters. Filters are created by instinct and experience… The entire world looks and feels COMPLETELY different for each person, because no ones’ set of filters is the same.
The “deeper” the filter, the more influence it has over your perception of reality. Evolutionarily developed filters (instinct) occurred from millions of years of selection, and are very deep. Filters originated in your childhood that survive into adulthood are generally deep, etc. Someone calling you a mean word adds a filter that might last an hour.
These filters are stacked on top of each other like a house of cards. The deeper the filter, the more influential. But every filter effects one’s perception of reality… There are deep filters based on physical brain chemistry, instinct based on human evolution, etc. Layers of filter can be peeled away to see reality in a more “pure” way. Peeling away layers allows one to see things(reality) in a way they didn’t before, and reconsider “their” reality. Note: peeling away layers does not necessarily mean one will then go on to form a truer view of reality.
Some of the filters defining what's beautiful and what's ugly are going to be learned and others innate, with the learned ones being formed on the basis of the innate ones.
comment by Dagon · 2020-01-14T16:22:00.268Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
This matches my general model. There are artifacts of human-style neural processing which don't introspect easily, and most attempts at explanation are ad-hoc and untestable. Emotions are a key element of this, and aesthetics are deeply related to, and possibly just the same as, emotions.
Note that these things are mutable over time, both for ineffable reasons and intentionally via practice. You can decide to see something as beautiful, and with a few months or years of practice, it will become so. And things you once adored become so-so or worse as you age and change.
comment by Gordon Seidoh Worley (gworley) · 2020-01-14T20:14:38.396Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
So I think you are right about the way aesthetics power ethical reasoning, and I think aesthetics is just a waypoint on the causal mechanism of generating ethical judgements, because aesthetics are ultimately about what we value [LW · GW] (how we compare things for various purposes), and what we value is a function of valence [LW · GW]. So to the extent I agree it's to the extent that I see ethics and aesthetics as applications of valence to different domains.
comment by rosyatrandom · 2020-01-14T14:47:10.059Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
I'm glad someone else thinks so, too. I'd also go so far as to say that our notions of rationality are also largely aesthetic.