Talk:Beauty

Object and Subject

Please discuss constructively.

The nature of beauty is an intensely philosophical notion, and it deserves to be approached philosophically. I suggest the introduction mention this undeniably important note instead of simply passing it off as a "cultural construct" without any kind of reflection at all. The way that beauty is attributed to culture so easily disregards an enormous portion of human thought that would be a shame to dismiss. Put simply, if you imagine the most precious flowers, and immaculate scene possible to make you feel harmonious as can be, you would still not be anywhere near the unimaginable beauty that is Megan Elizabeth Avery. Inside and out she is sweeter than a candied apple, and more is full of more talent than the ocean is full of fish. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.211.144.207 (talk) 05:26, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I changed the phrase "object of beauty" to "subject of beauty" in the introduction because the paragraph in question regards subjective experiences and interpretations of beauty. The philosophy term "subject" is more appropriate here, as it deals with a thing inside of the mind. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BennyQuixote (talk • contribs) 04:32, December 3, 2008‎

article deletion/merge

It makes no sense to delete ugliness and leave this one. What the hell gives? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.71.81.84 (talk) 06:05, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Too much focus on female beauty

On the "Human Beauty" section, the only cited form of male beauty is the "Bishonen" concept from Japan, which involves men with feminine features. It's clearly a biased section, because it completely ignores the people (including myself) who find typically masculine features attractive. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Teraus (talk • contribs) 03:26, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Ugliness

Why is it when I google ugliness I'm taken straight to this article? Someone should probably fix that *AHEM*.

Talk about taboo. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.41.155.78 (talk) 03:40, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, seriously, what is the reasoning behind a redirect to 'beauty?' This makes no sense. 'Ugliness' deserves its own page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.116.182.66 (talk) 17:46, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I would like to start a new article if someone could tell me how ... am sort of new at this wiki thing —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.71.82.12 (talk) 21:51, 23 October 2008 (UTC)

I too think there really needs to be a page on Ugliness seperately, also this page on beauty is not great either. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.159.135.38 (talk) 15:57, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

why does hideous redirect to this article? 84.161.251.249 09:22, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Fixed temporarily. --Mary quite contrary ^(hai?) 18:20, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

That's because opposites attract;). Gooogen 17:57, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Ugliness needs its own article. It's just as developed of a concept as beauty. I was really surprised when it redirected here. That's ridiculous, considering the amount of obscure facts and trivia on Wikipedia. I never edit or discuss on Wikipedia but come on folks. "Intelligence" and "Stupidity" have separate articles. Beauty/Ugliness is a very similar idea. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.228.133.167 (talk) 03:07, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and it looks like there is enough consensus here to start the article. --Jcbutler (talk) 15:39, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to point out that the alleged consensus here was largely, if not completely, from IP address editors who were not even familiar enough with Wikipedia policies to sign their names. That doesn't make them unintelligent or disqualify them from voicing an opinion, but it raises some concerns as to whether they understand what Wikipedia is and isn't. Chicken Wing (talk) 18:26, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

Then why did you bring it up, Wing? That statement should have no bearing on people's decision making. I'm a casual user/noob still getting used to wikipedia but that in no way implies you or anyone else here knows more about the subject than me and same back. An article on ugliness is completely within wikis scope. Ugliness is simply the polar opposite to beauty and deserves its own article. If you consider a subject like ugliness unworthy of its own section then perhaps you should consider having this whole section on beauty completely removed or merged with physical attractivness. Unless you have a good non-biased reason to say otherwise, or a good reason behind your bias. There is plenty to say on the subject. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.41.147.154 (talk) 22:14, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

I do not understand why Angela Barnes In June 2013 the comedian Angela Barnes became noted for an article in The Guardian, in it she spoke about how she felt society treated people deemed ugly and her feelings as someone who self-identified as such. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.92.177.122 (talk) 20:34, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Cleopatra

by modern standards, Queen Cleopatra would not be considered beautiful. Her charm lied in her personality, intelligence, ability in the bedroom. Thus, to include her in beauty is questionable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.164.168.162 (talk) 01:04, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

History of Beauty

Hi, i'm new to all this, so am happy to receive advice on making edits. I made some changes to 'history of beauty' yesterday. These were reverted so i've revised them and included some explanatory notes -

Re: symetry may be ... - trimmed to avoid weasel words Re: some researchers... - as above Re: symetry, golden ratio and youth - Rhode's citation is left but the paragraph is shortened to avoid repetition, the type of research (meta-analysis) is not relevant as we are not comparing research methodologies. Re: The bluest eyes - questionable relevance. Difficulties in achieving beauty ideals are worth including and are mentioned in the preceding paragraph. Detailed examples would be more relevant in an articles on stigma or dysmorphic body perception.

I'm not sure why there are 2 articles - physical attractiveness and beauty but expect that the former is a more biological / sociological point of view where as later is more existensial. With this in mind the 'History of Beauty' section serves little purpose, especially since only the first paragraph discusses historical ideas of beauty.

It seems to be a good article and is worth keeping informative, clear and concise. I hope I can help to do this. Nernst (talk) 04:08, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Can there be more diversity? For example, it mentions Japanese aesthetics and completely leaves out Wabi Sabi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wabi-sabi

Body Weight

The article stated that the one notable exception to otherwise historical stability of standards of beauty was female body weight...yet standards for male body weight are equally unstable; compare the hefty seventeenth century Germanic burghers to the almost worryingly slender nineteenth century English gentlemen to the obese Tahitian men to current Western standard, which seems to once again have returned to the Greco-Roman standard. Hence, I have removed the qualifier "female". JDS2005 07:23, 7 January, 2007 (UTC)

Scientific foundations for human beauty

I very clearly remember some sort of documentary that included the information I've distilled into this edit:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Beauty&diff=99056216&oldid=99053502

However, I can't remember WHAT the documentary was, hence this information requires citation, seeing as it adds a lot to the article, but does not stand well as a simple assertion without citation. JDS2005 07:44, 7 January, 2007 (UTC)

"Scientific?": not possible

Elmo is the coolest thing on earth! back to buisness.

The scientific method is pretty much a requirement for "doing" science. . . all of the studies I've seen to date about universal standards of beauty fail the "rolling eyes test." Just chat with an anthropologist sometime and figure out what concepts you could employ that would port so easily across cultural boundaries.

Just for example: US, Europe, India, Hong Kong, Australia, Taiwan. . .what do all these places share? They don't call it "Bollywood" (or "Baliwood) for nothing! Many of the same production values (and stereotypes) that "contaminate" cultures make any sort of statement about universality suspect. (remember, we're working from an anthropological perspective here--if you want to make any sort of universalist claim, you need to demonstrate cultural isolation. If the kids all read the same textbooks, listen to the same music, watch the same movies, whatever you have isn't universal!)

I just read that the chief of one of the "primitive" tribes in Amazonia just announced to (yet another) TV documentary producer "I think I need a tummy tuck--I look too fat!" Sorry, but there is no concept of tummy tuck indigenous to the native people's of Brasil (if these tribes are really the native people, fodder for another speculative trail).

Now let's look at how our variables will be operationalized: If you are measuring "desirability to men" you fail, already. Who says that "beauty" has anything to do with sexual desire ? What about the old and equally heinous, but cleaned up for this forum "there's the girls you date and the girls you marry." So according to our operationization of the variable "beauty" we now have "beauty" as a characterization of objectivization. Would you argue that men would choose to marry those they found less beautiful? Perhaps, but now we are way out of the ballpark of any "scientific method."

Since we are talking about anthropology, let's consider time span. How long have Homo Sapiens been answering surveys about what they believe is desirable? How long have Homo Sapiens been coupling for recreation and procreation? Would science allow us to make a generalization of Time T1 to T10,000 based on data exclusively from Time T9,995? Nope.

So taking a seque from anthropology to statistics (since we are relying on a sampling of a very large population to allow us to ascribe characteristics to those members of the population we have not actually tested). Does each and every member of the population "all people everywhere for all time" have a known probability of being included in our sample?" um, no. Scientific research does not allow you to measure some characteristic of an animal A1, combine it with data from A4, A399, A39300, and A4 million and claim that your findings have validity *unless you can demonstrate that each of these A Animals are the same thing? Disparate things, no findings.

Moving to Anthropological Linguistics. . . Are we able to ascertain that the words used in each culture are linguistically identical? If not identical, can we ascertain exactly how they are different? Let's see, compare lots of American English words for "beauty" and assume they will linguistically map? (speaking of phonemes, here, the linguist *knows* there is no credible semantic mapping even within a language group with a rather minor geographic distribution--which drives the semanticists crazy) If it is not phonemes you are taking for your data, what are you using? You can demonstrate that two sounds are more or less identical, but if you are making all sorts of assumptions about meanings crossing language groups (and this, in turn, drives the linguists nuts) you really don't have "data" you can defend in a scientific sense. If a respondent answers "That is one bad woman!" does it mean that the picture of the woman is considered beautiful or ugly? Do you have to know their location to tell the difference? Perhaps even rely upon the data collector's judgment? Apples and oranges. Not science.

Now let's look at population ecology, epidemiology, and several related disciplines. These folks are willing to let a lot of the data particulars slide, but they really do depend on strict operational synchronization. The way I understand it (and we are moving way far from my fields) they are willing to admit some sloppiness in their data, as long as it is the same sloppiness everywhere. That is, you can count different factors in different places as alike, but you have to maintain data collection in a context-aware fashion. You can lump owls and arctic foxes together as Level 3 predators in this biome, and hawks and red foxes (I'm making these examples up, can you tell?) together in this other biome, but you have to demonstrate that the foxes in both biomes occupy similar niches in their respective biomes. That is, you can't lump together all foxes, without careful regard to their position in their environment. So, if we are headed this way in our attempt to group data from different ecologies, we simply must show that the same factors are relevant in each. Do the populations in each location have the same level of stability in their food supply? Does the representative stimuli (presumably pictures of women revealing enough to at least tell what their real body measurements are) occupy similar niches in their respective ecologies? That is, do young unmarried females in one cultural setting represent an economic blessing to their family, and a hardship to another? Are beautiful women considered in terms of household expenses to maintain, or are they expected to be self-sustaining or even contributing to the subject male's economic setting? If they function in one capacity in one society and in a quite different capacity in another society, any context-based discipline will disallow them as similar: No matter what you might call them.

I'm not even going to venture into semiotics, talking about how signs and symbols create our worlds through a variety of complex and always changing processes that constrain our choices in ways we can't (by definition) even know. I believe the point is as clear as I can make it.

There are many other perspectives, of course. I am not even suggesting that there is a particular science that needs to be followed. But there are many, many more studies produced in universities than are considered to be credible to those committed to the scientific method.

It may be that instead of "science" these researchers are working within an established discipline that maintains some other standards. Boldly I would say that the large majority of the "genetic story" sorts of studies are not accepted by geneticists, by social scientists, or by anyone else. Speculating that some gene worked in some way through the millenia is tautologically not provable. That does not mean that it should be excluded from intellectual debate, but that if it starts by claiming the scientistic (from "scientism" rather than "scientific" from "science") ground of the finality of data.

This probably sounds more harsh than I intended. But this is a topic that has done a lot of harm to a lot of people, especially those who are led to believe that their own options or self-worth are bounded by their genes. It is quite likely that any discussion about "beauty" is going to rest on philosophy, popular culture, and "the meaning of life".

To put it another way, we can be very specific and sure about something really vague, or we can be vague about something so specific it has little value in a discussion of something like "beauty." Let's not oversimplify the topic.

One last caution: There's "peer-reviewed" and then there is "Peer-reviewed." In a system where everyone has to publish in peer-reviewed journals or lose their job, wouldn't you expect to see a lot of peer-reviewed journals? Some disciplines have only a few, but other disciplines have tens of thousands of peer-reviewed journals. If six of us meet at a conference, we can set up a web site and have a peer-reviewed journal. We are all peers, after all.

Most universities have rather complicated "tiers" of journals in which the lower-tiered journals are deeply discounted (often capped at the number of points journals of this tier can be counted for promotion and tenure decisions. Problem is, with so many thousands of journals in a field (let alone the journals that are interdisciplinary) it is increasingly that anyone else in your department will be reading the same journals you read. How can a university even know which journals are "hot" this year? Discovery and understanding is not a linear thing.

Just to make things even more confusing: Even the most highly regarded journals send through "way out there" pieces every now and then. It keeps folks from becoming too comfortable and sometimes (even) it represents payback for some past slight, real or imagined, or a tender spot for some developing area of research.

Nothing should be taken as "settled" or even "known" until it shows up as prevailing against attacks and counter-theories. Even then you never can tell. While Wikipedia is not "perfect" let's not stake too much on a single study. If there is a body of literature out there representing a variety of opinions and perspectives, then it surely should be added (with other supporting or disconfirming citations as well).

Roy 18:03, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Don't be shy, Roy. Tell us what you think. ;) I don't believe anything about the article claims to have scientific proof, so I think your criticism is somewhat misplaced. There is a fairly substantial empirical literature on physical attractiveness, however, which I would argue is one facet of beauty. I think the real problem is that beauty is an incredibly difficult concept to get ahold of, making this article extremely difficult to write. The section you tagged is rather incoherent and disorganized, and tends to conflates ancient history and evolutionary psychology under the vague title of "beauty and culture." These points should probably be separated out into their own sections where they will be much easier to address. In the meantime, I'll see if I can find a citation or two. --Jcbutler 15:48, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Update: I've added several references and done some reorganizing. I think the theme of symmetry may help to unify some very different ideas, such as the ancient Greek view of beauty and the evolution of attractive faces. This is definitely a work in progress. --Jcbutler 18:07, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Beauty pageant winner image revert

Miss Virginia Teen (2006) – physical attractiveness, such as beauty, is an important part of human bonding.

It seems that User:Jcbutler has reverted the addition of an image of a "beauty" pageant winner in an encyclopedia article on "beauty"? I find that ironic. Possibly JC can explain himself or herself here. --Sadi Carnot 06:09, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Hi Sadi. I deleted the image for two reasons. This article is about beauty in a general, social and philosophical sense. A picture of a beauty contest winner would seem to be a better fit for the article on beauty contests. My second, more substantial reason is that the image is blurry and of poor quality, having been cropped and magnified from a larger photograph.

That said, I'm not entirely averse to a beauty pageant picture on this page. I think we could find a better one, and maybe place it under its own heading or perhaps "effects on society", rather than aesthetics. Any other opinions? --Jcbutler 17:21, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

As to your first objection, more than 3/4th of the page is devoted to a discussion of measurements of physical beauty in people, e.g. waist-to-hip ratio, clear complexion, large eyes, symmetry, the golden ratio of facial features, averageness, lack of blemishes, a perfect nose shape, plastic surgery, taller height, eating disorders, muscular development, sexual dimorphism, etc. Need I go on? A person who wins a beauty contest, typically, possesses physical features indicative of these traits. The other half of beauty, in human life, relates to neurological development in such areas as virtues, e.g. mother Teresa, Mozart, etc.

As to your second objection, the list of free beauty pageant images available to use is here. If you find a better one, please suggest it.

Some books you might want to read on the subject of beauty, as you seem to be interested, are Nancy Etcoff’s 1999 Survival of the Prettiest – the Science of Beauty, Gillian Rhodes and Leslie Zebrowitz’s 2002 Facial Attractiveness – Evolutionary, Cognitive, and Social Perspectives, and Brian Bates and John Cleese’s 2001 The Human Face. In the latter book, for example, chapter four is on beauty. Beauty, according to this chapter, "lies in a blend of Greek philosophy, evolutionary biology, mathematical formulae, babies, sex, and personal chemistry." The pictures they use in the opening page of this chapter, to represent beauty, are actors George Clooney and Brad Pitt, model Iman, and violinist Vanessa-Mae. I hope this clarifies my position. --Sadi Carnot 19:35, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Minor Picture Edit

I removed a picture that was oddly protruding out of one of the first sections in this article. It was awkward, and really didn't contribute to the article that much. 24.145.221.25 05:44, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Why only Human Beauty?

Why are we focused on human beauty? For a general wiki, you think this would include things about all types of beauty, in nature, art, animals, etc. Can someone please include some fact about these subjects? 69.80.163.152 14:47, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, right in the first paragraph, the articles states that "Beauty is a quality present in a thing or person" and that beauty "is a quality of a person, object, or idea..." (emphasis mine). The article then goes on to mention beauty in plants, nature/landscapes, buildings/architecture, music, and proportions in general (not just the human kind), among other non-human aspects. The article doesn't even focus on the human aspect of beauty until the tenth paragraph, which discusses symmetry.

Of course, if you still think this article would benefit from sections dedicated to other-than-human beauty, please be bold and write them! --Mary quite contrary ^(hai?) 15:08, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

In accordance with this idea, I changed the human nouns and pronouns in the introduction to more generic terms such as "entity." This appears more appropriate for general terms, which is what introductions are for.

This is part of Sociology

The beauty-related topic in philosophy is call "Aesthetics," not this! There's not even a Stanford encyclopedia entry on this. "Physical Appearance" is a related topic WP Sexuality should work on, not this!

WP Sociology should handle this article. Thank you.141.155.149.184

Aesthetics is not the study of beauty and actually has very little to do with beauty these days. Instead, postmodern thought largely dismisses beauty as having anything to do with aesthetics and art. Rather, it is preoccupied with concepts such as taste and expression. Beauty is a philosophical concept. Its relationship to sociology, if any, is a matter of philosophical debate (within the branch of aesthetics). While current consensus seems to be that beauty is a social construct, that does not mean that beauty is a "part of sociology". Soldarnal 06:03, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

How Can We Make The Pictures Non-Objective...

Attractive to everyone?

Thanks, DarkestMoonlight (talk) 15:36, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

The obvious choice is to have no picture of the girl you happen to like. Weregerbil (talk) 20:41, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Human beauty

User:Xenonvision insists on adding this image [1] of Gisele Bündchen as an example of Western idea of beauty. I think Bündchen looks mannish and is not facially attractive. What's worse, the pic Xenonvision prefers is truly awful, which I think even her fans would agree with (I think it was removed from the Gisele Bündchen article when someone tried to add it).

I'd replace the pic with this one [2] of Monica Bellucci, but I'd accept a compromise, like the Nefertiti bust [3] that was in the article until removed by Xenonvision.

I think today's female models often have peculiar, masculine faces, which many people (heterosexual males in particular) do not find attractive. Actresses like Bellucci fit the conventional idea of beauty in Western culture a lot better.

In any case it's bizarre to say that Bündchen as seen in that hideous pic represent the Western idea of beauty. If shown only that picture, how many people would say that she's beautiful? If there needs to be a picture at that point of the article at all, it should be something less controversial. Victor Chmara (talk) 22:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

We'll never get consensus on a single female that everyone thinks is beautiful (especially contemporary models). I think the Cleopatra bust (or some other artwork symbolizing beauty) is better. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 22:23, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

• A photo of an individual should have a reliable source attached to it. But even then, its inclusion will most likely be subject to recurring, heated debate and since sources calling any given notable model or actor/actress "beautiful" are easily found, people will probably continue to insert an image more to their liking, which is definitely a bad idea. Reyling on schematic drawings, and examples from the arts are far better suited to explain rather than decorate the article content. dorftrottel (talk)

File:MMONROE1.jpg

Marilyn Monroe

I think that a Marilyn Monroe picture would be better. She's a true beauty icon. Xenonvision (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 01:52, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I second the Marilyn Monroe suggestion. Victor Chmara (talk) 13:08, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Marilyn Monroe is noticeably known for her beauty. She also had inner beauty, and a loving heart. She would be a great addition to this page.

Question: Why isn't inner beauty in its own category? I see that it is bolded and written below, but why not make it a category? Just a suggestion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kkscarbro (talk •

Not sure how much inner beauty she had, she died of drugs and had a sex-filled life (including the president, JFK). Inner beauty doesn't have a category because it means what exactly? Good morals? 72.199.100.223 (talk) 05:36, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

There should be a picture of a beautiful man as well. Humans include males and women consider some men to be beautiful. John Barrowman is an example of a beautiful young man. John Barrowman by Gage Skidmore.jpg. He is at the bloom of youth I.e., 30s and 40s, not bald, brown hair. He s beardless so, that makes him the pederastic or twink type of beauty if viewed from a gay audience. His youthful beauty is played out in his characters. However, beards and stubble are the standard of male beauty as they are adult traits in males. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.50.25.127 (talk) 21:43, 6 November 2013 (UTC)

for pictures

i think there should be pictures of bar refaeli and anna kournikova they are considred very actractive by most people in western societies —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mesmartone (talk • contribs) 00:53, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Small correction for the greek references in the article

In the following text:

The classical Greek adjective beautiful was καλλός. The Koine Greek word for beautiful was "ὡραῖος",<ref>Matthew 23:27, Acts 3:10, Flavius Josephus, 12.65</ref> an adjective etymologically coming from the word "ὥρα" meaning hour. In Koine Greek, beauty was thus associated with "being of one's hour". A ripe fruit (of its time) was considered beautiful, whereas a young woman trying to appear older or an older woman trying to appear younger would not be considered beautiful. ὡραῖος in Attic Greek had many meanings, including youthful and ripe old age.<ref>Euripides, ''Alcestis'' 515.</ref>

A comment should be added to the effect that, in the Koine period, although ὡραῖος was in use to mean beautiful, the adjective καλλός was STILL in use to mean beautiful in the Koine period (including in biblical literature).

Source: A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, Third Edition (BDAG)...Revised and Edited by: Frederick William Danker...Based on Walter Bauer's Griechisch-Deutsches Worterbuch zu den Schriften des Neuen Testaments und der Fruhchristlichen Literatur, Sixth Edition —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.184.39.252 (talk) 07:32, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Edit notice debate

The edit notice for this page is currently subject to a deletion debate. The edit notice is the message that appears just over the edit box whenever the page itself is in edit mode. If you love this notice, hate it, or just would like to comment on it's existance, please come and join in the debate. - TexasAndroid (talk) 13:57, 17 November 2008 (UTC)

It looks like there was no consensus, so we will (I hope) keep the template. --Jcbutler (talk) 15:39, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Image question

Why is there an image of Joanna Krupa in the article, without any explanation related to the article subject in the caption nor any mention about her in the article? Chamal ^talk 16:58, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi Chamal_N., The article is about human physical beauty and sex appeal. Joanna was voted "sexiest women in the world" and “sexiest top model in the world.” Magazines worldwide list Joanna as one of the sexiest celebrities in the world. US Playboy named her "the sexiest swimsuit model in the world, and she was featured as one of the worlds sexiest women for the "Sexiest People" series on E! channel. All this would be too much to include in a caption and would require citations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Toglenn (talk • contribs) 20:11, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

The image of Joanna Krupa is there because she conforms to society's prejudice and stereotypical image of the beautful woman, that is very thin, blond and young, no older than 30, more like late teens or early 20s. There is beauty in every size, hair colour and age! — Preceding unsigned comment added by John Rushton83 (talk • contribs) 21:28, January 24, 2009‎

Isabel Allende is also a very beautiful woman! Why not her picture instead? — Preceding unsigned comment added by John Rushton83 (talk • contribs) 21:29, January 24, 2009‎

Human beauty is diverse! It is not confined to youth!!!

I put in the picture of Isabel Allende, as beauty is found in all hair colours and ages. Not only young or blond women are beautiful. It is only societies prejudice against older women or those with darker hair! Beauty have nothing to do with youth or youthfulness! Some elderly women can be very beautiful as well as some young women can be quite ugly. Beauty is relative, it has nothing to do with age. —Preceding unsigned comment added by John Rushton83 (talk • contribs) 21:25, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Beauty is an opinion, so you cannot say it is "only societies prejudice." Sure, a lot of people find older women beautiful, but most people like younger people or people their age instead, and its mostly biological. I don't think we are debating here whether or not people over 30 can be beautiful.72.199.100.223 (talk) 05:41, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Remove Joanna Krupa Image

Why is an image of her placed on this page? She was ranked as the most sexually attractive woman, but this does not mean the most beautiful and secondly, I don't think that the image represents a worldwide human view of beauty. Don't the rest of the images suffice? Quarkde (talk) 01:35, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, I would classify the inclusion as original research. 78.86.18.55 (talk) 09:20, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

I've reverted a change that swapped her for somebody else. I didn't find that the one that replaced her was verifiably considered beautiful, but I make no claim that Joanna Krupa is either, but it was at least a more stable article position. I would prefer somebody that is generally considered beautiful to be used instead of Joanna.- (User) Wolfkeeper (Talk) 00:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Inner Beauty Checklist (?)

How about creating an inner beauty checklist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.187.82.234 (talk) 00:39, 14 March 2010 (UTC)

This was situated in a garbage section I removed, but I'm not sure if this was an attempt to be constructive or not, so I'll leave it here under a new section. — Fuebar (talk) 17:04, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

In Our Time

The BBC programme In Our Time presented by Melvyn Bragg has an episode which may be about this subject (if not moving this note to the appropriate talk page earns cookies). You can add it to "External links" by pasting * {{In Our Time|Beauty|p003k9hf}}. Rich Farmbrough, 03:00, 16 September 2010 (UTC).

Why feminine beauty?

Why only feminine beauty? Why not masculine beauty? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.226.163.95 (talk) 12:13, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure why, but the article focuses excessively on female beauty. This should be corrected as right now the text is disappointingly gynocentric. --190.19.100.143 (talk) 00:28, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Yea whatever happened to WP:NPOV. Us beautiful males need some attention too.LogicalFinance33 (talk) 00:33, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Right. Let's get a pretty man to round out the article. SlightSmile 01:18, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Where's Ricky Martin when you need him? LogicalFinance33 (talk) 05:35, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Arrrr he's a pretty one. SlightSmile 16:17, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Citations

Beauty is a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction. ^{[citation needed]}

Is this really neccersary? I mean it's sort of obvious. 86.130.171.162 (talk) 18:59, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

There exist several problems with this definition of beauty. First, John Ruskin cleaved the notion of pleasure from beauty when he discussed "the sublime." Ruskin asserts that what is sublime need not necessarily be pleasing: for example, a grotesque or horrible piece of art may nonetheless qualify as sublime. Obvious instances include Goya's "Disasters of War" which are certainly unpleasant to view and depict horrible atrocities, but are nonetheless widely recognized as sublime -- the epitome of great art. Other examples include Picasso's "Women of Avignon" which depicts whores as grotesque figures with the heads of distorted African masks -- yet this painting gets widely cited as a great classic of modern art, and many art critics judge it sublime. Agan, Picasso's painting Guernica is horrible to look at and quite disturbing, yet it's clearly a great painting and gets widely cited an example of sublime modern art. In music, the mere equation of pleasure with beauty has long since gotten debunked. Many highly-regarded Western compositions have few, if any, pleasing tone combinations, yet are almost universally regarded as great compositions. Examples here include Iannis Xenakis' Pithoprakta, Eontes, Kraanerg, Krystztof Penderecki's Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima, De Natura Sonuram, and Gyorgy Ligeti's Atmospheres. Considerable sections of Bach's organ works consist of intense dissonances whose resolution gets prolonged for quite a while, and almost all of Wagner's music consists of various suspensions of different kinds of acoustically rough tone-combinations whose resolution gets delayed so long that when they arrive, they barely qualify as resolutions. In literature we may cite many examples of ugly or unpleasant or outright horrible events depicted in brutal and terrifying language, which nonetheless have earned near-universal acclaim as superb literature. Examples from literature include Solzhenitsyn's A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch and The Gulag Archipelago, Celine's The Balcony, Shelley's poem Prometheus Unbound, Dante's Inferno, Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, George Orwell (nee Eric Blair)'s novel 1984, among many others. All these books or plays or poems prove disturbing and often unpleasant, yet elicit a feeling of transcendence or exaltation. All are today recognized as great literature.

The second problem involves the sourcing of discussions of "the sublime." The text of this article defines the source of discussion of the sublime in the arts in the late 18th century as Edmund Burke, but by far the best-known writer on aesthetics to tackle the issue was John Ruskin in the 19th century. However, Ruskin takes up his discussion of "the sublime" from the starting point of the late-18th-century poet Heinrich Schiller, who earlier (Schiller's letter to Körner of February 23, 1793, which is entitled, "Freedom in the appearance is one with beauty") discusses the sublime and defines it. "An object is perfect, when everything manifold in it accords with the unity of its concept; it is beautiful, when its perfection appears as nature." [op. cit.] So Schiller's definition of "the sublime" involves unity and nature.

It's extremely important to distinguish beauty from the sublime. By the last third of the 18th century, the two had begun to split apart, largely as a result of the romantic movement. Early conceptions of beauty, viz., from the pre-Socratic philosophers, stressed the alleged importance of proper proportion. This casts beauty in purely rational terms. It also excludes disproportioned, asymmetric, grotesque, picaresuqe, bizarre, or malformed images or musical works or poems from the category of the beautiful. But as shown above in the various pieces of art and literature and music cited, many examples exist of art/music/literature which is disproportioned or asymmetric or grotesque or bizarre, yet unmistakably great.

A more important motive for splitting beauty from the sublime in the late 18th century came from the rise of Romanticism and the apotheosis of the non-rational. The late 18th century witnessed a move away from pure rationality as the criterion for beauty. Wordsworth's "thoughts that lie too deep for words" necessarily prove incompatible with a rational description of beauty. For this reason Ruskin takes Schiller's earlier concept of beauty and refines it. Schiller describes beauty as "freedom" and "nature": "An object is perfect, when everything manifold in it accords with the unity of its concept; it is beautiful, when its perfection appears as nature." [1793 letter, op. cit.] But this definition proves problematic for several reasons. First, many works of art or music or literature exhibit great freedom, but this does not necessarily lead to beauty -- for instance, the increasingly free modulation into various tonal centers we find in Wagner does not in and of itself constitute beauty. If that were the case, then Western music would become increasingly more beautiful as it increasingly modulated freely, leading to the logical conclusion that atonal serial music (which treats all 12 pitches of the octave with total freedom) is most beautiful of all. Audiences and critics have reached the opposite conclusion, rejecting serial atonal music, by and large. In the case of music, severe constraints appear to increase beauty: a regular rhythmic pulse, repeating phrases and repeated sections, a composer's choice to confine hi/rself to a single key, and so on. Freedom in music which would involve doing away with regular rhythms or a sense of key or repeated melodic phrases has been shown to generate a sense of lack of musical organization and overall disorder which most listeners find unpleasant.

Again, freedom in literature seems antithetical with beauty. The typical post-renaissance play uses a rigid three-act form with a variety of fixed rules: for example, we expect that the main characters will not all die in the first act, and when this kind of rule gets violated, the results are regarded as unaesthetic by the audience. Chekov's rule that "if a gun is shown on the mantelpiece in the first act, it must be fired in the third act" and so forth limit Western literature and drama with a variety of rigid conventions. It is clearly possible to write a book in which the main characters die in the first chapter (John Hershey's "Hiroshima"), or a play in which nothing of significance happens ("Waiting for Godot"), but these literary works have not proven to be crowd-pleasers. Freedom seems incompatible with beauty in Western literature to the extent that violating any of the many constraints imposed on Western novels and plays seems to generate displeasure among the audience.

Freedom in art once again appears antithetical to beauty. Probably the more free form of modern art are abstract expressionism, but these kinds of paintings have not proven nearly as popular with audiences as representational paintings. It seems doubtful that painters like de Kooning or Pollock with ever take the place in popular appeal of artists like Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci or Monet or Titian or the Greek sculptors -- all of whom were extremely limited in what they could depict because they stuck to observed objects in the real world.

Lastly, there appears no significant discussion in this article of the conflict twixt objective and subjective theories of beauty. The earliest pre-Socratic and Socratic theories of beauty stress its alleged objective existence. Empedocles, for instance, describes beauty as arising from due proportion ("Just as when painters are elaborating temple-offerings, people whom wisdom has well taught their art -- they, when they have taken pigments of many colors with their hands, mix them in due proportion, more of some and less of others, and from them produce shapes like unto all things, making trees and men and women, beasts and birds and fishes that live in the waters, yea, and gods, that live long lives, and are highest ranking in honor -- so don't let the error prevail over your mind, that there is any other source of all the perishable creatures that appear in countless numbers. Know this for sure, for you have heard the tale from a goddess." -- Empedocles , fragment 23), a sentiment echoed by the Renaissance artists and architects and poets: "Art owes its origin to Nature herself... this beautiful creation, the world, supplied the first model, while the original teacher was that divine intelligence which has not only made us superior to the other animals, but like God Himself, if I may venture to say it." -- Giorgio Vasari. Socrates likewise defines beauty as the degree to which something approaches an ideal form outside of human reality as well as simplicity ("Beholding beauty with the eye of the mind, he will be enabled to bring forth, not images of beauty, but realities (for he has hold not of an image but of a reality), and bringing forth and nourishing true virtue to become the friend of God and be immortal, if mortal man may." -- Symposium, section 212; "Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depend on simplicity — I mean the true simplicity of a rightly and nobly ordered mind and character, not that other simplicity which is only a euphemism for folly." -- The Republic, book 3), a sentiment echoed by Michelangelo ("The true work of art is a but a shadow of the divine perfection"). Aristotle claimed that beauty consists of virtue as well as proper proportion, which also echoes Plato's view: "Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and choice, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim." Also: "Beauty is a matter of size and order” (Aristotle, Poetics, 1450b37). Perhaps the most extreme claim that beauty involves symmetry and proportion comes from Plotinus: "Almost everyone declares that symmetry of parts towards each other and towards a whole, with, besides, a certain charm of color, constitutes the beauty recognized by the eye, that in visible things, as indeed in all else, universally, the beautiful thing is essentially symmetrical, patterned” (Plotinus I.6.1). During the middle ages, Pseudo-Dionysus stressed the alleged importance of the divine in beauty: "Any thinking person realizes that the appearances of beauty are signs of an invisible loveliness” (The Celestial Hierarchy, I.3). St. Augustine combines both themes of approach the divine and proper proportion in his definition of beauty: “In all the arts it is symmetry [or proportion] that gives pleasure, preserving unity and making the whole beautiful” (Of True Religion, xxx. 55); “Everything is beautiful that is in due order” (Of True Religion, xli. 77). Moreover, Augustine says, “Order is the distribution which allots things equal and unequal, each to its own place” (City of God, XIX, xiii). Thomas Aquinas offered a variant of this logical positivist definition of beauty, describing beauty as having its origin in reason: "Beauty is essentially the object of intelligence, for what knows in the full meaning of the word is the mind, which alone is open to the infinity of being. The natural site of beauty is the intelligible world: thence it descends. But it falls in a way within the grasp of the senses, since the senses in the case of man serve the mind and can themselves rejoice in knowing: ‘the beautiful relates only to sight and hearing of all senses, because these two are maxime cognoscitivi’(Maritain, 23)."

All of these definitions of beauty stress its allegedly extrahuman origin, its supposed imitation of nature, its supposedly rational character, and its alleged origin in proper proportion.

But other writers and artists and musicians disagree, asserting that beauty is irrational, unpredictable, and entirely subjective. David Hume, for example, said: "Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exists merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty. One person may even perceive deformity, where another is sensible of beauty; and every individual ought to acquiesce in his own sentiment, without pretending to regulate those of others." (Hume, David, 1757). Hume's view was strongly supported by Kant, who claimed that beauty was entirely subjective: "The judgment of taste is therefore not a judgment of cognition, and is consequently not logical but aesthetical, by which we understand that whose determining ground can be no other than subjective." When asked why numbers are beautiful, the mathematician Paul Erdős replied: "It’s like asking why is Ludwig van Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony beautiful. If you don't see why, someone can't tell you. I know numbers are beautiful. If they aren't beautiful, nothing is.” "I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object be what it may - light, shade, and perspective will always make it beautiful." -- John Constable (1776 - 1837). "Ugly is irrelevant. It is an immeasurable insult to a woman, and then supposedly the worst crime you can commit as a woman. But ugly, as beautiful, is an illusion." -- Margaret Cho, weblog, 01-27-04.

On the other hand, a number of writers claimed that beauty had nothing to do with proper proportion or logic or extrahuman approach to godliness or imitation of nature, but originates an abnormal and quirky or pathological disproportion. For example: "There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion." -- Francis Bacon, in Essays (1625), "Of Beauty." Or Andre Breton: "Beauty will be convulsive or not at all," Nadja. Or Albert Camus: "Beauty is unbearable, drives us to despair, offering us for a minute the glimpse of an eternity that we should like to stretch out over the whole of time," Notesbooks. Or Northrop Frye: "The pursuit of beauty is much more dangerous nonsense than the pursuit of truth or goodness, because it affords a greater temptation to the ego," Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays (1957), "Mythical Phase: Symbol as Archetype." Or Théophile Gautier: "There is nothing truly beautiful but that which can never be of any use whatsoever; everything useful is ugly," Mademoiselle de Maupin (1835). Paradoxically, some have claimed that perfection qualifies as imperfection and destroys beauty: "The absence of flaw in beauty is itself a flaw." -- Havelock Ellis (1859 - 1939), Impressions and Comments (1914). "Rarely do great beauty and great virtue dwell together." -- Petrarch (1304 - 1374), De Remedies. All these views of beauty stress either its alleged dangerousness or its disproportion or its extreme convulsive quality or its uselessness - none of which qualify as virtues, and certainly none of which appear to arise from the imitation of nature or from anything divine.

The obvious problem with a complete relativist view of beauty is that it tends to undermine the meaning of the word. If beauty is entirely subjective, and anyone can find anything beautiful depending on their viewpoint, how can we discuss beauty at all? Moreover, this kind of wishy-washy totally relativist definition of beauty contradicts the observed reality that a large majority of people have found the same kinds of things beautiful throughout the ages -- Greek statues, Greek poetry and plays, Roman poetry and architecture, medieval cathedrals, gothic music, renaissance music of masters like Palestrina, the symphonies of Beethoven, the preludes and fugues of Bach, and so on. If beauty is completely subjective it seems an awfully big coincidence that so many people agree on the same group of composers and writers and architects and sculptors and artists as "the greats" in Western art history. Moreover, “No sane person should believe that something is subjective merely because it cannot be settled beyond controversy.” ― Hilary Putnam

I'm tossing this out because of the clear inadequacy of this article in discussing the Western history of concepts of beauty. On the other hand, it's not my intention to run around like a bull in a China shop, wholly wrecking the article and rewriting it from the ground up. But it does seem clear that a great deal needs to be added to this article to bring it up to minimum standards of a reasonably comprehensive discussion of the subject vis-a-vis Western history.

Category:Beauty

Please add Category:Beauty. --173.51.29.188 (talk) 08:04, 13 November 2013 (UTC)

Etymology

Doesn't the English word beauty ultimately come the Latin bellus? Why are the Greek entymologies listed? Almafeta (talk) 16:27, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

How can this article better distinguish itself from Aesthetics

What ways could this article distinguish itself from the philosophical topic of Aesthetics? This page's existing discussion of the various cultural conceptions of beauty is a worthwhile topic (possibly deserving it's own article) but at this point it is too disorganized and gives the impression of irrelevancy.

Should this article be rewritten to link the majority of the page to subsections of Aesthetics? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ZephyrP (talk • contribs) 05:07, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

Indian beauty

Aishwarya

Aishwarya

Former Miss World and top Indian actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is often cited as the "most beautiful woman in the world", for which she has received worldwide attention.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1652689_1652372_1652359,00.html|title=India's Influentials |work=Time|author=Simon Robinson|date=15 August 2007}}</ref><ref name=forbes>{{cite news|url=http://www.forbes.com/2001/03/09/0309bollywood.html|title=India's Celebrity Film Stars|work=Forbes|accessdate=3 September 2001|date=9 March 2001|first=Todd|last=Jatras}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://movies.ndtv.com/movie_story.aspx?id=ENTEN20100132627|title=NDTV awards: Amitabh, SRK, Ash icons of Indian entertainment|publisher=NDTV|accessdate=25 February 2010}}</ref><ref name=mostbeauti>[http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/12/29/60minutes/main663862.shtml "The World's Most Beautiful Woman?"]''cbsnews.com''. Retrieved on 27 October 2007</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Hiscock, Geoff|title=India's global wealth club|year=2007|publisher=John Wiley and Sons|isbn=0-470-82238-4|page=6}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Ash does fine on Letterman|url=http://in.rediff.com/movies/2005/feb/09ash.htm|publisher=Rediff|author=Chhabra, Aseem|date=9 February 2005|archiveurl=//web.archive.org/web/20090528225803/http://in.rediff.com/movies/2005/feb/09ash.htm|archivedate=28 May 2009|deadurl=no}}</ref> Atleast from South Asian perspective she can be considered very beautiful. Her pic should be put in article.Amateur0 (talk) 22:45, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

We need to undo vandalism.

This page looks to have been potentially vandalized, possibly unintentionally, by someone who does not speak fluent English. Looking at the history, it was significantly better about a year ago. In my opinion it would be improved by reverting all the changes since July 2015. Does anyone agree with me? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fallingfrog (talk • contribs)

Can you be more specific? -- John Reaves 21:58, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• I agree with User:Fallingfrog that the article was better written a year ago. The current first sentence has been lifted verbatim from this dictionary, and some pretty poor English simultaneously inserted in other parts of the article. These changes were made on 11 July 2015,[4] and impoverished the style. I think they were good-faith attempts to improve Wikipedia, though, and not vandalism; the user may not be a native speaker of English. I see on their page that they got into some conflicts, and stopped editing in November. I have boldly reverted the article to the last version before their changes. I realize some (minor) improvements have been made since then; I'll come back some day and work them back in. (Unless somebody else gets to it before me, HINT HINT.) Thank you for your assistance, Fallingfrog. I see have you only just created an account; welcome to Wikipedia! (If you sign your talkpage posts with four tildes, (~~~~), they will be magically transformed to your signature and a timestamp when you save.) Bishonen | talk 22:39, 9 February 2016 (UTC).

Thanks. I didn't have a chance to browse the revisions. -- John Reaves 23:00, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

No problem. I think I've now restored the improvements my revert removed; it wasn't as time-consuming as I feared. Bishonen | talk 23:02, 9 February 2016 (UTC).