RS doesn't introduce terminology in order. He can't help but run ahead of himself. He throws around undefined terms, the mark of an inexperienced teacher who knows too much. He's so excited about Bach, he can't control the flow of trivia. He speaks nonsense, viz. "Martin Luther had a lot of hymn tunes." He expects too much of this class. It's an illogical, romantic approach to music. He needs to write down his terms in order of presentation. Thinking on the fly. Your poor EU students! What crap!
This is all really backwards. Just because you can identify the subject of a fugue and its multiple entrances does not mean you get the music, unless there really isn't that much to get because the music is profoundly simple and merely decorative.
Unfortunately, as far as this explanation goes, the profundity of music is not captured, if indeed it exists at all.
@bahramf "The subject is a series of notes. That's why there is nothing like an idea in this music."
And spoken language is a series of speech acts, written language scratches on a page. Logic is a series of empty symbols and math is the same but with an irrational assumption thrown in. Art is a collection of colours, poetry a collection of words.
Besides, a fugal subject is not a series of notes, it is an temporally embodied relationship within a set of of tones.
@JDMusicTuition You must have meant "painting is a collection of colours". Art is not a category of art.
Okay, so the notes/tones have a temporary (I assume, while the fugue is being played) embodied relationship with each other? Is that what you're claiming? I want to get it right before we move on. I would suggest restating it w/o the embodied part b/c I think you'll have a hard time explaining what the body of a tone is.
So, please state what you think a Fugue really is.
@bahramf "You must have meant "painting is a collection of colours"."
When space is limited and one of the dictionary definitions of "art is "(uncountable) The study and the product of these processes." then you are free to make such assumptions.
"I think you'll have a hard time explaining what the body of a tone is"
A tone is what you hear when you hear a sound as a note in the context of other notes in terms of the interrelationship between those notes.
@bahramf A fugue isn't necessarily one thing, it is an approach to composition in the same way that a novelisation is an approach to writing a biography.
A fugue is ABOUT its theme in the same way that the novel is ABOUT someone's life. You can come to understand that person through the novel, you can come to understand that theme through the fugal treatment.
But the theme can also be about some other concept by the connotation of its intervallic structure, just like a novel can have a moral.
@JDMusicTuition Novels aren't necessarily about a person's life. Actually, they're not usually about a person's life. Novels are a lot more complicated than that.
I think a fugue can be complicated, but not in the same way, unless you can explain how it might be. It can be a very complicated arrangements of sound with a theme, but the theme is musical. And it, alone, is meaningless (unless you can show me otherwise). So, coming to understand it through the fugue is an odd idea.
@bahramf "Novels aren't necessarily about a person's life."
I specifically mean novelisations, not novels. But you can apply the same reasoning to any artistic genre or even industrial/professional practice.
"And it, alone, is meaningless (unless you can show me otherwise)."
Why do you get a free pass in claiming musical themes are meaningless? I can show that music necessarily has meaning, but I would like to know the basis of your claim first.
@DarkwingScooter Burden of proof: "When debating any issue, there is an implicit burden of proof on the person asserting a claim.[1] This burden does not necessarily require a mathematical or strictly logical proof, although many strong arguments do rise to this level (such as in logical syllogisms). Rather, the evidential standard required for a given claim is determined by convention or community standards, with regard to the context of the claim in question.[2][3]" (wiki).
I think you will find that the commonsense position is that music is meaningful and logical, the burden of proof has always been on the other side.
"an art form capable of profundity"
It depends, again, what your definition of profundity is. For me logic is profound and music is logical (which I can positively prove), so by that fact alone music is profound.
But if you cannot tell me what you think "profound" is we can't discuss this.
@DarkwingScooter The common-sense position is not how we determine burden of proof. I'm making a negative claim, you a positive claim. The burden of proof is on the one making a positive claim. Therefore, you have the burden of proof.
However, we're not talking about language and also, even if language is not profound, music might not be as well. There is no positive claim implied by my negative claim "music is not profound". You're just making shit up now.
@bahramf The simple reality is that people think profound thoughts and seek to express those thoughts in any one of a multiplicity of media.
It happens to be the case that music is more successful at conveying the idea of profundity (no scrabbling about for definitions), while language can be more effective at referring to it (no struggling with the theme, just say the word).
Music of a certain sort is written by people when they wish to deal with subjects of human experience...
@JDMusicTuition You're wrong about that. Music doesn't more successfully convey profound ideas. It doesn't convey any ideas, and the ones it does are only very simple (e.g. sadness).
@bahramf Specifically, lest you make your burden of proof argument again:
You have specific burden under your positivist scheme to discharge your responsibility to PROVE that language is profound in the first place.
If you can just ignore my arguments, stick your fingers in your ears and go lalala with my explanation of profundity in music why can I not do the same for your (much weaker) explanation in the case of language?
@JDMusicTuition I don't have to prove language is profound. I will prove that literature is though. Literature is profound b/c it deals with subjects of human experience with great depth, nuance and wisdom.
@bahramf The person wishing to convey a profound concept uses language he believes will convey profundity or illicit a response which he thinks of as profound in the listener.
This is no different from the case of the composer who decides to write, and deems successful, such music which he believes to convey profundity and will be experienced as profound by the listener.
Neither literature nor music IS PROFOUND in the sense you want literature to be but try to deny music.
Who's the one making positive statements without proof now eh?
"You could give me one example."
Wow! Just read man, just read. I gave it more than once. The fugue in this video is an example of profoundness in music. Move along please.
"I've explained how literature is profound."
No, you have given a definition which is far too narrow, which does not exclude music, which constitutes a positive unproven claim and which I did not accept.
@bahramf "Just stating that a fugue is profound doesn't make it so."
Yes, and neither does just stating that literature is either.
Things are what they are.
"The rest of the world does."
Really? Most people I speak to find the idea that music is NOT profound patently absurd.
I haven't come across anyone who hasn't read those few rarefied sources that authoritatively make this claim who didn't give me an incredulous look when I tell them that some people believe this.
@DarkwingScooter Well, fortunately those who think literature is profound can explain it. Those who think music is profound tend to be pretentious and talking out of their ass.
@bahramf ...That's the difference. Anyone can just say something, but only a few can substantiate it. Also, if music has profound content so obviously, why aren't there more sophisticated conversations about music like there are about literature, and why does Spano's ass-talk get taught in Universities?
Apparently so, you haven't substantiated jack squat, you just made up a definition and stuck your finger in your ear.
"if music has profound content so obviously"
Music doesn't have profound content. Music, when considered as music, can also be considered profound when it is considered in a way that attends to serious issues (e.g. ethical) in a thorough and deeply considered mode of thought.
Language also has no profound content: Think referent.
@DarkwingScooter I've defined profundity, I've given examples of how at least two literary works are profound and how others might be as well. I really don't know what else you could want.
My definition is made up in the same way that the definition of any concept is made-up. Nevertheless, it has strong intuitive appeal. Yours defines profundity as a mental state, mine as thought-provoking and thoughtful content. I can't imagine how mine is ad hoc and yours not.
Yes, but a definition is a positive statement of identity, by your standards you need to PROVE your definition correctly identifies profundity (which it does not) AND prove that it excludes music (which it does not).
"it's music vs. literature."
What you are speaking of is rhetoric, and musical rhetoric has always been part of music education.
You are confusing music with the sounds that comprise it. Music exists at the same level of thought as literature.
@DarkwingScooter You're just saying that though. You're clearly wrong. Do you really think children should be listening to music as much as they read novels? Clearly the burden is on you b/c people think we can learn from literature but not from music.
@bahramf "Clearly the burden is on you b/c people think we can learn from literature but not from music."
Are you mad? Have you never heard of the trivium and quadrivium?
Listening to music (if you are thinking Lady Gaga) is no different from reading trashy romance novels and simply listening to "art" music is no different to simply reading a Shakespeare play.
To understand it (be it Bach or Dostoyevsky) you have to study it. Many people pay lots of money to have their kids study music.
@DarkwingScooter Wow, that means a lot to an aesthetic debate. Why aren't more philosophers of art citing studies like those??? Oh yeah, they have nothing to do with aesthetics.
@bahramf Listen, I don't mind trying to help you out with trying to understand something you clearly don't have the foggiest over. But if you ask me to prove things which I just did a three post exposition wihtout even so much as acknowledging said exposition on you are just being a slippery troll.
I have had enough. You are not adding to this debate. You will not prove any of your claims and demand ridiculous standards of proof for everything you disagree with.
@bahramf "The positive claim was that people learn from literature, not that reading helps them in other school subjects"
Yes... and your claim was that people do not learn from music, something which is obviously and demonstrably false.
You study and learn from music itself too, just because music benefits other learning doesn't not mean you don't learn from music separately and severally.
In fact the dominant mode of music education is of the absolute kind.
@DarkwingScooter No, my claim is true. Because people don't learn from the music. You might sleep 8 hours and learn better the next day, this doesn't mean you learned anything from sleeping.
@bahramf Yes, but that is not the claim I was addressing, I was addressing the claim that there was no value to studying music.
The claim that you cannot learn anything by studying is a bit bizarre, frankly, because the origin of Western philosophy is traditionally linked to Pythagoras' discovery of the harmonic series.
You obviously can't learn anything from anything by passive non-engagement.
@JDMusicTuition That's a contentious claim when it comes to Pythagoras. We don't really know what the greeks listened to. Also, the claim that learning music helps us know music better or that sort of learning transfers to other areas of study is not controversial. Whether we actually learn something about history, religion, philosophy, etc. from music is the controversial claim which cognitivists (like you) have to affirm.
If you're not a cognitivist, then gtfo b/c that's the debate.
@DarkwingScooter HOW do you study and learn from the music itself? You can study it and it will help you with studying anything else. This doesn't mean the music has cognitive value. Do you even know what the cognitivist position is?
I really don't believe you're a grad student. If so, it must be at some horrible University. No grad student I know thinks 9/11 was a conspiracy or that music has cognitive value based on it helping students with their math tests.
You are now frantically trying to change the topic to something else you clearly know nothing about to av oid looking like an idiot in this topic you know nothing about. Why are you yacking on about cognitivism? I said quite clearly that I am not interested in positivist arguments that go nowhere.
Or are you on about trying to inject ethics into everything again?
@JDMusicTuition Cognitivism is the view that we can learn from X art form. How is that positivist? It's one of the biggest topics in the philosophy of music.
@bahramf Specifically: Roger Scruton distinguishes very usefully between SOUNDS, NOTES and TONES.
This distinction is analogous to phonemes, words and the intended signified.
Music exists when we attend to tones, but because of the recursive and agglomerative nature of tones music (as in tones or collections of tones at the word scale) exists at the same level of thought as music at the scale of literature.
The difference between shallow and profound literature IS its music.
@bahramf The reason for it it is quite simple: When you read literature you consider as profound you attend to it in the same way that you attend to music as opposed to words.
The difference, at a technical level, being that words signify signifiers but tones signify only their only quality as tones and connote signifiers afterward.
Profound literature is not ABOUT whales and Russian princes, it is about itself as literature and as such it connotes something else as signifier.
@bahramf "why does Spano's ass-talk get taught in Universities?"
Spano's claim to fame is firstly as a practicing musician. But his ideas will resonate with the experiences of other practicing musicians.
He is not primarily a philosophers so he may not be able to grasp the finer details needed to make his own position work in THAT domain. You don't study Picasso to learn Spanish.
Come to think of it, you shouldn't gripe, you haven't demonstrated much command of the field yourself.
@bahramf "You're the one who doesn't even understand burden of proof."
I understand that you like to ask everyone else to prove absolutely everything and then like to make broad sweeping negative (i.e. unprovable) claims to avoid doing the same yourself, as well as liberally employing definitional retreat to save your self from, heaven forbid, ever having to back up anything.
In other words, I understand full well how you are abusing it.
Uhm, the burden of proof is not the scientific precept, it is a legal one.
It has never been a scientific precept in practice and it only was one in philosophy between 1900 and 1950 with logical positivism. It was shot down in that field by Popper most especially.
The scientific precept you are looking for is falsifiability, the dominant mode of scientific inquiry is pragmatism, which explicitly avoids looking for positive proof.
@bahramf "Burden of proof is used in science too."
No, no it most certainly is not. Why do you think studies involving mostly significance testing get so far? You strictly speaking can never prove ANYTHING with significance testing, and yet it is the single most overused test in the field.
"Oh yeah, they have nothing to do with aesthetics."
It has nothing to do with aesthetics, it has everything to you with you making a positive statement which this little fact amply falsifies.
@DarkwingScooter The positive claim was that people learn from literature, not that reading helps them in other school subjects. So, it doesn't falsify the claim at all.
Literature itself is something to study and learn from even if it doesn't impact other academic subjects. Music is not like this b/c you literally have to point to success in other subjects (as you did) to show that learning it has any cognitive value at all.
@bahramf "Music is not like this b/c you literally have to point to success in other subjects (as you did) to show that learning it has any cognitive value at all."
Just because I DID point at success outside of the study of music does not mean that the ONLY value is in this. Again, your claim that there was NO value in studying music.
I simply pointed out that, aside from the intrinsic value, there is also an clearly demonstrable extrinsic value.
@bahramf You seem to be implying that for music to be profound ALL music must be profound. This is of course ludicrous because you would not want to claim that ALL literature is profound I presume.
Just to clarify, you are trying to demonstrate that SOME literature is profound in such a way that NO music can be similarly profound. Correct?
@JDMusicTuition All music mustn't be profound. You could give me one example. I've explained how literature is profound. Do you really want me to dredge up where I did this for the third time?
@bahramf Reason I ask is because I wrote a dissertation on this very subject and what you usually find is that claims of "meaninglessness" or "alogicality" in music is usually based on very peculiar notions of meaning or logic which are rarely themselves fully expressed.
In my view showing that something music is not language is not sufficient to show that music does not have meaning unless you can also show that meaning is necessarily linguistic.
@DarkwingScooter I agree with you. The other commenter brought up language. Did you address the question on musical profundity in your dissertation? Because even if there is some meager meaning to be garnered from absolute music, this does not make it an art form capable of profundity. My professor wrote a paper on musical profundity. And I've written one too, but not for publication. When his comes out would you like the info?
@bahramf "Also, b/c I've heard of this happening, is your dissertation online?"
Nope soz. It is in the pipes of academia, I don't think my Uni. Library will put it online in any case and I don't think I am allowed to.
"Can I assume you're at a University with access to scholarly journals?"
Not at the moment unfortunately, but I have a lot of material printed out on the subject from when I did. If you cite a journal article that I can't find I will take you on faith though for now.
@DarkwingScooter I don't have a peculiar notion of meaning or logic. In fact, if you have a peculiar notion of meaning you use, I may well accept it for music if it captures some of why we think music has aesthetic value.
@bahramf "I don't have a peculiar notion of meaning or logic"
So you keep saying but you still haven't said what you think these are.
I will lay my cards on the table:
- Meaning is the Witgenstinian sort roughly corresponding to that found in "Philosophical Investigations".
- Logic is anything that can be reduced to first order logic, but I do admit special pleading for second order axioms such as the axioms of choice and inductions.
RS doesn't introduce terminology in order. He can't help but run ahead of himself. He throws around undefined terms, the mark of an inexperienced teacher who knows too much. He's so excited about Bach, he can't control the flow of trivia. He speaks nonsense, viz. "Martin Luther had a lot of hymn tunes." He expects too much of this class. It's an illogical, romantic approach to music. He needs to write down his terms in order of presentation. Thinking on the fly. Your poor EU students! What crap!
DonVueltaMorales 8 months ago
This is all really backwards. Just because you can identify the subject of a fugue and its multiple entrances does not mean you get the music, unless there really isn't that much to get because the music is profoundly simple and merely decorative.
Unfortunately, as far as this explanation goes, the profundity of music is not captured, if indeed it exists at all.
bahramf 1 year ago
Backwards, upside down, slow, fast... Wow.
The subject is a series of notes. That's why there is nothing like an idea in this music.
bahramf 1 year ago
Comment removed
JDMusicTuition 1 year ago
@bahramf "The subject is a series of notes. That's why there is nothing like an idea in this music."
And spoken language is a series of speech acts, written language scratches on a page. Logic is a series of empty symbols and math is the same but with an irrational assumption thrown in. Art is a collection of colours, poetry a collection of words.
Besides, a fugal subject is not a series of notes, it is an temporally embodied relationship within a set of of tones.
JDMusicTuition 1 year ago
@JDMusicTuition You must have meant "painting is a collection of colours". Art is not a category of art.
Okay, so the notes/tones have a temporary (I assume, while the fugue is being played) embodied relationship with each other? Is that what you're claiming? I want to get it right before we move on. I would suggest restating it w/o the embodied part b/c I think you'll have a hard time explaining what the body of a tone is.
So, please state what you think a Fugue really is.
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "You must have meant "painting is a collection of colours"."
When space is limited and one of the dictionary definitions of "art is "(uncountable) The study and the product of these processes." then you are free to make such assumptions.
"I think you'll have a hard time explaining what the body of a tone is"
A tone is what you hear when you hear a sound as a note in the context of other notes in terms of the interrelationship between those notes.
i.e. It is embodied in your mind.
JDMusicTuition 1 year ago
@bahramf A fugue isn't necessarily one thing, it is an approach to composition in the same way that a novelisation is an approach to writing a biography.
A fugue is ABOUT its theme in the same way that the novel is ABOUT someone's life. You can come to understand that person through the novel, you can come to understand that theme through the fugal treatment.
But the theme can also be about some other concept by the connotation of its intervallic structure, just like a novel can have a moral.
JDMusicTuition 1 year ago
@JDMusicTuition Novels aren't necessarily about a person's life. Actually, they're not usually about a person's life. Novels are a lot more complicated than that.
I think a fugue can be complicated, but not in the same way, unless you can explain how it might be. It can be a very complicated arrangements of sound with a theme, but the theme is musical. And it, alone, is meaningless (unless you can show me otherwise). So, coming to understand it through the fugue is an odd idea.
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "Novels aren't necessarily about a person's life."
I specifically mean novelisations, not novels. But you can apply the same reasoning to any artistic genre or even industrial/professional practice.
"And it, alone, is meaningless (unless you can show me otherwise)."
Why do you get a free pass in claiming musical themes are meaningless? I can show that music necessarily has meaning, but I would like to know the basis of your claim first.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter Burden of proof: "When debating any issue, there is an implicit burden of proof on the person asserting a claim.[1] This burden does not necessarily require a mathematical or strictly logical proof, although many strong arguments do rise to this level (such as in logical syllogisms). Rather, the evidential standard required for a given claim is determined by convention or community standards, with regard to the context of the claim in question.[2][3]" (wiki).
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "Burden of proof"
I think you will find that the commonsense position is that music is meaningful and logical, the burden of proof has always been on the other side.
"an art form capable of profundity"
It depends, again, what your definition of profundity is. For me logic is profound and music is logical (which I can positively prove), so by that fact alone music is profound.
But if you cannot tell me what you think "profound" is we can't discuss this.
You need to define terms.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter The common-sense position is not how we determine burden of proof. I'm making a negative claim, you a positive claim. The burden of proof is on the one making a positive claim. Therefore, you have the burden of proof.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "The burden of proof is on the one making a positive claim."
You can't just shift the burden of proof by not stating the positive claim that is implied by your negative claim.
If your negative claim is "Music cannot be profound like language can be" you are making the positive claim that "Language can be profound".
So if I need to substantiate my claim why do you get to be pigheaded about yours. Music is more obviously profound to me than language is.
Make your case.
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition I've made the positive case several times.
However, we're not talking about language and also, even if language is not profound, music might not be as well. There is no positive claim implied by my negative claim "music is not profound". You're just making shit up now.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf The simple reality is that people think profound thoughts and seek to express those thoughts in any one of a multiplicity of media.
It happens to be the case that music is more successful at conveying the idea of profundity (no scrabbling about for definitions), while language can be more effective at referring to it (no struggling with the theme, just say the word).
Music of a certain sort is written by people when they wish to deal with subjects of human experience...
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition You're wrong about that. Music doesn't more successfully convey profound ideas. It doesn't convey any ideas, and the ones it does are only very simple (e.g. sadness).
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf Specifically, lest you make your burden of proof argument again:
You have specific burden under your positivist scheme to discharge your responsibility to PROVE that language is profound in the first place.
If you can just ignore my arguments, stick your fingers in your ears and go lalala with my explanation of profundity in music why can I not do the same for your (much weaker) explanation in the case of language?
This is why positivism died in the first place.
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition I don't have to prove language is profound. I will prove that literature is though. Literature is profound b/c it deals with subjects of human experience with great depth, nuance and wisdom.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf The person wishing to convey a profound concept uses language he believes will convey profundity or illicit a response which he thinks of as profound in the listener.
This is no different from the case of the composer who decides to write, and deems successful, such music which he believes to convey profundity and will be experienced as profound by the listener.
Neither literature nor music IS PROFOUND in the sense you want literature to be but try to deny music.
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition Yes, literature is profound.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "Yes, literature is profound."
Who's the one making positive statements without proof now eh?
"You could give me one example."
Wow! Just read man, just read. I gave it more than once. The fugue in this video is an example of profoundness in music. Move along please.
"I've explained how literature is profound."
No, you have given a definition which is far too narrow, which does not exclude music, which constitutes a positive unproven claim and which I did not accept.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter You're just being an idiot. Just stating that a fugue is profound doesn't make it so.
You don't have to accept the definition. The rest of the world does.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "Just stating that a fugue is profound doesn't make it so."
Yes, and neither does just stating that literature is either.
Things are what they are.
"The rest of the world does."
Really? Most people I speak to find the idea that music is NOT profound patently absurd.
I haven't come across anyone who hasn't read those few rarefied sources that authoritatively make this claim who didn't give me an incredulous look when I tell them that some people believe this.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter Well, fortunately those who think literature is profound can explain it. Those who think music is profound tend to be pretentious and talking out of their ass.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf ...That's the difference. Anyone can just say something, but only a few can substantiate it. Also, if music has profound content so obviously, why aren't there more sophisticated conversations about music like there are about literature, and why does Spano's ass-talk get taught in Universities?
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "but only a few can substantiate it."
Apparently so, you haven't substantiated jack squat, you just made up a definition and stuck your finger in your ear.
"if music has profound content so obviously"
Music doesn't have profound content. Music, when considered as music, can also be considered profound when it is considered in a way that attends to serious issues (e.g. ethical) in a thorough and deeply considered mode of thought.
Language also has no profound content: Think referent.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter I'm not talking about language. I'm talking about literature. It's not music vs. language, it's music vs. literature.
bahramf 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter I've defined profundity, I've given examples of how at least two literary works are profound and how others might be as well. I really don't know what else you could want.
My definition is made up in the same way that the definition of any concept is made-up. Nevertheless, it has strong intuitive appeal. Yours defines profundity as a mental state, mine as thought-provoking and thoughtful content. I can't imagine how mine is ad hoc and yours not.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "I've defined profundity"
Yes, but a definition is a positive statement of identity, by your standards you need to PROVE your definition correctly identifies profundity (which it does not) AND prove that it excludes music (which it does not).
"it's music vs. literature."
What you are speaking of is rhetoric, and musical rhetoric has always been part of music education.
You are confusing music with the sounds that comprise it. Music exists at the same level of thought as literature.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter You're just saying that though. You're clearly wrong. Do you really think children should be listening to music as much as they read novels? Clearly the burden is on you b/c people think we can learn from literature but not from music.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "Clearly the burden is on you b/c people think we can learn from literature but not from music."
Are you mad? Have you never heard of the trivium and quadrivium?
Listening to music (if you are thinking Lady Gaga) is no different from reading trashy romance novels and simply listening to "art" music is no different to simply reading a Shakespeare play.
To understand it (be it Bach or Dostoyevsky) you have to study it. Many people pay lots of money to have their kids study music.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter A lot of people spend money having their kids learn about Jesus. That's doesn't make him real.
Also, most people don't. But almost everyone wants their kids to read good books.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf And in case you were wondering THOSE kids (in study after study) are the kids who perform best at school.
One study found that taking a child out of 50% of their math classes to have music lessons instead IMPROVED their math performance over their peers.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter Wow, that means a lot to an aesthetic debate. Why aren't more philosophers of art citing studies like those??? Oh yeah, they have nothing to do with aesthetics.
bahramf 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter "Music exists at the same level of thought as literature." prove it.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf Listen, I don't mind trying to help you out with trying to understand something you clearly don't have the foggiest over. But if you ask me to prove things which I just did a three post exposition wihtout even so much as acknowledging said exposition on you are just being a slippery troll.
I have had enough. You are not adding to this debate. You will not prove any of your claims and demand ridiculous standards of proof for everything you disagree with.
Good day to you.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter Yeah, but your three post exposition was a joke. Good day.
bahramf 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter You're one of those 9/11 trufers??? This conversation is over. You're a moron.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "The positive claim was that people learn from literature, not that reading helps them in other school subjects"
Yes... and your claim was that people do not learn from music, something which is obviously and demonstrably false.
You study and learn from music itself too, just because music benefits other learning doesn't not mean you don't learn from music separately and severally.
In fact the dominant mode of music education is of the absolute kind.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter No, my claim is true. Because people don't learn from the music. You might sleep 8 hours and learn better the next day, this doesn't mean you learned anything from sleeping.
Get it???
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf Yes, but that is not the claim I was addressing, I was addressing the claim that there was no value to studying music.
The claim that you cannot learn anything by studying is a bit bizarre, frankly, because the origin of Western philosophy is traditionally linked to Pythagoras' discovery of the harmonic series.
You obviously can't learn anything from anything by passive non-engagement.
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition That's a contentious claim when it comes to Pythagoras. We don't really know what the greeks listened to. Also, the claim that learning music helps us know music better or that sort of learning transfers to other areas of study is not controversial. Whether we actually learn something about history, religion, philosophy, etc. from music is the controversial claim which cognitivists (like you) have to affirm.
If you're not a cognitivist, then gtfo b/c that's the debate.
bahramf 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter HOW do you study and learn from the music itself? You can study it and it will help you with studying anything else. This doesn't mean the music has cognitive value. Do you even know what the cognitivist position is?
I really don't believe you're a grad student. If so, it must be at some horrible University. No grad student I know thinks 9/11 was a conspiracy or that music has cognitive value based on it helping students with their math tests.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "Get it???"
Yes I do get.
You are now frantically trying to change the topic to something else you clearly know nothing about to av oid looking like an idiot in this topic you know nothing about. Why are you yacking on about cognitivism? I said quite clearly that I am not interested in positivist arguments that go nowhere.
Or are you on about trying to inject ethics into everything again?
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition Cognitivism is the view that we can learn from X art form. How is that positivist? It's one of the biggest topics in the philosophy of music.
bahramf 11 months ago
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DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
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@bahramf "You're a moron."
Yeah, ad hominem will make any argument go away. Never mind the merits. Just poke your finger in your ears and go lalala, everything will be okay.
I am getting the distinct sense that you were telling porkies when you claimed to be a philosophy student the other day.
You have not demonstrated any familiarity with any of the key concepts either in semiology, or philosophy in general.
Dispensing with the a priori? Really? You don't even know what a proof IS!!!!!!
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@bahramf Specifically: Roger Scruton distinguishes very usefully between SOUNDS, NOTES and TONES.
This distinction is analogous to phonemes, words and the intended signified.
Music exists when we attend to tones, but because of the recursive and agglomerative nature of tones music (as in tones or collections of tones at the word scale) exists at the same level of thought as music at the scale of literature.
The difference between shallow and profound literature IS its music.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter That sounds absurd. That's not better than anything Spano has said.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf The reason for it it is quite simple: When you read literature you consider as profound you attend to it in the same way that you attend to music as opposed to words.
The difference, at a technical level, being that words signify signifiers but tones signify only their only quality as tones and connote signifiers afterward.
Profound literature is not ABOUT whales and Russian princes, it is about itself as literature and as such it connotes something else as signifier.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@bahramf "why does Spano's ass-talk get taught in Universities?"
Spano's claim to fame is firstly as a practicing musician. But his ideas will resonate with the experiences of other practicing musicians.
He is not primarily a philosophers so he may not be able to grasp the finer details needed to make his own position work in THAT domain. You don't study Picasso to learn Spanish.
Come to think of it, you shouldn't gripe, you haven't demonstrated much command of the field yourself.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter You're the one who doesn't even understand burden of proof.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "You're the one who doesn't even understand burden of proof."
I understand that you like to ask everyone else to prove absolutely everything and then like to make broad sweeping negative (i.e. unprovable) claims to avoid doing the same yourself, as well as liberally employing definitional retreat to save your self from, heaven forbid, ever having to back up anything.
In other words, I understand full well how you are abusing it.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter I'm abusing the a scientific precept. Sure...
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "I'm abusing the a scientific precept"
Uhm, the burden of proof is not the scientific precept, it is a legal one.
It has never been a scientific precept in practice and it only was one in philosophy between 1900 and 1950 with logical positivism. It was shot down in that field by Popper most especially.
The scientific precept you are looking for is falsifiability, the dominant mode of scientific inquiry is pragmatism, which explicitly avoids looking for positive proof.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter
Burden of proof is used in science too.
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf "Burden of proof is used in science too."
No, no it most certainly is not. Why do you think studies involving mostly significance testing get so far? You strictly speaking can never prove ANYTHING with significance testing, and yet it is the single most overused test in the field.
"Oh yeah, they have nothing to do with aesthetics."
It has nothing to do with aesthetics, it has everything to you with you making a positive statement which this little fact amply falsifies.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@DarkwingScooter The positive claim was that people learn from literature, not that reading helps them in other school subjects. So, it doesn't falsify the claim at all.
Literature itself is something to study and learn from even if it doesn't impact other academic subjects. Music is not like this b/c you literally have to point to success in other subjects (as you did) to show that learning it has any cognitive value at all.
bahramf 11 months ago
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@bahramf "Music is not like this b/c you literally have to point to success in other subjects (as you did) to show that learning it has any cognitive value at all."
Just because I DID point at success outside of the study of music does not mean that the ONLY value is in this. Again, your claim that there was NO value in studying music.
I simply pointed out that, aside from the intrinsic value, there is also an clearly demonstrable extrinsic value.
Come on! L2logic already.
DarkwingScooter 11 months ago
@bahramf You seem to be implying that for music to be profound ALL music must be profound. This is of course ludicrous because you would not want to claim that ALL literature is profound I presume.
Just to clarify, you are trying to demonstrate that SOME literature is profound in such a way that NO music can be similarly profound. Correct?
JDMusicTuition 11 months ago
@JDMusicTuition All music mustn't be profound. You could give me one example. I've explained how literature is profound. Do you really want me to dredge up where I did this for the third time?
bahramf 11 months ago
@bahramf Reason I ask is because I wrote a dissertation on this very subject and what you usually find is that claims of "meaninglessness" or "alogicality" in music is usually based on very peculiar notions of meaning or logic which are rarely themselves fully expressed.
In my view showing that something music is not language is not sufficient to show that music does not have meaning unless you can also show that meaning is necessarily linguistic.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter I agree with you. The other commenter brought up language. Did you address the question on musical profundity in your dissertation? Because even if there is some meager meaning to be garnered from absolute music, this does not make it an art form capable of profundity. My professor wrote a paper on musical profundity. And I've written one too, but not for publication. When his comes out would you like the info?
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "When his comes out would you like the info?"
I'm always looking for new things to read.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter Great, I'll let you know when it comes out, where to find it. Can I assume you're at a University with access to scholarly journals?
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "Also, b/c I've heard of this happening, is your dissertation online?"
Nope soz. It is in the pipes of academia, I don't think my Uni. Library will put it online in any case and I don't think I am allowed to.
"Can I assume you're at a University with access to scholarly journals?"
Not at the moment unfortunately, but I have a lot of material printed out on the subject from when I did. If you cite a journal article that I can't find I will take you on faith though for now.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
Also, b/c I've heard of this happening, is your dissertation online?
bahramf 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter I don't have a peculiar notion of meaning or logic. In fact, if you have a peculiar notion of meaning you use, I may well accept it for music if it captures some of why we think music has aesthetic value.
bahramf 1 year ago
@bahramf "I don't have a peculiar notion of meaning or logic"
So you keep saying but you still haven't said what you think these are.
I will lay my cards on the table:
- Meaning is the Witgenstinian sort roughly corresponding to that found in "Philosophical Investigations".
- Logic is anything that can be reduced to first order logic, but I do admit special pleading for second order axioms such as the axioms of choice and inductions.
- Profound is anything which bears contemplation.
DarkwingScooter 1 year ago
@DarkwingScooter A logical paradox is worth contemplating. That doesn't mean it's profound. It could be very elementary.
bahramf 1 year ago