Fine art and Estimation

picture of man looking at art objectsInterpretation in fine art refers to the attribution of meaning to a piece of work. A point on which people often disagree is whether the artist'southward or author's intention is relevant to the estimation of the work. In the Anglo-American analytic philosophy of fine art, views about interpretation co-operative into two major camps: intentionalism and anti-intentionalism, with an initial focus on one art, namely literature.

The anti-intentionalist maintains that a work's meaning is entirely determined by linguistic and literary conventions, thereby rejecting the relevance of the author's intention. The underlying assumption of this position is that a piece of work enjoys autonomy with respect to significant and other aesthetically relevant properties. Extra-textual factors, such as the author's intention, are neither necessary nor sufficient for meaning conclusion. This early position in the analytic tradition is oftentimes called conventionalism because of its strong emphasis on convention. Anti-intentionalism gradually went out of favor at the end of the 20th century, but it has seen a revival in the so-chosen value-maximizing theory, which recommends that the interpreter seek value-maximizing interpretations constrained by convention and, according to a different version of the theory, by the relevant contextual factors at the time of the work'due south production.

Past contrast, the initial brand of intentionalism—actual intentionalism—holds that interpreters should business concern themselves with the author's intention, for a piece of work'south meaning is afflicted past such intention. There are at to the lowest degree three versions of actual intentionalism. The absolute version identifies a piece of work's pregnant fully with the author'south intention, therefore allowing that an writer can intend her work to mean whatever she wants it to mean. The extreme version acknowledges that the possible meanings a work can sustain have to exist constrained by convention. According to this version, the author'due south intention picks the correct pregnant of the work every bit long every bit information technology fits one of the possible meanings; otherwise, the piece of work ends up being meaningless. The moderate version claims that when the writer's intention does not match any of the possible meanings, meaning is fixed instead by convention and perhaps also context.

A second brand of intentionalism, which finds a middle form between actual intentionalism and anti-intentionalism, is hypothetical intentionalism. According to this position, a work's pregnant is the appropriate audience's best hypothesis about the author'due south intention based on publicly available information about the author and her piece of work at the fourth dimension of the slice's production. A variation on this position attributes the intention to a hypothetical author who is postulated by the interpreter and who is constituted by piece of work features. Such authors are sometimes said to be fictional because they, being purely conceptual, differ decisively from flesh-and-blood authors.

This commodity elaborates on these theories of estimation and considers their notable objections. The contend most interpretation covers other art forms in addition to literature. The theories of estimation are also extended across many of the arts. This broad outlook is assumed throughout the commodity, although aught said is affected even if a narrow focus on literature is adopted.

Table of Contents

  1. Key Concepts: Intention, Pregnant, and Interpretation
  2. Anti-Intentionalism
    1. The Intentional Fallacy
    2. Beardsley's Speech Act Theory of Literature
    3. Notable Objections and Replies
  3. Value-Maximizing Theory
    1. Overview
    2. Notable Objections and Replies
  4. Actual Intentionalism
    1. Accented Version
    2. Farthermost Version
    3. Moderate Version
    4. Objections to Actual Intentionalism
  5. Hypothetical Intentionalism
    1. Overview
    2. Notable Objections and Replies
  6. Hypothetical Intentionalism and the Hypothetical Creative person
    1. Overview
    2. Notable Objections and Replies
  7. Conclusion
  8. References and Further Reading

1. Fundamental Concepts: Intention, Significant, and Interpretation

It is common for us to ask questions nearly works of art due to puzzlement or curiosity. Sometimes we do non sympathise the indicate of the work. What is the point of, for case, Metamorphosis by Kafka or Duchamp'due south Fountain? Sometimes there is ambiguity in a work and we desire information technology resolved. For example, is the final sequence of Christopher Nolan'south film Inception reality or some other dream? Or do ghosts really exist in Henry James's The Turn of the Screw? Sometimes we make hypotheses about details in a piece of work. For instance, does the woman in white in Raphael'due south The School of Athens correspond Hypatia? Is the conch in William Golding's Lord of the Flies a symbol for civilization and democracy?

What these questions accept in mutual is that all of them seek later on things that get beyond what the piece of work literally presents or says. They are all concerned with the implicit contents of the work or, for simplicity, with the meanings of a work. A distinction can be drawn between two kinds of pregnant in terms of telescopic. Meaning can be global in the sense that it concerns the work's theme, thesis, or point. For example, an audience first encountering Duchamp'south Fountain would want to know Duchamp's point in producing this readymade or, put otherwise, what the work as a whole is fabricated to convey. The aforementioned goes for Kafka's Metamorphosis, which contains and so bizarre a plot as to make the reader wonder what the story is all about. Meaning tin can as well exist local insofar as it is about what a office of a work conveys. Inquiries into the meaning of a particular sequence in Christopher Nolan's picture show, the woman in Raphael's fresco, or the conch in William Golding's Lord of the Flies are directed at only part of the work.

We are said to be interpreting when trying to find out answers to questions well-nigh the pregnant of a work. In other words, interpretation is the attempt to attribute piece of work-meaning. Here "attribute" can mean "recover," which is retrieving something already existing in a work; or it tin more weakly mean "impose," which entails ascribing a meaning to a work without ontologically creating anything. Many of the major positions in the debate endorse either the impositional view or the retrieval view.

When an interpretative question arises, a frequent way to bargain with information technology is to resort to the creator's intention. Nosotros may enquire the artist to reveal her intention if such an opportunity is available; we may likewise check what she says nigh her work in an interview or autobiography. If nosotros have access to her personal documents such every bit diaries or messages, they likewise will go our interpretative resource. These are all evidence of the artist's intention. When the evidence is compelling, we take good reason to believe it reveals the artist's intention.

Certainly, there are cases in which external evidence of the artist's intention is absent-minded, including when the piece of work is anonymous. This poses no difficulty for philosophers who view entreatment to artistic intention every bit crucial, for they have that internal evidence—the work itself—is the best evidence of the artist's intention. Most of the time, close attention to details of the work will lead us to what the artist intended the work to mean.

But what is intention exactly? Intention is a kind of mental land commonly characterized as a design or program in the creative person'due south mind to exist realized in her artistic cosmos. This rough view of intention is sometimes refined into the reductive analysis 1 volition detect in a contemporaneous textbook of philosophy of heed: intention is constituted by belief and desire. Some bodily intentionalists explain the nature of intention from a Wittgensteinian perspective: authorial intention is viewed every bit the purposive construction of the work that can be discerned by close inspection. This view challenges the supposition that intentions are always private and logically independent of the work they cause, which is often interpreted as a position held by anti-intentionalists.

A 2005 proposal holds that intentions are executive attitudes toward plans (Livingston). These attitudes are firm but defeasible commitments to acting on them. Contra the reductive assay of intention, this view holds that intentions are distinct and real mental states that serve a range of functions irreducible to other mental states.

Clarifying each of these bones terms (meaning, interpretation, and intention) requires an essay-length treatment that cannot be done here. For current purposes, it suffices to introduce the aforesaid views and proposals commonly causeless. Behave in mind that for the almost part the debate over art interpretation proceeds without consensus on how to ascertain these terms, and clarifications appear merely when necessary.

2. Anti-Intentionalism

Anti-intentionalism is considered the first theory of interpretation to sally in the analytic tradition. It is normally seen as affiliated with the New Criticism movement that was prevalent in the centre of the twentieth century. The position was initially a reaction against biographical criticism, the main thought of which is that the interpreter, to grasp the significant of a work, needs to study the life of the author because the work is seen as reflecting the author'south mental world. This approach led to people considering the writer's biographical data rather than her work. Literary criticism became criticism of biography, not criticism of literary works. Confronting this trend, literary critic William Yard. Wimsatt and philosopher Monroe C. Beardsley coauthored a seminal paper "The Intentional Fallacy" in 1946, marking the starting signal of the intention contend. Beardsley later extended his anti-intentionalist stance across the arts in his monumental book Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism ([1958] 1981a).

a. The Intentional Fallacy

The main idea of the intentional fallacy is that appeal to the creative person'south intention outside the work is beguiling, because the piece of work itself is the verdict of what meaning information technology bears. This contention is based on the anti-intentionalist's ontological supposition about works of fine art.

This underlying assumption is that a work of art enjoys autonomy with respect to pregnant and other aesthetically relevant properties. Every bit Beardsley's Principle of Autonomy shows, critical statements will in the end demand to be tested against the work itself, not against factors exterior it. To give Beardsley's example, whether a statue symbolizes human destiny depends not on what its maker says but on our being able to make out that theme from the statue on the basis of our knowledge of creative conventions: if the statue shows a homo confined to a muzzle, nosotros may well conclude that the statue indeed symbolizes human destiny, for by convention the image of solitude fits that alleged theme. The anti-intentionalist principle hence follows: the interpreter should focus on what she can detect in the work itself—the internal bear witness—rather than on external evidence, such equally the artist'due south biography, to reveal her intentions.

Anti-intentionalism is sometimes called conventionalism considering it sees convention as necessary and sufficient in determining piece of work-meaning. On this view, the artist'south intention at best underdetermines pregnant even when operating successfully. This tin be seen from the famous argument offered by Wimsatt and Beardsley: either the artist'due south intention is successfully realized in the work, or information technology fails; if the intention is successfully realized in the work, appeal to external evidence of the artist's intention is not necessary (we tin can discover the intention from the work); if it fails, such entreatment becomes insufficient (the intention turns out to be inapplicable to the work). The determination is that an entreatment to external testify of the creative person's intention is either unnecessary or insufficient. Equally the 2nd premise of the argument shows, the creative person's intention is bereft in determining meaning for the reason that convention alone can do the play tricks. Every bit a result, the overall argument entails the irrelevance of external evidence of the artist's intention. To recollect of such evidence every bit relevant commits the intentional fallacy.

There is a second way to codify the intentional fallacy. Since the artist does not always successfully realize her intention, the inference is invalid from the premise that the creative person intended her work to mean p to the conclusion that the work in question does mean p. Therefore, the term "intentional fallacy" has two layers of pregnant: normatively, it refers to the questionable principle of interpretation that external testify of intent should be appealed to; ontologically, it refers to the beguiling inference from probable intention to piece of work-meaning.

b. Beardsley's Oral communication Act Theory of Literature

Beardsley at a afterwards betoken develops an ontology of literature in favor of anti-intentionalism (1981b, 1982). Reviving Plato's imitation theory of art, Beardsley claims that fictional works are essentially imitations of illocutionary acts. Briefly put, illocutionary acts are performed by utterances in particular contexts. For example, when a detective, convinced that someone is the killer, points his finger at that person and utters the sentence "yous did it," the detective is performing the illocutionary act of accusing someone. What illocutionary deed is being performed is traditionally construed as jointly determined past the speaker'southward intention to perform that human activity, the words uttered, and the relevant conditions in that item context. Other examples of illocutionary acts include asserting, alert, castigating, asking, and the like.

Literary works can be seen equally utterances; that is, texts used in a particular context to perform different illocutionary acts by authors. However, Beardsley claims that in the case of fictional works in particular, the purported illocutionary force will always be removed so as to make the utterance an imitation of that illocutionary human activity. When an attempted human action is insufficiently performed, it ends up existence represented or imitated. For example, if I say "please pass me the salt" in my dining room when no 1 except me is in that location, I terminate upward representing (imitating) the illocutionary act of requesting because there is no uptake from the intended audition. Since the illocutionary act in this instance is merely imitated, it qualifies as a fictional act. This is why Beardsley sees fiction as representation.

Consider the uptake condition in the case of fictional works. Such works are not addressed to the audience every bit a talk is: there is no concrete context in which the audition can exist readily identified. The uttered text hence loses its illocutionary force and ends upward beingness a representation. Aside from this "address without access," another obtaining condition for a fictional illocutionary act is the existence of non-referring names and descriptions in a fictional piece of work. If an author writes a poem in which she greets the bully detective Sherlock Holmes, this greeting will never obtain, because the proper noun Sherlock Holmes does not refer to whatsoever existing person in the world. The greeting will but stop up being a representation or a fictional illocution. By parity of reasoning, fictional works terminate up beingness representations of illocutionary acts in that they always contain names or descriptions involving events that never take place.

Now we must inquire: by what criterion do we determine what illocutionary human action is represented? It cannot exist the speaker or author's intention, because even if a speaker intends to stand for a detail illocutionary deed, she might end upwards representing another. Since the possibility of failed intention ever exists, intention would not exist an appropriate criterion. Convention is once again invoked to determine the correct illocutionary act beingness represented. Information technology is true that any practice of representing is intentional at the commencement in the sense that what is represented is determined by the representer's intention. Nevertheless, one time the connection betwixt a symbol and what it is used to represent is established, intention is said to be detached from that connexion, and deciding the content of a representation becomes a sheer affair of convention.

Since a fictional piece of work is essentially a representation of an insufficiently performed illocutionary act, determining what it represents does not require us to get beyond that incomplete operation, simply as determining what a mime is imitating does non crave the audience to consider anything outside her performance, such as her intention. What the mime is imitating is completely determined by how we conventionally construe the human activity being performed. In a similar fashion, when considering what illocutionary act is represented by a fictional work, the interpreter should rely on internal evidence rather than on external prove of authorial intent to construct the illocutionary human action existence represented. If, based on internal data, a story reads like a castigation of war, information technology is suitably seen equally a representation of that illocutionary act. The decision is that the author'south intention plays no role in fixing the content of a fictional piece of work.

Lastly, it is worth mentioning that Beardsley's attitude toward nonfictional works is ambivalent. Obviously, his spoken language act argument applies to fictional works only, and he accepts that nonfictional works can be 18-carat illocutions. This category of works tends to have a more identifiable audience, who is hence not addressed without admission. With illocutions, Beardsley continues to argue for an anti-intentionalist view of meaning according to which the utterer'southward intention does not determine meaning. Only his accepting nonfictional works as illocutions opens the door to considerations of external or contextual factors that go against his earlier stance, which is globally anti-intentionalist.

c. Notable Objections and Replies

One firsthand concern with anti-intentionalism is whether convention alone tin point to a unmarried significant (Hirsch, 1967). The mutual reason why people argue about interpretation is precisely that the piece of work itself does not offer sufficient evidence to disambiguate pregnant. Very ofttimes a work tin sustain multiple meanings and the problem of selection prompts some people to appeal to the creative person'due south intention. It does not seem plausible to say that one can assign only a single meaning to works like Ulysses or Picasso's abstruse paintings if i concentrates solely on internal evidence. To this objection, Beardsley (1970) insists that, in nigh cases, appeal to the coherence of the piece of work can eventually leave us with a single right estimation.

A 2nd serious objection to anti-intentionalism is the example of irony (Hirsch, 1976, pp. 24–5). It seems reasonable to say that whether a work is ironic depends on if its creator intended it to be so. For example, based on internal testify, many people took Daniel Defoe's pamphlet The Shortest Way with the Dissenters to exist genuinely confronting the Dissenters upon its publication. However, the only footing for maxim that the pamphlet is ironic seems to be Defoe's intention. If irony is a crucial component of the work, ignoring it would fail to respect the piece of work's identity. Information technology follows that irony cannot be grounded in internal evidence alone. Beardsley's answer (1982, pp. 203–vii) is that irony must offering the possibility of understanding. If the artist cannot imagine anyone taking it ironically, in that location would exist no reason to believe the piece of work to exist ironic.

However, the problem of irony is but part of a bigger business organisation that challenges the irrelevance of external factors to interpretation. Many factors nowadays at the time of the piece of work's creation seem to play a key function in shaping a work's identity and content. Missing out on these factors would lead us to misidentifying the work (and hence to misinterpreting it).

For instance, a work will non be seen as revolutionary unless the interpreter knows something about the contemporaneous creative tradition: ignoring the work's innovation amounts to accepting that the piece of work can lose its revolutionary character while remaining self-identical. If we see this grapheme every bit identity-relevant, nosotros should then take it into consideration in our interpretation. The same line of thinking goes for other identity-conferring contextual factors, such as the social-historical atmospheric condition and the relations the work bears to contemporaneous or prior works. The present view is thus called ontological contextualism to foreground the ontological claim that the identity and content of a work of art are in role determined by the relations it bears to its context of production.

Contextualism leads to an of import distinction between piece of work and text in the case of literature. In a nutshell: a text is not context-dependent only a work is. The anti-intentionalist stance thus leads the interpreter to consider texts rather than works because it rejects considerations of external or contextual factors. The aforementioned distinction goes for other fine art forms when we draw a comparison between an artistic production considered in its creature form and in its context of cosmos. For convenience, the word "work" is used throughout with notes on whether contextualism is taken or not.

As a reply to the contextualist objection, information technology has been argued (Davies, 2005) that Beardsley'south position allows for contextualism. If this is convincing, the contextualist criticism of anti-intentionalism would non be conclusive.

3. Value-Maximizing Theory

a. Overview

The value-maximizing theory tin be viewed as being derived from anti-intentionalism. Its core claim is that the primary aim of art estimation is to offer interpretations that maximize the value of a work. There are at least ii versions of the maximizing position distinguished past the commitment to contextualism. When the maximizing position is committed to contextualism, the constraint on interpretation will be convention plus context (Davies, 2007); otherwise, the constraint will be convention merely, as endorsed past anti-intentionalism (Goldman, 2013).

As indicated, the give-and-take "maximize" does not imply monism. That is, the present position does non claim that there can be only a single way to maximize the value of a piece of work of art. On the opposite, it seems reasonable to presume that in most cases the interpreter tin envisage several readings to bring out the value of the work. For instance, Kafka's Metamorphosis has generated a number of rewarding interpretations, and information technology is difficult to argue for a single best among them. As long as an interpretation is revealing or insightful under the relevant interpretative constraints, we may count it as value-maximizing. Such existence the example, the value-maximizing theory may be relabelled the "value-enhancing" or "value-satisfying" theory.

Given this pluralist movie, the maximizer, unlike the anti-intentionalist, will need to accept the indeterminacy thesis that convention (and context, if she endorses contextualism) lonely does not guarantee the unambiguity of the work. This allows the maximizing position to featherbed the challenge posed by said thesis, rendering it a more flexible position than anti-intentionalism in regard to the number of legitimate interpretations.

Encapsulating the maximizing position in a few words: it holds that the main aim of art estimation is to enhance appreciative satisfaction by identifying interpretations that bring out the value of a work inside reasonable limits gear up by convention (and context).

b. Notable Objections and Replies

The actual intentionalist will maintain that figurative features such as irony and allusion must be analysed intentionalistically. The maximizer with contextualist delivery can counter this objection by dealing with intentions more sophisticatedly. If the relevant features are identity conferring, they volition be respected and accepted in interpretation. In this case, any interpretation that ignores the intended feature ends upwardly misidentifying the work. Only if the relevant features are non identity conferring, more room volition be left for the interpreter to consider them. The intended feature can be ignored if it does not add together to the value of the piece of work. By contrast, where such a characteristic is not intended but tin can exist put in the work, the interpreter tin can still build it into the interpretation if information technology is value enhancing.

The most of import objection to the maximizing view has information technology that the present position is in danger of turning a mediocre work into a masterpiece. Ed Wood's picture Plan 9 from Outer Space is the most discussed example. Many people consider this work to be the worst film ever made. Withal, interpreted from a postmodern perspective every bit satire—which is presumably a value-enhancing estimation—would turn it into a classic.

The maximizer with contextualist leanings can respond that the postmodern reading fails to identify the film every bit authored past Wood (Davies, 2007, p, 187). Postmodern views were not available in Wood'due south time, so it was incommunicable for the film to exist created as such. Identifying the film every bit postmodernist amounts to anachronism that disrespects the piece of work'southward identity. The moral of this example is that the maximizer does not blindly enhance the value of a piece of work. Rather, the piece of work to be interpreted needs to be contextualized first to ensure that subsequent attributions of aesthetic value are done in light of the truthful and fair presentation of the work.

4. Actual Intentionalism

Contra anti-intentionalism, actual intentionalism maintains that the artist's intention is relevant to interpretation. The position comes in at least 3 forms, giving dissimilar weights to intention. The absolute version claims that work-significant is fully determined by the artist's intention; the extreme version claims that the work ends up existence meaningless when the artist'south intention is incompatible with it; and the moderate version claims that either the artist's intention determines significant or—if this fails—meaning is determined instead by convention (and context, if contextualism is endorsed).

a. Absolute Version

Accented actual intentionalism claims that a piece of work means whatsoever its creator intends information technology to mean. Put otherwise, it sees the creative person's intention every bit the necessary and sufficient condition for a work's pregnant. This position is often dubbed Humpty-Dumptyism with reference to the character Humpty-Dumpty in Through the Looking-Drinking glass. This graphic symbol tries to convince Alice that he can make a give-and-take mean what he chooses it to hateful. This unsettling decision is supported past the argument nigh intentionless pregnant: a mark (or a sequence of marks) cannot accept significant unless it is produced by an agent capable of intentional activities; therefore, meaning is identical to intention.

It seems plausible to abandon the thought that marks on the sand are a poem once we know they were acquired by accident. But this at best proves that intention is the necessary status for something'due south being meaningful; information technology does not prove further that what something ways is what the agent intended it to mean. In other words, the argument about intentionless pregnant does a better chore in showing that intention is an indispensable ingredient for meaningfulness than in showing that intention infallibly determines the meaning conveyed.

b. Extreme Version

To avoid Humpty-Dumptyism, the extreme actual intentionalist rejects the view that the artist'due south intention infallibly determines piece of work-pregnant and accepts the indeterminacy thesis that convention alone does non guarantee a single axiomatic meaning to exist found in a work. The farthermost intentionalist claims further that the pregnant of the work is fixed by the artist'southward intention if her intention identifies one of the possible meanings sustained by the piece of work; otherwise, the work ends up being meaningless (Hirsch, 1967). Meliorate put, the extreme intentionalist sees intention as the necessary rather than sufficient condition for work-meaning.

Bated from the unsatisfactory event that a work becomes meaningless when the artist's intention fails, the nowadays position faces a dilemma when dealing with the example of figurative linguistic communication (Nathan, in Iseminger (1992)). Take irony for example. The showtime horn of the dilemma is equally follows: Constrained by linguistic conventions, the range of possible meanings has to include the negation of the literal significant in club for the intended irony to be constructive. But this results in accented intentionalism: every expression would be ironic as long equally the writer intends it to be. But—this is the second horn—if the range of possible meanings does not include the negation of literal meaning, the expression simply becomes meaningless in that there is no appropriate significant possible for the writer to concretize. Information technology seems that a broader notion of convention is needed to explain figurative language. But if the extreme intentionalist makes that movement, her intentionalist position volition exist undermined, for the writer's intention would exist given a less important function than convention in such cases. However, this problem does non arise when the actual intentionalist is committed to contextualism, for in that instance the contextual factors that brand the intended irony possible will exist taken into account.

c. Moderate Version

Though there are several dissimilar versions of moderate bodily intentionalism, they share the common ground that when the artist's intention fails, meaning is fixed instead by convention and context. (Whether all moderate bodily intentionalists have context into business relationship is controversial and this article will non dig into this controversy for reasons of space.) That is, when the artist'south intention is successful, it determines meaning; otherwise, significant is determined by convention plus context (Carroll, 2001; Stecker, 2003; Livingston, 2005).

Equally seen, an intention is successful so long as information technology identifies one of the possible meanings sustained by the piece of work even if the meaning identified is less plausible than other candidates. But what exactly is the interpreter doing when she identifies that meaning? Information technology is reasonable to say that the interpreter does not demand to ascertain all the possible meanings and see if there is a fit. Rather, all she needs to practise is to see whether the intended meaning can be read in accord with the work. This is why the moderate intentionalist puts the success condition in terms of compatibility: an intention is successful so long equally the intended meaning is uniform with the piece of work. The fact that a certain meaning is compatible with the work means that the work can sustain information technology equally ane of its possible meanings.

Unfortunately, the notion of compatibility seems to permit foreign cases in which an insignificant intention tin can decide work-meaning as long as information technology is non explicitly rejected by the relevant interpretative constraint. For instance, if Agatha Christie reveals that Hercule Poirot is actually a smart Martian in disguise, the moderate intentionalist would need to accept information technology because this proclamation of intention can still be said to be compatible with the text in the sense that it is not rejected by textual prove. To avoid this bad result, compatibility needs to be qualified.

The moderate intentionalist then analyses compatibility in terms of the meshing condition, which refers to a sufficient degree of coherence betwixt the content of the intention and the piece of work'south rhetorical patterns. An intention is compatible with the work in the sense that it meshes well with the work. The Martian case will hence be ruled out by the meshing condition because it does not engage sufficiently with the narrative even if it is not explicitly rejected by textual bear witness. The meshing status is a minimal or weak success condition in that information technology does non require the intention to mesh with every textual characteristic. A sufficient amount will do, though the moderate intentionalist admits that the line is non ever like shooting fish in a barrel to draw. With this weak standard for success, it tin happen that the interpreter is not able to discern the intended meaning in the work before she learns of the artist'due south intention.

In that location is a second kind of success condition which adopts a stronger standard (Stecker, 2003; Davies, 2007, pp. 170–ane). This standard for success states that an intention is successful simply in instance the intended meaning, amidst the possible meanings sustained by the work, is the ane most likely to secure uptake from a well-backgrounded audience (with contextual knowledge and all). For example, if a work of art, within the limits set past convention and context, affords interpretations x, y, and z, and x is more readily discerned than the other 2 by the appropriate audience, and so x is the pregnant of the work.

These accounts of the success condition answer a notable objection to moderate intentionalism. This objection claims that moderate intentionalism faces an epistemic dilemma (Trivedi, 2001). Consider an epistemic question: how do we know whether an intention is successfully realized? Presumably, nosotros figure out work-meaning and the artist'southward intention respectively and independently of each other. And then nosotros compare the two to run across if there is a fit. Nevertheless, this motion is redundant: if we tin can figure out work-significant independently of actual intention, why do we need the latter? And if piece of work-meaning cannot exist independently obtained, how can we know it is a case where intentions are successfully realized and not a example where intentions failed? Information technology follows that appeal to successful intention results in redundancy or indeterminacy.

The first horn of the dilemma assumes that work-meaning can be obtained independently of knowledge of successful intention, but this is false for moderate intentionalists, for they acknowledge that in many cases the work presents ambiguity that cannot be resolved solely in virtue of internal evidence. The moderate intentionalist rejects the second horn past claiming that they practise non determine the success of an intention by comparing independently obtained piece of work-meaning with the artist'south intention (Stecker, 2010, pp. 154–five). Every bit already discussed, moderate intentionalists suggest different success weather condition that do not appeal to the identity between the artist's intention and piece of work-meaning. Moderate intentionalists adopting the weak standard concur that success is defined by the caste of meshing; those who adopt the strong standard maintain that success is defined by the audience's ability to grasp the intention. Neither requires the interpreter to identify a work'southward meaning independently of the artist'south intention.

d. Objections to Actual Intentionalism

The well-nigh commonly raised objection is the epistemic worry, which asks: is intention knowable? Information technology seems impossible for 1 to actually know others' mental states, and the epistemic gap in this respect is thus unbridgeable. Bodily intentionalists tend to dismiss this worry as insignificant and maintain that in many contexts (daily conversation or historical investigations) we have no difficulty in discerning another person's intention (Carroll, 2009, pp. 71–v). In that case, why would things all of a sudden stand differently when it comes to fine art interpretation? This is not to say that we succeed on every occasion of interpretation, just that nosotros exercise so in an amazingly large number of cases. That beingness said, we should not reject the appeal to intention solely because of the occasional failure.

Another objection is the publicity paradox (Nathan, 2006). The main idea is this: when someone S conveys something p past a production of an object O for public consumption, at that place is a 2d-order intention that the audience need not go beyond O to reach p; that is, there is no need to consult S'due south first-order intentions to empathize O. Therefore, when an artist creates a piece of work for public consumption, there is a 2d-society intention that her first-order intentions non be consulted, otherwise it would indicate the failure of the artist. Actual intentionalism hence leads to the paradoxical claim that we should and should non consult the artist's intentions.

The actual intentionalist's response (Stecker, 2010, pp. 153–4) is this: not all artists have the second-order intention in question. If this premise is fake, and so the publicity argument becomes unsound. Fifty-fifty if it were true, the argument would notwithstanding be invalid, because it confuses the intention that the artist intends to create something standing alone with the intention that her outset-order intention need non be consulted. The paradox will non hold if this distinction is made.

Lastly, many criticisms are directed at a popular argument amid actual intentionalists: the chat argument (Carroll, 2001; Jannotta, 2014). An analogy betwixt chat and art estimation is drawn, and bodily intentionalists merits that if we take that art interpretation is a grade of conversation, nosotros demand to have bodily intentionalism as the correct prescriptive account of estimation, because the standard goal of an interlocutor in a chat is to grasp what the speaker intends to say. (This is a premise even anti-intentionalists have, but they obviously reject the farther merits that art interpretation is conversational. Encounter Beardsley, 1970, ch.ane.) This analogy has been severely criticized (Dickie, 2006; Nathan, 2006; Huddleston, 2012). The greatest disanalogy betwixt conversation and art is that the latter is more than like a monologue delivered by the artist rather than an interchange of ideas.

I way to come across the monologue objection is to specify more conspicuously the role of the conversational interest. In fact, the actual intentionalist claims that the conversational interest should constrain other interests such equally the aesthetic interest. In other words, other interests can be reconciled or work with the conversational interest. Take the case of the hermeneutics of suspicion for instance. Hermeneutics of suspicion is a skeptical mental attitude—oft heavily politicized—adopted toward the explicit stance of a work. Interpretations based on the hermeneutics of suspicion have to be constrained by the artist'due south non-ironic intention in club for them to count as legitimate interpretations. For instance, in attributing racist tendencies to Jules Verne'southward Mysterious Island, in which the black slave Nib is portrayed as docile and superstitious, we need to suppose that the tendencies are not ironic; otherwise, the suspicious reading becomes inappropriate. In this example, the artistic conversation does non end upwardly being a monologue, for the suspicious hermeneut listens and understands Verne before responding with the suspicious reading, which is constrained by the conversational interest. A conversational interchange is hence completed.

5. Hypothetical Intentionalism

a. Overview

A compromise between bodily intentionalism and anti-intentionalism is hypothetical intentionalism, the core claim of which is that the right meaning of a piece of work is determined by the best hypothesis about the artist's intention made by a selected audience. The aim of interpretation is and then to hypothesize what the artist intended when creating the piece of work from the perspective of the qualified audience (Tolhurst, 1979; Levinson, 1996).

Two points call for attention. Showtime, it is hypothesis—not truth—that matters. This means that a hypothesis of the actual intention will never exist trumped by cognition of that very intention. Second, the membership of the audience is crucial because information technology determines the kind of show legitimate for the interpreter to use.

A 1979 proposal (Tolhurst) suggests that the relevant audience be singled out by the artist's intention, that is, the audience intended to be addressed by the artist. Work-meaning is thus determined by the intended audience'due south best hypothesis nigh the artist's intention. This means that the interpreter will need to equip herself with the relevant beliefs and background noesis of the intended audition in order to brand the best hypothesis. Put another way, hypothetical intentionalism focuses on the audience's uptake of an utterance addressed to them. This being so, what the audience relies on in comprehending the utterance will be based on what she knows well-nigh the utterer on that detail occasion. Post-obit this contextualist line of thinking, the meaning of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal will non be the suggestion that the poor in Republic of ireland might ease their economic force per unit area past selling their children equally food to the rich; rather, given the groundwork knowledge of Swift's intended audition, the best hypothesis about the author's intention is that he intended the work to be a satire that criticizes the heartless attitude toward the poor and Irish gaelic policy in general.

Even so, there is a serious problem with the notion of an intended audition. If the intended audience is an extremely minor group possessing esoteric knowledge of the creative person, significant becomes a private thing, for the work can merely exist properly understood in terms of individual information shared between artist and audition, and this results in something close to Humpty-Dumptyism, which is feature of absolute intentionalism.

To cope with this problem, the hypothetical intentionalist replaces the concept of an intended audience with that of an platonic or appropriate audience. Such an audience is non necessarily targeted by the creative person's intention and is platonic in the sense that its members are familiar with the public facts near the artist and her work. In other words, the ideal audition seeks to ballast the piece of work in its context of creation based on public testify. This avoids the danger of interpreting the work on the basis of private testify.

The hypothetical intentionalist is aware that in some cases there volition be competing interpretations which are equally practiced. An aesthetic benchmark is then introduced to adjudicate betwixt these hypotheses. The aesthetic consideration comes every bit a necktie breaker: when nosotros reach 2 or more epistemically all-time hypotheses, the ane that makes the piece of work artistically better should win.

Another notable stardom introduced by hypothetical intentionalism is that between semantic and categorial intention (Levinson, 1996, pp. 188–9). The kind of intention nosotros have been discussing is semantic: it is the intention by which an artist conveys her message in the piece of work. By contrast, categorial intention is the artist's intention to categorize her production, either as a work of art, a certain artform (such as Romantic literature), or a item genre (such equally lyric poetry). Categorial intention indirectly affects a work's semantic content because information technology determines how the interpreter conceptualizes the piece of work at the fundamental level. For instance, if a text is taken as a grocery listing rather than an experimental story, nosotros will translate it as saying nothing beyond the named grocery items. For this reason, the artist'southward categorial intention should exist treated every bit amongst the contextual factors relevant to her piece of work's identity. This motility is often adopted past theorists endorsing contextualism, such as maximizers or moderate intentionalists.

b. Notable Objections and Replies

Hypothetical intentionalism has received many criticisms and challenges that merit mention. A frequently expressed worry is that information technology seems odd to stick to a hypothesis when newly establish evidence proves information technology to exist false (Carroll, 2001, pp. 208–9). If an artist's private diary is located and reveals that our best hypothesis nigh her intention regarding her work is false, why should we cling to that hypothesis if the newly revealed intention meshes well with the piece of work? Hypothetical intentionalism implausibly implies that warranted assertibility constitutes truth.

The hypothetical intentionalist clarifies her position (Levinson, 2006, p. 308) by saying that warranted assertibility does not constitute the truth for the utterer's meaning, simply it does constitute the truth for utterance meaning. The platonic audience'southward best hypothesis constitutes utterance meaning fifty-fifty if it is designed to infer the utterer'south meaning.

Another troublesome objection states that hypothetical intentionalism collapses into the value-maximizing theory, for, when making the all-time hypothesis of what the artist intended, the interpreter inevitably attributes to the artist the intention to produce a piece with the highest degree of aesthetic value that the work can sustain (Davies, 2007, pp. 183–84). That is, the epistemic criterion for determining the all-time hypothesis is inseparable from the aesthetic benchmark.

In answer, it is claimed that this objection may stem from the impression that an artist normally aims for the best; nevertheless, this does non imply that she would anticipate and intend the artistically best reading of the work. Information technology follows that it is not necessary that the best reading be what the artist most likely intended fifty-fifty if she could have intended information technology. The objector replies that, notwithstanding, the state of affairs in which nosotros have ii epistemically plausible readings while 1 is junior cannot arise, because nosotros would adopt the inferior reading only when the superior reading is falsified past evidence.

The third objection is that the distinction between public and private prove is blurry (Carroll, 2001, p. 212). Is public bear witness published evidence? Does published data from private sources count as public? The answer from the hypothetical intentionalist emphasizes that this is not a distinction between published and unpublished information (Levinson, 2006, p. 310). The relevant public context should be reconstrued equally what the artist appears to have wanted the audience to know almost the circumstances of the work'southward creation. This means that if it appears that the artist did not want to brand certain proclamations of intent known to the audition, then this bear witness, even if published at a later point, does not constitute the public context to be considered for estimation.

Finally, 2 notable counterexamples to hypothetical intentionalism have been proposed (Stecker, 2010, pp. 159–60). The starting time counterexample is that Westward means p but p is not intended by the artist and the audition is justified in believing that p is not intended. In this case hypothetical intentionalism falsely implies that Due west does not hateful p. For case, it is famously known among readers of Sherlock Holmes adventures that Dr. Watson's war wound appears in two different locations. On 1 occasion the wound is said to be on his arm, while on another it is on his thigh. In other words the Holmes story fictionally asserts impossibility regarding Watson's wound. But given the realistic style of the Holmes adventures, the best hypothesis of authorial intent in this case would deny that the impossibility is part of the meaning of the story, which is evidently false.

Withal, the hypothetical intentionalist would non maintain that Due west means p, because p is not the best hypothesis. She would not claim that the Holmes story fictionally asserts impossibility regarding Watson'south wound, for the best hypothesis fabricated by the ideal reader would exist that Watson has the wound somewhere on his body—his arm or thigh, but exactly where we do non know. It is a mistake to presuppose that W means p without post-obit the strictures imposed past hypothetical intentionalism to properly reach p.

The 2d counterexample to hypothetical intentionalism is the case where the audience is justified in assertive that p is intended by the creative person merely in fact W means q; the audience would and so falsely conclude that W means p. Over again, what W ways is adamant by the ideal audience'south all-time hypothesis based on convention and context, not by what the work literally asserts. The meaning of the work is the production of a prudent cess of the total prove bachelor.

6. Hypothetical Intentionalism and the Hypothetical Artist

a. Overview

There is a second variety of hypothetical intentionalism that is based on the concept of a hypothetical creative person. Generally speaking, it maintains that interpretation is grounded on the intention suitably attributed by the interpreter to a hypothetical or imagined artist. This version of hypothetical intentionalism is sometimes chosen fictionalist intentionalism or postulated authorism. The theoretical apparatus of a hypothetical artist can be traced back to Wayne Booth's business relationship of the "implied author," in which he suggests that the critic should focus on the author nosotros can brand out from the work instead of on the historical author, because there is ofttimes a gap between the two.

Though proponents of the nowadays brand of intentionalism disagree on the number of acceptable interpretations and on what kind of evidence is legitimate, they concur that the interpreter ought to concentrate on the appearance of the work. If it appears, based on internal evidence (and perhaps contextual information if contextualism is endorsed), that the artist intends the work to mean p, then p is the right interpretation of the work. The artist in question is not the historical artist; rather, it is an creative person postulated past the audience to be responsible for the intention fabricated out from, or implied past, the work. For example, if there is an anti-war mental attitude detected in the work, the intention to castigate war should be attributed to the postulated creative person, non to the historical artist. The motivation behind this move is to maintain work-centered interpretation but avoid the fallacious reasoning that whatever we notice in the work is intended by the existent artist.

Inheriting the spirit of hypothetical intentionalism, fictionalist intentionalism aims to brand interpretation work-based but author-related at the same time. The biggest difference between the two stances is that, as said, fictionalist intentionalism does non appeal to the actual or real artist, thereby avoiding whatever criticisms arising from hypothesizing near the real artist such as that the best hypothesis about the real creative person's intention should be abandoned when compelling testify against information technology is obtained.

b. Notable Objections and Replies

The first concern with fictionalist intentionalism is that amalgam a historical variant of the actual artist sounds suspiciously similar hypothesizing nigh her (Stecker, 1987). But there is nonetheless a difference. "Hypothesizing about the actual artist," or more accurately, "hypothesizing the actual artist'due south intention," would be a label of hypothetical intentionalism rather than fictionalist intentionalism. The latter does non runway the bodily artist'southward intention but constructs a virtual 1. As shown, fictionalist intentionalism, unlike hypothetical intentionalism, is allowed to any criticisms resulting from ignoring the actual artist's announcement of her intention.

A second objection criticizes fictionalist intentionalism for not existence able to distinguish between different histories of creative processes for the same textual appearance (Livingston, 2005, pp. 165–69). For case, suppose a work that appears to exist produced with a well-conceived scheme did result from that kind of scheme; suppose further that a second piece of work that appears the same actually emerged from an uncontrolled process. So, if we follow the strictures of fictionalist intentionalism, the interpretations we produce for these ii works would plow out to exist the same, for based on the same advent the hypothetical artists nosotros construct in both cases would be identical. But these two works have different creative histories and the difference in question seems too crucial to be ignored.

The objection hither fails to consider the subtlety of reality-dependent appearances (Walton, 2008, ch. 12). For example, suppose the exhibit note beside a painting tells us it was created when the painter got heavily drunk. Any well-organized feature in the work that appears to result from careful manipulation by the painter might at present either look matted or structured in an eerie way depending on the characteristic's actual presentation. Compare this scenario to another where a (almost) visually duplicate counterpart is exhibited in the museum with the exhibit note revealing that the painter spent a long catamenia crafting the work. In this 2nd case the audition's perception of the work is not very likely to exist the same as that in the kickoff case. This shows how the apparent creative person account tin can even so discriminate between (appearances of) different creative histories of the same artistic presentation.

Finally, at that place is ofttimes the qualm that fictionalist intentionalism ends up postulating phantom entities (hypothetical creators) and phantom actions (their intendings). The fictional intentionalist can answer that she is giving descriptions only of appearances instead of quantifying over hypothetical artists or their actions.

vii. Determination

From the above discussion we can notice 2 major trends in the argue. Beginning, most late 20th century and 21st century participants are committed to the contextualist ontology of art. The relevance of art's historical context, since its start philosophical appearance in Arthur Danto'southward 1964 essay "The Artworld," continues to influence analytic theories of art interpretation. There is no sign of this trend diminishing. In Noël Carroll's 2016 survey commodity on interpretation, the contextualist basis is still assumed.

2nd, bodily intentionalism remains the most pop position among all. Many substantial monographs take been written in this century to defend the position (Stecker, 2003; Livingston, 2005; Carroll, 2009; Stock 2017). This intentionalist prevalence probably results from the influence of H. P. Grice's work on the philosophy of language. And once more, this trend, like the contextualist vogue, is even so ongoing. And if we run into intentionalism as an umbrella term that encompasses not but actual intentionalism just also hypothetical intentionalism and probably fictionalist intentionalism, the influence of intentionalism and its related emphasis on the concept of an creative person or author will be even stronger. This presents an interesting contrast with the trend in post-structuralism that tends to downplay authorial presence in theories of interpretation, as embodied in the author-is-dead thesis championed past Barthes and Foucoult (Lamarque, 2009, pp. 104–xv).

eight. References and Farther Reading

  • Beardsley, M. C. (1970). The possibility of criticism. Detroit, MI: Wayne State Academy Press.

  • Contains four philosophical essays on literary criticism. The commencement 2 are among Beardsley's nigh important contributions to the philsoophy of interpretation.

  • Beardsley, One thousand. C. (1981a). Aesthetics: Problems in the philosophy of criticism (iind ed.). Indianapolis, IN: Hackett.

  • A comprehensive book on philosophical issues across the arts and as well a powerful argument of anti-intentionalism.

  • Beardsley, G. C. (1981b). Fiction as representation. Synthese, 46, 291–313.

  • Presents the voice communication act theory of literature.

  • Beardsley, M. C. (1982). The aesthetic betoken of view: Selected essays. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

  • Contains the essay "Intentions and Interpretations: A Fallacy Revived," in which Beardsley applies his voice communication act theory to the interpretation of fictional works.

  • Booth, West. C. (1983). The rhetoric of fiction (2nd ed.). Chicago, IL: Academy of Chicago Press.

  • Contains the original account of the implied writer.

  • Carroll, North. (2001). Beyond aesthetics: Philosophical essays. New York, NY: Cambridge Academy Printing.

  • Contains in detail Carroll's chat argument, discussion on the hermenutics of suspicion, defense of moderate intentionalism, and criticism of hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Carroll, North. (2009). On criticism. New York, NY: Routledge.

  • An engaging book on artistic evaluation and interpretation.

  • Carroll, N., & Gibson, J. (Eds.). (2016). The Routledge companion to philosophy of literature. New York, NY: Routledge.

  • Anthologizes Carroll's survey article on the intention argue.

  • Currie, G. (1990). The nature of fiction. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

  • Contains a defense of fictionalist intentionalism.

  • Currie, Thousand. (1991). Piece of work and text. Listen, 100, 325–40.

  • Presents how a commitment to contextualism leads to an important distinction between work and text in the example of literature.

  • Danto, A. C. (1964). The artworld. Periodical of Philosophy, 61, 571–84.

  • First paper to depict attention to the relevance of a work's context of production.

  • Davies, Due south. (2005). Beardsley and the autonomy of the piece of work of art. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 63, 179–83.

  • Argues that Beardsley is actually a contextualist.

  • Davies, Due south. (2007). Philosophical perspectives on art. Oxford, England: Oxford University Printing.

  • Part II contains Davies' defense of the maximizing position and criticisms of other positions.

  • Dickie, G. (2006). Intentions: Conversations and art. British Journal of Aesthetics, 46, 71–81.

  • Criticizes Carroll's conversation argument and actual intentionalism.

  • Goldman, A. H. (2013). Philosophy and the novel. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

  • Contains a defence force of the value-maximizing theory without a contextualist commitment.

  • Hirsch, E. D. (1967). Validity in interpretation. New Oasis, CT: Yale University Press.

  • The most representative presentation of farthermost intentionalism.

  • Hirsch, East. D. (1976). The aims of estimation. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

  • Contains a collection of essays expanding Hirsh'southward views on interpretation.

  • Huddleston, A. (2012). The conversation argument for actual intentionalism. British Journal of Aesthetics, 52, 241–56.

  • A brilliant criticism of Carroll'southward chat argument.

  • Iseminger, 1000. (Ed.). (1992). Intention & interpretation. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.

  • A valuable collection of essays featuring Beardsley's account of the piece of work'southward autonomy, Knapp and Michaels' absolute intentionalism, Iseminger'due south farthermost intentionalism, Nathan'due south business relationship of the postulated artist, Levinson'south hypothetical intentionalism, and eight other contributions.

  • Jannotta, A. (2014). Interpretation and conversation: A response to Huddleston. British Journal of Aesthetics, 54, 371–lxxx.

  • A defense of the conversation argument.

  • Krausz, M. (Ed.). (2002). Is in that location a unmarried right interpretation? Academy Park: Pennsylvania Country University Press.

  • Another valuable anthology on the intention debate, containing in item Carroll's defence of moderate intentionalism, Lamarque'due south criticism of viewing work-meaning as utterance significant.

  • Lamarque, P. (2009). The philosophy of literature. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

  • The third and the fourth capacity talk over analytic theories of interpretation along with a critical assessment of the author-is-dead claim.

  • Levinson, J. (1996). The pleasance of aesthetics: Philosophical essays. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Printing.

  • The tenth chapter is Levinson's revised presentation of hypothetical intentionalism and the stardom between semantic and categorial intention.

  • Levinson, J. (2006). Contemplating art: Essays in aesthetics. Oxford, England: Oxford University Printing.

  • Contains Levinson's replies to major objections to hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Levinson, J. (2016). Aesthetic pursuits: Essays in philosophy of art. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

  • Contains Levinson's updated defense of hypothetical intentionalism and criticism of Livingston's moderate intentionalism.

  • Livingston, P. (2005). Art and intention: A philosophical report. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

  • A thorough discussion on intention, literary ontology, and the problem of interpretation, with emphases on defending the meshing condition and on the criticisms of the ii versions of hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Nathan, D. O. (1982). Irony and the artist'southward intentions. Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 22, 245–56.

  • Criticizes the notion of an intended audience.

  • Nathan, D. O. (2006). Fine art, pregnant, and artist's meaning. In M. Kieran (Ed.), Contemporary debates in aesthetics and the philosophy of art (pp. 282–93). Oxford, England: Blackwell.

  • Presents an business relationship of fictionalist intentionalism, a critique of the conversation argument, and a brief recapitulation of the publicity paradox.

  • Nehamas, A. (1981). The postulated author: Critical monism as a regulative ideal. Disquisitional Research, 8, 133–49.

  • Presents some other version of fictionalist intentionalism.

  • Stecker, R. (1987). 'Apparent, Implied, and Postulated Authors', Philosophy and Literature xi, pp 258-71.

  • Criticizes different versions of fictionalist intentionalism

  • Stecker, R. (2003). Interpretation and construction: Fine art, speech, and the constabulary. Oxford, England: Blackwell.

  • A valuable monograph devoted to the intention debate and its related bug such equally the ontology of art, incompatible interpretations and the application of theories of art interpretation to law. The book defends moderate intentionalism in particular.

  • Stecker, R. (2010). Aesthetics and the philosophy of art: An introduction. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

  • Contains a chapter that presents the disjunctive formulation of moderate intentionalism and the two counterexamples to hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Stecker, R., & Davies, Southward. (2010). The hypothetical intentionalist'south dilemma: A reply to Levinson. British Periodical of Aesthetics, 50, 307–12.

  • Counterreplies to Levinson's replies to criticisms of hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Stock, M. (2017). Merely imagine: Fiction, interpretation, and imagination. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

  • Contains a defense of absolute (the author uses the term "extreme") intentionalism.

  • Tolhurst, W. East. (1979). On what a text is and how information technology means. British Periodical of Aesthetics, xix, iii–14.

  • The founding certificate of hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Trivedi, S. (2001). An epistemic dilemma for actual intentionalism. British Periodical of Aesthetics, 41, pp. 192–206.

  • Presents an epistemic dilemma for bodily intentionalism and defense of hypothetical intentionalism.

  • Walton, M. L. (2008). Marvelous images: On values and the arts. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

  • A collection of essays, including "Categories of Fine art," which might have inspired Levinson's conception of categorial intention; and "Fashion and the Products and Processes of Art," which is a defense of fictionalist intentionalism in terms of the notion "apparent artist."

  • Wimsatt, W. One thousand., & Beardsley, M. C. (1946). The intentional fallacy. The Sewanee Review, 54, 468–88.

  • The first thorough presentation of anti-intentionalism, normally regarded as starting bespeak of the intention debate.

Author Data

Szu-Yen Lin
Electronic mail: lsy17@ulive.pccu.edu.tw
Chinese Culture University
Taiwan