Blog 2

1. The movies Aesthetics: Philosophy of the Arts, and CARTA: Evolutionary Origins of Art and Aesthetics: Neurobiology, Neurology, and Art and Aesthetics and the article What the Brain Draws from: Art and Neuroscience all cover most of the same key concepts.  They all cover the different techniques in art that help us to establish what something is.  They show how the brain interprets a piece of art and how some people prefer a certain type compared to others.  For example, some people prefer to look at faces than an abstract artwork.  All three break down the meaning of Aesthetics and what it does for the world of art.  This is where the different philosophers were brought up to describe how the theory of aesthetics has progressed through time.  The final concept was where they showed pictures of how the chemicals in our brains interpret different emotions.  Each emotion made the brain look completely different.

      2.  The most influential philosopher was Aristotle.  He lived during the 7^th century B.C.  He wrote a book called “The Poetics” which stated that strong emotion was good for people to feel.  The principles to art were simple.  There was a beginning, middle, and end to each story.  Each one captured a different emotion from people.  Art was not just a documentation of a story, but a place where people can go and lose themselves in emotion.

   

      3.  I didn't really find Changeux’s scientific view interesting at all.  He was hard to understand and I think I may have only understood half of what he said.  I found the pictures of the brain to be interesting because it showed what everyone’s brain looks like when they feel a specific emotion.  Ramachandran was extremely interesting.  He talked about the eight laws of aesthetics which really caught my attention.  He was also easier to understand than Changeux. 

      4.  The article and movies elaborate on the topics assigned in the reading.  For example, the textbook mentions aesthetics and lets the movies and article elaborate on the topic.  They also mentioned the philosophers that brought aesthetics to where it is today. 

        5.  I really enjoyed most of the videos and article because they really brought light on the topic of aesthetics and everything involved within the topic.  I liked that the video showed the many different important philosophers that helped to discover information about aesthetics.  I also enjoyed how in depth they went about the definition of the topic.