Intro: • I will evaluate that Barthes claim ‘the author is dead’ is correct, and in doing so will discuss the role of intention in responding to, and interpreting, works of art Define intention: • Intentionalism subscribes to the idea that an author creating an artwork has an intended message and intention to create a work of art. The value of this intention, and consequently the value of the author, can be evaluated through considering the intentions’ ability to construct/influence meaning for the responder when examining the artwork. Evaluation that Barthes claim ‘the author is dead’ is correct: • Intention has no role in helping us respond/interpret meaning of art. This is because intention certainly doesn’t reflect the meaning individual responders gain when responding to, and interpreting artworks. Therefore, the artist can be considered irrelevant to the meaning of the art, and the artwork itself.
It is a defense of studying each historical period on its own terms, and not imposing one's own moral and social standards on figures and situations that existed with, perhaps, a different set of ethical and cultural concerns. Butterfield’s text described historians who project modern attitudes on to the past, pass moral judgments on historical figures, and regard history as significant only to the extent that it labored to create the modern world. Such judgments are viewed as problematic because they tempt historians not to understand the past on its own terms. Butterfield argues that historians should write aesthetically rather than polemically, exercising "imaginative sympathy" in appreciating the lost worlds of the dead rather than seeking, or expecting, the vindication of their own current positions (92). The "Whig interpretation," as Butterfield calls it, sees history as a struggle between a progression of good libertarian parties and evil reactionary forces, failing to do justice to history's true complexity.
Each situation and each person must be assessed on their own merits (Thiroux, 2004, p. 42). Since we cannot look at each client individually to determine whether or not Dr. Smith’s confidentiality policy is morally justifiable (it may be for one client, but not for another), we cannot properly answer this question using act-based utilitarianism. Rule-based utilitarianism, on the other hand, changes the basic utilitarianism’s principle from “everyone should always act to bring about the greatest good (i.e., “happiness”) for all
Art today is driven by many things, but perhaps the most common force is one's need to be original. Artists' today believes that they must develop their own style, and if that style is taken, they must find one, invent one, fabricate one, for he can be nothing if he cannot be original. Is that truly an acceptable ideal? How do you separate innovative ideas from those that are derived from being inspired by others? R. G. Collingwood, once called ‘one of the twentieth century's best-known "neglected" thinkers’ portrayed art as a "necessary function of the human mind, and considered it collaborative, i.e., a collective and social activity."
On the one hand, "the attack on moral relativism was part of an effort to rearm the West spiritually" for the battle ahead, while "the attack on cognitive relativism aimed at making a clear distinction between the scholarship and science of the Free World and the debased practices of its enemies" (282). In the long run, the opinions should fall beyond the margins of historiography, and therefore the judgment of any work of historiography should not be preset by a conceptual disagreement. Novick's perspective on the objectivity question undoubtedly guided his book. However, his beliefs are unable to create the past. Even the most simple personal beliefs and bias can skew the appearance we see of the
Visual rhetoric assists in furthering his main points (discuss??). Ironically, Berger’s visual assistance is his greatest supporting argument. He counters that “in this essay each image reproduced has become part of an argument which has little or nothing to do with the painting’s original independent meaning.” (reword)John Berger concedes that even he, the very man who criticized reproduction, is guilty of using reproductions for his own argument, thus changing the original purpose of the
Wallace also strongly points out that we need to be “a little less arrogant” and not believe solely in our preconceived notions about things, because we usually tend to be wrong. We must be aware of our surroundings and learn how to control how and what we want to think. Wallace says that we get to decide what has meaning and what does not, and we must do this with awareness, an open mind, and give ourselves choices of how to view situations. Bertrand Russell tells readers in “The Problems of Philosophy” that unlike typical sciences where one discovers correct answers, we are constantly searching for the value of philosophy. Russell says that philosophy does not find right answers, but rather encourages thinking.
Chuang Tzu believed that how we perceive things are directly related to each of our separate pasts, or our “paths”. Also, that we need to realized that our conclusions and dispositions would be completely different had we experienced another past, even possibly just one single instance. Confucius believed that all things are naturally good. It is only if you haven’t pursued the way that you can turn out evil. He also believed that the most important characteristic of our personalities is created by how we treat others.
Citing Watchmen as the point where the comic book medium "came of age", Iain Thomson wrote in his essay "Deconstructing the Hero" that the story accomplished this by "developing its heroes precisely in order to deconstruct the very idea of the hero and so encouraging us to reflect upon its significance from the many different angles of the shards left lying on the ground". [38] Thomson stated that the heroes in Watchmen almost all share a nihilistic outlook, and that Moore presents this outlook "as the simple, unvarnished truth" to "deconstruct the would-be hero's ultimate motivation, namely, to provide a secular salvation and so attain a mortal immortality". [39] He wrote that the story "develops its heroes precisely in order to ask us if we would not in fact be better off without heroes". [40] Thomson added that the story's deconstruction of the hero concept "suggests that perhaps the time for heroes has passed", which he feels distinguishes "this postmodern work" from the deconstructions of the hero in the existentialism movement. [41] Richard Reynolds states that without any supervillains in the story, the superheroes of Watchmen are forced to confront "more intangible social and moral concerns", adding that this removes the superhero concept from the normal narrative expectations of the genre.
Jamieson Reinhard September 11, 2012 History of U.S. Since 1865 Section 005 Prompt 1 In Herbert Butterfield’s The Whig Interpretation of History, Butterfield asserts his position that despite the numerous ways that various historians around the world attempt to piece together our past and relate it to our present, the only “safe piece of causation that a historian can put his hand upon” is the idea that “It is nothing less than the whole of the past, with its complexity of movement, its entanglement of issues, and its intricate interactions, which produced the whole of the complex present.” [1]Butterfield is correct in his thesis that students of history should only view the present as a direct result of the whole entire past. He proves it through his recognition of the Whigs’ fallacy that it is possible to make inferences about the present state of society by creating analogies between the present and specific moments in the far past. In addition, he explains, in his opinion, the only reasonable processes by which historians can explain the current state of the world based on its histories. Butterfield’s repetitive mention of inferences and abridgments alludes to the fact that Whig studies of history are characterized by too much summarizing and concluding.