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A Matter of Taste

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 May 2010

Stanley Godlovitch
Affiliation:
Mount Royal College

Extract

In any discussion about evaluation, particularly in ethics and aesthetics, there always exists a small recalcitrant group denying any purpose to the enterprise. Although they may be called relativists or extreme subjectivists or some such name to distinguish them from others who seek the basis of merit in the ‘thing itself’, they are best characterized by the two slogans frequently touted in times of intractable disagreement. These are, of course, the suave Chacun à Son Goût and the more pontifical de Gustibus non Disputandum. The first is frequently tossed out when someone displays growing signs of disapproval at another's unrepentant preference, while the second takes the stage when he who disapproves attempts to alter the choice already made. The import of these slogans is that there is an impregnable, irreducible sovereignty in matters of taste.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1981

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References

NOTES

1 Isenberg, Arnold, “Critical Communication” in Elton, Wm. (ed.), Aesthetics and Language (Oxford, 1954), p. 139.Google Scholar

2 Hampshire, Stuart, “Logic and Appreciation” in Elton, Wm., op. cit., p. 166.Google Scholar

3 David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, Section I.