essays

Full versions of most of these papers can be downloaded from my site on www.academia.edu.


 

“Aesthetic Preservation”, in Environmental Ethics for Canadians: A Text with Readings, Byron Williston (ed), (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011).

A short piece on arguments that urge us to preserve wilderness because of its beauty or aesthetic value.


 

 “Fact and Function in Architectural Criticism”, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 69 (2011): 21-30.

Pretty much everyone agrees that good buildings should be suited to their function. But it isn't always clear what a building's true function really is. In this essay, I argue that we can determine these functions by looking at histories of marketplace selection. I illustrate this solution using the case of Daniel Libeskind’s controversial addition to Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum.

 


“A Face Only a Mother Could Love: On Maternal Assessments of Infant Beauty”, in Motherhood - Philosophy for Everyone: The Birth of Wisdom, Sheila Lintott, ed. (Wiley Blackwell, 2011).

This paper tries to solve an age-old problem: Why do all parents think that their baby is the most beautiful one in the world? Are they just sleep deprived? Or could they all be right?


 

“Science, Nature, and Moore’s Syncretic Aesthetic”, Environmental Values 12 (2009): 351-356.

This is a short critical piece on Ronald Moore's book Natural Beauty, which presents his notion of a ‘syncretic aesthetics’ for nature. I take issue with Moore's criticisms of a rival view called 'scientific cognitivism', and suggest that the two views are not incompatible.

 


 

Nature, Aesthetic Values and Urban Design: Building the Natural City in Philosophy and Design: From Engineering to Architecture, Pieter Vermaas, Peter Kroes, Andrew Light and Steven Moore, eds. (Springer, 2008).

This essay grew out of a talk given to the Society for Philosophy and Technology in the Netherlands in 2005. In it, I try to get clear about what exactly it means to create ‘natural cities’, and how that relates to urban design practices. I draw on some ideas about function from the philosophy of science, and some ideas from the late Jane Jacobs’ Death and Life of Great American Cities.

 


 

The Aesthetic Value of Animals
Environmental Ethics 27 (2007) 151-169

In this essay, I consider some moral issues surrounding the beauty of animals, and develop the idea that animals can be appreciated aesthetically in light of the biological functions of their parts, forms, and traits. I later organized, with Emily Brady (Edinburgh), a panel on the topic at the 2007 American Society for Aesthetics meeting. Brady, Steven Davies (Auckland), Ned Hettinger (College of Charleston), and John Fisher (Colorado) presented papers. Hettinger’s contribution is available online here.

 


 

The Aesthetics of Nature (Invited Review Essay)
Philosophy Compass 2 (3) (2007) 358-72)

This essay is a short introduction to current debates in philosophical aesthetics regarding the appreciation of nature.

 


 

Theory, Observation, and the Role of Scientific Understanding in the Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature
Canadian Journal of Philosophy 36 (2006) 165-186

A response to the question: How can scientific knowledge affect the perceptual appearances of natural things? Here I approach the issue via reconceptualizations of the theory/observation distinction in the philosophy of science.

 


 

Freedom and Objectivity in the Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature
British Journal of Aesthetics 46 (2006) 17-37

An attempt to show the extent to which the notion of objectivity can be applied in the aesthetic appreciation of nature. The essay was inspired by Malcolm Budd’s discussion of perception in the aesthetics of nature in his book The Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature (2002). Budd’s response to my essay is here.

 


 

New Formalism and the Aesthetic Appreciation of Nature (with Allen Carlson)
Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 62 (2004) 363-376

Response to recent critiques of the claim that scientific understanding of nature is necessary for its appropriate aesthetic appreciation, and reassessment of the significance of formal qualities in nature appreciation. There is a brief critical discussion of this paper in Ronald Moore’s new book Natural Beauty (p. 177).

 


 

Moderate Formalism as a Theory of the Aesthetic
Journal of Aesthetic Education 38 (2004) 1-17

Response to Nick Zangwill’s ‘Moderate Formalism’, a sophisticated version of traditional Formalism that he develops in his book The Metaphysics of Beauty. I argue that this Formalism is in fact too modest to provide us with a substantial conception of the aesthetic.

 


 

Platonism, Metaphor and Mathematics (with James Robert Brown)
Dialogue 63 (2004) 47-66

Critical discussion of Lakoff and Nunez’s 2000 book Where Mathematics Comes From. We defend Platonism in the philosophy of mathematics against the authors’ attacks.

 


 

Natural Functions and the Aesthetic Appreciation of Inorganic Nature
British Journal of Aesthetics 44 (2004) 44-56

This piece argues against the claim, defended by Nick Zangwill (Durham) that functions have no place in the aesthetic appreciation of inorganic natural things, like rocks and clouds. Zangwill’s reply is here. Check our Zangwill’s nifty website.

 


 

Nature Appreciation, Science and Positive Aesthetics
British Journal of Aesthetics 42 (2002) 279-295

Reconsideration of the controversial idea of ‘Positive Aesthetics’: nature is everywhere beautiful. In this essay, I also defend the view that scientific knowledge is necessary for the aesthetic appreciation of nature.

This essay is reprinted in the new anthology Nature, Aesthetics and Environmentalism: From Beauty to Duty, edited by Allen Carlson and Sheila Lintott (Columbia University Press, 2008).

 

 


 

Can the Bundle Theory Save Substantivalism from the Hole Argument?
(with Patrick McGivern)
Philosophy of Science (Proceedings) 68 (2001) S358-S370

Attempt to solve a metaphysical difficulty in the interpretation of General Relativity using a neglected view of the nature of substance.

 


 

The Epistemic Significance of Appreciating Experiments Aesthetically (with Alex Rueger)
British Journal of Aesthetics 40 (2000) 407-423

A twist on the typical discussion of aesthetic factors in science: instead of aesthetic factors in theory choice, we look at aesthetic factors in experimentation.

 


 

Critical Notice of Eddy Zemach’s Real Beauty (with Allen Carlson)
Canadian Journal of Philosophy 29 (1999) 635-654

Critical analysis of Zemach’s 1997 book Real Beauty, which defends a robust variety of realism about aesthetic properties.

 



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