Yuriko Saito, Aes of Unscenic Nature

• I. ADVOCATES OF SCENICALLY CHALLENGED PARTS OF NATURE
• Critique of the bias toward pictorial, scenic landscapes
• Show pieces, spectacular, grand
• Entertainment by easy beauty
• The scenically-challenged rest of nature
• Boring/tedious
• Plains, bogs, wetlands
• Subtle beauty



• Connection knowledge of natural history, positive aes and scenery cult
• Nature study allows us to go beyond scenery cult (i.e., nature app as scenery app) and embrace positive aes
• One argument for + aes is that denial of + aes may often be based on scenery cult and prejudice for easy beauty





• II. WHY SHOULD WE ADVOCATE +AES VALUE OF UNSCENIC NATURE?
• Why can't we just enjoy what appeals to us and forget boring landscapes and dead animals with putrid smells and maggots crawling all over them?"



• Cognitivist reply (Carlson)
• If aes judgments are going to be true and avoid aesthetic omissions and aesthetic deceptions
• Must interpret/app nature in correct sci categories
• Massive rat? When really a cute chipmunk
• Awkward deer? When really a graceful moose
• Must not interpret nature as a scenic, two dimensional design for this fails to app it for what it is and involves aes omissions and deceptions



• Saito thinks cog reply not work
• Someone may not care about making true aes judgements
• Deceptive/incorrect aes app may be more enjoyable
• Aes app a painting as a non-rep design may be more pleasant and avoid arduous task of determining its symbolic content
• Oak tree may look more exciting and interesting when viewed as a maple tree
• Is this Heyd's position? Yes....



• Saito responds to "Entertainment seekers who pursue any path to get aesthetic kicks, no matter how misguided"



• Saito's moral argument against entertainment seekers, those who have no interest in trying to appreciate scenically challenged nature
• A refusal to experience art/nature on own terms
• To put aside our own agenda
• Ought to approach aes object with due respect and give it a chance to tell its story
• Should not impose our own standard of aes value (pictorial coherence)
• Let nature speak in own terms (via science/natural history?)
• Should drop demand for easy beauty, for aes pleasure, and try to app unscenic nature
• Why? Because it is morally important not to treat nature solely as a visual resource for our enjoyment
• Rolston: "Ought not to tour national parks for a view, as if nature that can't serve us ought to at least please us"
• Respect for nature's intrinsic value requires listening to its own story and not treating it as a mere instrument to human pleasure.
• Ned is inclined to think this is not only a moral argument but also an aes argument
• Leopold's instrumental moral argument
• Should aes app unscenic parts of nature for they are crucial to ecological sustainability and ignoring them for the scenic will have us not protect them
• E.g. Wetlands



• III. HOW TO AES APP UNSCENIC NATURE
• Example: Dead elk carcass with maggots?



• Rolston's response:
• View natural object in larger context and see role it plays in the drama of life struggle and sustenance of ecosystems
• Look at is as part of a whole.



• Saito's reply to Rolston's response
• One: Unclear what the aes object is suppose to be for Rolston?
• Entire ecosystem, rather than the individual carcass?
• The whole motion picture rather than a scene
• Since ecosystems are tied into global ecosystem, is Rolston saying that that is the only legitimate object of nature appreciation and not the individual pieces of nature?
• Two: Even if we agree that the whole of which it is a part is beautiful, that doesn't mean the part is
• Fallacy of division: (False idea that parts must have properties of whole)
• That a person is beautiful doesn't mean every piece of him/her is
• That a dog is fast doesn't mean a dog's tail is fast



• Saito's constraint on when sci (cognitive) information is aes relevant
• Aes app has to begin and end with sensuous
• Though it can be (should often be?) modified by the conceptual
• Cognitive information is relevant only when it is triggered by the sensuous surface of the aes object and brought back to illuminate it
• Otherwise moved on to (aes app of?) something else
• Sci understanding of natural objects important to aes app only insofar as it illuminates sensuous surface of immediate object.
• If understanding the drama of the life-cycle in nature is to be relevant we must see and feel it in the motionless elk, in the smell of decay and in the incessant movement of maggots (work crew behind the scenes)
• Answer to the question why is scientifically informed appreciation of nature aesthetic?



• Asymmetries in art & nature app makes pos aes not plausible for art, but plausible for nature
• With art:
• Story might be poorly told (neg aes response)
• Or story told well, but content morally objectionable (neg aes response)
• Well told story about joys of child abuse
• Beautifully designed torture device
• Or nuclear bomb mushroom cloud
• Ghetto: No better expression of despair than in ghetto with burned out buildings, broken windows, boarded-up houses, litter-strewn sidewalks loitered by drug addicts and dealers
• Morally objectionable to marvel at and get aes satisfaction from these things
• Clearly rejecting Wilde's morality not relevant to aes app
• Is she rejecting Gass' morality not relevant to aes quality?
• Perhaps not: She could be saying although these things have high aesthetic quality, we morally ought not to aes app them
• Assumes something can have high aes value and it be the case we should not (morally should not) aes app it (though perhaps a well trained aes observer would be able to (and should be able to) find aes value if she let herself

• With nature:
• No stories uninteresting or trivial
• Although there may be different degrees of nature's skill in telling story
• Weed in city lot tells the same story as the redwood
• Maggots breaking down carcass as fascinating as layers of Grand Canyon
• No matter how repulsive, uninteresting, or insignificant, natural history and eco science reveal the marvelous workings of every part of nature
• Carlson: "All of nature reveals the natural order"
• Is this the equal beauty thesis (every part of nature equal in beauty to every other part)?
• No stories morally objectionable (nature not a moral agent)
• Hurricane's destructiveness and predators killing not morally objectionable
• Ned: They could be a disvalue, even if not a moral disvalue; so some of nature's stories might have unfortunate content



• IV. IS EVERYTHING IN NATURE AES APPRECIATABLE?
• Saito's answer is "No"
• Rejects the claim that everything in nature can or should be app aesthetically



• One: Some aes app of nature is psychologically impossible
• Some things in nature are so annoying, repulsive, unattractive that we can't bring ourselves to app the + aes value of their story
• Cockroaches, mosquitos, snakes, slugs, sharks, lions, weeds
• Are eyesores, give me the creeps, are simply pesky
• Our negative reaction to them outweighs the + aes value of their life story



• Some things in nature (e.g. natural disasters) are so threatening that we can't aesthetically appreciate them
• An avalanche as it sweeps you down the slope
• A bear's hot breath as it bites into your leg
• Story earth tells is too dramatic and powerful for us to listen and comprehend and appreciate
• John Muir story of climbing tallest tree as wind storm approaches
• Attempt to distance: Negative reaction can perhaps be overcome by distancing ourselves, taking a contemplative attitude, bracketing our concern for safety
• But distancing has aes costs
• Conflicts with the essential engagement (active participant) part of aes exp of nature
• Miss sensory qualities important to the experience
• Awe, being overpowered, painful awareness of own vulnerability



• Two: Some aes app of nature is morally impermissible
• We ought not to appreciate natural disasters that cause harm to people
• Such aes app is inappropriate
• Aes value of disasters overwhelmed or held in check by moral concerns.