Aesthetic relativism is the idea thatviews ofbeauty arerelative to differences in perception and consideration, andintrinsically, have no absolutetruth or validity.
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Aesthetic relativism might be regarded as a sub-set of an overall philosophicalrelativism, which denies any absolute standards oftruth ormorality as well as of aesthetic judgement. (A frequently-cited source for philosophical relativism inpostmodern theory is a fragment byNietzsche, entitled "On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense".)
Aesthetic relativism is a variety of the philosophy known generally as relativism, which casts doubt on the possibility of directepistemic access to the "external world", and which therefore rejects thepositive claim that statements made about the external world can be known to be objectively true. Other varieties of relativism includecognitive relativism (the general claim that all truth and knowledge is relative) andethical relativism (the claim that moral judgements are relative). Aesthetic and ethical relativism are sub-categories of cognitive relativism.
Aesthetic relativism takes two major forms:aesthetic subjectivism andaesthetic perspectivism.[1]
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Philosophers who have been influential in relativist thinking includeDavid Hume, particularly his "radical scepticism" as set out inA Treatise of Human Nature;Thomas Kuhn, with regard to thehistory andphilosophy of science, and particularly his workThe Structure of Scientific Revolutions; Friedrich Nietzsche, inmoral philosophy and epistemology; andRichard Rorty, on the contingency of language.
Philosophers who have given influential objectivist accounts includePlato, and in particular hisTheory of the Forms;Immanuel Kant, who argued that the judgement of beauty, despite being subjective, is a universally practiced function of the mind;Noam Chomsky, whose "nativist" theory of linguistics argues for auniversal grammar (i.e., that language is not as contingent as relativists have argued that it is).
The most prominent philosophical opponent of aesthetic relativism was Immanuel Kant, who argued that the judgement of beauty, while subjective, is universal.