James Hendrick - eye f the beholder (cont).

3.  For this third blog post I will elaborate on a point made in the first blog: In Nietzsche's philosophy of Art, the concept of ‘Beauty’ really does lie in the eye of the beholder.  “For Nietzsche, man is the sole source or origin of meaning in the world; that is, the world alone, or what we would call ‘Nature’ is void of any meaning other than how man perceives and comes to understand it.”  ‘Beauty’ then is another concept created and established by man in his process to further understand the world around him.  However, we know there can be different understandings of nature; Objects are given a universal meaning that the society has agreed upon in order to further the ‘conquest’ of nature, but we also know these same objects are given various meanings created through individual perception.  To given an example, I will use the ‘STOP’ sign that serves as the object under investigation in my thesis paper.  The ‘stop’ sign, like many other objects, holds a blatant universal meaning that this society generally adheres to.  Through the transformation that the sign underwent, the process that gave rise to meaning for this sign in my existential existence, a new meaning for the sign was established.  So, the same object, the ‘stop’ sign has both its original universal meaning and its newly created subjective meaning.  By the terms of the former, the sign is an ugly tool of order; However, in the light of the latter the sign is a beautiful symbol of creative expression that inspires memories of the greatest times of my college career.  The real question that comes to mind concerns the effect of this dualistic meaning of objects on the concept of beauty; which meaning, the universal or subjective is responsible for determining beauty?  Is it the individuals opinion of beauty or the consensus of majority that carries more weight?  Certainly it seems the universal is more geared toward organizing or predisposing mankind to one understanding of beautiful.  According to Nietzsche, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, or in subjective perception.