Response to Jacob Wheeler's Post on 9/25/11 at 12:12pm

The question of whether a human being can exist without a biased perception is interesting and has many different angles from which it can be "attacked." For one, we've learned that your perception of something is influenced by relative experience, as an empiricist would argue. This explains a lot of psychological phenomena - typically phobias and taste aversions - but also allows plenty of room for bias based on the previous experiences with the object or situation being perceived. Also, this brings about a confusing question; if you perceive based on experience, then how did you perceive something for the first time?

Now, if you take the question from a skeptical approach, you are arguing that sensory perception is fairly subjective and, although Hume argues it is "true for everyone," we don't actually perceive the object as it is, we just attribute different features to it as we perceive them. In this case, I would argue that there is room for a few unbiased critics if they completely subjugate themselves from their perceptions and concentrate on the axiological aspects of the work at hand.

In Hume's text, we learned that there are unbiased critics in the world, and although few, they can give a perfectly unprejudiced view. They have certain questionable attributes to hold, however. As Hume says:

"Strong sense, united to delicate sentiment, improved by practice, perfected by comparison, and cleared of all prejudice, can alone entitle critics to this valuable character; and the joint verdict of such, wherever they are to be found, is the true standard of taste and beauty."

Even if some of Hume's views are seen as controversial, he does depict an accurate description of an unbiased critic, so if one exists, they would portray these attributes, even though some are questionable in whether or not they form bias or can be achieved by a conscious human.