Will truth emerge?

In class, the question "how will a work's true aesthetic judgment be revealed?" was posed. To this, Johnson replied, "truth will emerge," echoing the words of Scottish philosopher David Hume. This references Hume's belief that, over time, true aesthetic value is achieved in a work of art through its endurance. This is a point upon which I find very interesting. In class, I refuted Hume's statement, questioning how popularity and time can support true aesthetic value if most people are biased critics. There is one possible outcome that I can gather; the population is actually biased to believe the true, "unbiased" perception. This brought up voting and, as Johnson pointed out, a vote for the right candidate for the wrong reason is the wrong way for a president to be elected. It is with this spirit that I question the previous conclusion on determining a piece's aesthetic values, and I offer my question to you, my classmates:

Will the truth emerge through unbiased mediums?

The situation of the population achieving a true, united perception above is, of course, biased. For truth to emerge, the common notion would have to be on an individual basis. Hume argues that we perceive through our sensory experiences, and our past experiences influence future instances. From this and other sentimental readings by Hume, I've concluded that taste (judgments and opinions) is subjective, and I believe that Hume, an empiricist, would concur. If taste is subjective, however, then a unified taste would have to be, at least on some level, objective. Is it possible to accumulate many individual opinions using an unbiased method, all the while making sure the opinions themselves unbiased?

Now let us consider popularity. To be popular, you must have many followers in a sense, or be well known among the population in consideration. In Hume's texts, he speaks of the unbiased individual whose judgments are the "standard of aesthetic taste and beauty." He says "few are qualified to give judgments on any work of art . . .." If few can correctly judge art, then how can an opinion of reputable art gain popularity through an unbiased medium?

These are simply my thoughts. Refer to any or all of my questions in your responses. Thank you all!

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.