Richard Feynman on beauty

[Rum]

[mistermack]

I wouldn't argue with any of it, and he puts it very well.
But I take a different tack on beauty.

Beauty is hard-wired in our brains. The concept of beauty that is. There is no beauty "out there".
It only exists when a human brain decides that something is beautiful.

As we live and experience things, our brains gather more data, and the software gets modified. So we begin to find different things beautiful as we learn. A young child might not find a Picasso beautiful, but as an adult, might develop a passion for the beauty of Picasso's images. Nothing changes in the pictures, just in the head of the observer.

I've often wondered about beauty. I can understand flowers being beautiful. They were an important part of the diet of our ancestors, and a beautiful one, is a healthy one, and probably better to eat.

But why is a Leopard beautiful, and a Hyena ugly? They are both beautifully adapted to the environment, they are both a lethal threat, so you would think that they should both appear ugly.

What's the difference between the two?

My theory, which might be completely wrong, is that we look at them as we would a human.
The Leopard is muscular and sleek, things we associate with youth and health.
The Hyena has an enormous gut, and spindly legs, which we associate with older age and unfitness.

It's just an idea, I'm not over-confident of it. Any better ones out there?

[MiM]

My theory, which might be completely wrong, is that we look at them as we would a human.
The Leopard is muscular and sleek, things we associate with youth and health.
The Hyena has an enormous gut, and spindly legs, which we associate with older age and unfitness.

It's just an idea, I'm not over-confident of it. Any better ones out there?

The leopard looks like Homo Sapience and the Hyena like the Neanderthal Rather the same basic idea as you have. We are wired to prefer patterns that indicate health, fitness or utility (food), and then babies, of course.

[mistermack]

My theory, which might be completely wrong, is that we look at them as we would a human.
The Leopard is muscular and sleek, things we associate with youth and health.
The Hyena has an enormous gut, and spindly legs, which we associate with older age and unfitness.

It's just an idea, I'm not over-confident of it. Any better ones out there?

The leopard looks like Homo Sapience and the Hyena like the Neanderthal Rather the same basic idea as you have. We are wired to prefer patterns that indicate health, fitness or utility (food), and then babies, of course.

Oh yes, I forgot about babies. Babies and children are sleek, they don't have the lumps and bumps that adults get, as they get older. And babies have bigger eyes, which we find attractive.

That's why we like cars with sleek bodywork, and big shiny headlights.

[JacksSmirkingRevenge]

I've seen the original interview but this is a nice vid.

[Rum]

I know there's a more recent thread about Feynman but I can't be arsed to find it.

Tonight at 9.30 BBC2 - The Fantastic Mr Feynman.

[cronus]

There's six types of curve humans feel positive about. The rest are neutral. Woman know this. The land, the sea shore and the river. Humans know these to be keys to mean freedom or a trap. These three determine the rest.