Hi Michael, loved your talk, and have two questions. I agree with much of what you say, but I was wondering why you want to talk about ‘seeing-in’ rather than about ‘seeing as’. Regarding your inversion thesis, it seems to me more natural to say that we can see the real sky as a Poussin sky, for example, rather than that we see the Poussin sky in the real sky. For the latter seems to suggest some kind of superimposition, which might lend ammunition to the view that you reject, namely, the projection view. My second question concerns the inversion thesis itself. One might want to say that what is great about the Poussin sky is that it captures a central way that a real sky can be, and thus gives us insight into how skies can be in themselves, as it were. So, it’s not that we go on to apply the Poussin sky to real skies, rather the Poussin sky itself already tells us something about real skies. Thanks, Genia.

Thanks for the enjoyable talk! Curious: can the proponent of thesis (A) give proper place to the self-expressive role of representational art? I can imagine many reacting: representational art (as opposed to, say, cartography) doesn’t principally function to represent the world *as it is in itself*; it functions to represent the world as it is to the distinctive sensibility of the individual artist. You may have addressed this kind of worry early in the talk but it would be interesting to hear more!

Wonderful talk, thank you, Michael,
I think I get the basic idea, but could you give us a worked example of how seeing a painted person in a real person, say, contributes to understanding the latter as she is in herself. The fact that everything about the composition of the former (painted person) is as it is for a reason is supposed to illuminate the actual nature of the latter. But wouldn’t it normally be mistaken to suppose that the reasons for the latter (real person) being as she is in the various ways in which she may resemble the former are the same as the reasons for the artist’s composition of the former as she is in the painting? So how dos the (inverted) seeing in help?

I’ll add my thanks for such an engaging and interesting talk (under such unusual circumstances).
One question I had was asked by Rory Madden above. I look forward to hearing the answer to it.
A more general concern I had about the view you present here is that it is over-intellectualist. Here’s one way to bring out the point. You suggest that, at least in the case of good works of art, we can ask how each feature contributes to the whole—which here means, I think, that we can ask how the way in which the medium is configured determines its content. But you associate this with the idea that, for each feature, we can ask why it is there—which here means, I think, that we can ask what the artist’s reason is for configuring the medium in that way. No doubt there are cases in which the answer to the first question serves as the answer to the second—the artist’s reason is that such-and-such configuration of the medium contributes such-and-such to the content. But, plausibly, there are also cases in which the feature contributes to the whole even if the artist did not introduce that feature for that or any other reason.
In short, the reason why the work has the content it does and the reason why the artist did what they did can come apart (radically, I’m inclined to add).
Perhaps this is just pressing the point that Helen Steward raised concerning spandrels. In that case, don’t think your answer to that question speaks to it. My suggestion is that the contribution certain feature makes to the whole might not be something the artist considers at all, hence, not something they ‘leave’ for a reason.
More importantly, perhaps, it’s not clear to me why you need to place so much weight on the artist’s (motivating) reasons in order to defend (A) and (ND).

Many thanks the wonderful talk. When you explain how art is a way of understanding the world, you introduce composition and inverted ‘seeing in’. Regarding some of your examples (Poussin and Kertesz, for instance), I think I understand what this means, because we can quite literally see a Poussin in the sky, or a Kertesz scene. But with different artworks, I’m much less sure that I understand the idea. Can we see Munch’s ‘Scream’ or Goya’s ‘Dog’ in our own experiences of anxiety and depression? If so, then it must be ‘seeing’ in a different sense. Or can we see Friedrich’s ‘Monk by the sea’ in our world? Presumably not by finding a similarly composed view of the sea. It is not about that (or is it?). And yet all these artworks are representational, and they seem to help us understand our world in some way. I wonder if you could say more about this.

Michael Morris, thx for an excellent lecture. I think you are really on to something. I found your lecture deeply inspirational, so much so that I have basically written a little paper inspired by it.
I have taken some time to really think about what you have said and to form my own views.
What I’m about to say would not be possible without the excellent background you have laid.
Very rough, but here it is. Would love your views:

Art from a Philosophy of Science Perspective
My primary interest in philosophy is the Philosophy of Science (PoS). So, I asked myself the question, “What is Art from a Philosophy of Science perspective?”
I think there are 3 key ideas from a PoS perspective. Namely:
• Modelling
• Mechanistic Analysis
• Teleological Analysis
I think all of these apply to art.
Let’s explore.
Modelling:
Within PoS we have the concept of modelling. Scientists create models all the time and use them to understand the world or a particular part of the world better.
Axel Gelfert has written an excellent paper on modelling called, “Probing Possibilities: Toy Models, Minimal Models, and Exploratory Models”. I will use this paper as a reference.
In this paper he states:
“Scientific models, according to one important line of philosophical analysis, aim at representing real-world target systems, even if they only ever do so imperfectly. Even where an underlying theory is available, a full description of a target is often out of reach, so simplified models need to be derived using abstraction and idealization.”

So, in essence we use a model to understand the world better.

He further states that due to the practical limitations of model building, scientists typically use 3 types of models. Namely:

• Toy Models – Like a simulacra. A model that captures reality, but does not exactly conform to it. Like a virtual world, or simulation that may be like reality in some ways and differ in others.
• Minimal Models – A model which captures the essential essence of a system.
• Exploratory Models – A model which simulates a reality, for the purposes of understanding its underlying mechanistic operation.

I would argue that there is one additional model which should be added to the list. Namely, an Analogical model. Or what Einstein called a Thought Experiment.

Analogical Model – A model which captures the essence of a system by means of an analogy.

To quote Einstein:

“…a paradox upon which I had already hit at the age of sixteen: If I pursue a beam of light with the velocity c (velocity of light in a vacuum), I should observe such a beam of light as an electromagnetic field at rest though spatially oscillating. There seems to be no such thing, however, neither on the basis of experience nor according to Maxwell’s equations. From the very beginning it appeared to me intuitively clear that, judged from the standpoint of such an observer, everything would have to happen according to the same laws as for an observer who, relative to the earth, was at rest. For how should the first observer know or be able to determine, that he is in a state of fast uniform motion? One sees in this paradox the germ of the special relativity theory is already contained.”

I would further argue, that art is indeed a form of Analogical Model of reality. As it embodies the concepts of representing reality in the form of analogy.

Let’s explore this concept further by examining art from a mechanistic point of view.

Mechanistic Analysis of Art:

A mechanistic view seeks to understand the physical operation of a system. If we expand this concept to the world of abstract ideas, then it can eb understood to also understand the knowledge structure of a system. Which is essentially what we aim to do when building a physical or mental model of a system.

In terms of art we can understand the following:

Art is an analogical representation of reality through a particular medium. It consists of the following components:

We have a medium:

Art is expressed through a medium. Examples include words, visual painting, photography, sounds & music etc…

Each medium is only capable of representing certain dimensions of meaning. It therefore effectively acts a filter of reality.

For instances,

Painting – 2 dimensions, colours, lines, shapes, static. Constrained by what the brush can produce. Limited to a single point of view.
Photography – 2 dimensions, colours, lines, shapes, static. Constrained by the ability to find a scene that reflects the desired meaning. Limited to a single point of view.
Film – 2 or 3 dimensions, colours, lines, shapes, movement, dialogue, music. Constrained by the ability to create a scene which reflects the desired meaning. Limited to filmmakers perspective, so you can’t actually step into the reality and explore your way, like a holodeck.
Music – sound, rhythm, harmony, melody, lyrics & poetry. Constrained to audio domain.
Poetry – words, rhythm, rhyme. Constrained to words.
Comedy – words, narrative, patterns, breaking patterns.
Stories – words, narrative

Etc…

Each of these constraints gives the message of the art in that medium a particular character. And limits what it can represent.

For Instances,

Painting – Can represent a picture of a scene or idea
Photography – Can represent a picture of a scene
Film – Can represent a moving Visual, Auditory (Sometimes Kinaesthetic) moving image of a created scene
Music – Can represent sounds and the mental states evoked by those sounds. And words, and the emotional state evoked by those words
Poetry – Can represent words and the emotional state evoked by those words
Comedy – Can represent words, and the deeper insights evoked by those words
Stories – Can represent words and the experiences of the characters and lessons they learnt from those experiences

The above list is by no means exhaustive, but I think it captures the essential elements and is a start.

Art also has a fundamental structure which is dictated by its medium and the practices of artists. This structure performs the purpose of making practicing “good art” easier. As it helps an artist to understand what works well, and what the rules of good art are, and to know when these rules are being deliberately broken.

Examples of fundamental structures of art are:

Music Theory – The rules of scales, modes, chords, harmony, rhythm and melody.
Visual Arts – The rules of colour. Harmonies of colour, colour schemes and colour wheels.
Visual Arts – The principles of Gestalt and the rules of composition
Visual Arts – Mathematical principles like perspective, proportion, ratios (e.g. Golden Ratio), planar symmetries and fractal dimensions
Poetry – The rules of lines, stanza, meter and rhyme
Comedy – The rules of jokes structure

There are many more, and artists often invent their own rules.

Artists often deliberately break the rules of their craft, to create dramatic effect. One famous historical example of this is impressionism. For example, Franz Liszt changes the established rules of harmony during his time, to create new forms of music, which were the beginnings of musical impressionism.

Further art by its very nature embodies the idea of foreground and background. Or what I propose could be called primary information and contextual information.

Foreground – The primary message of the art
Background – The context of the primary message

If a painting has a man walking on a path, it conveys a very different meaning to a painting of a man walking on water.

Examples of foreground and background in art include,

Painting, Photography – Foreground: Subject. Background: Scene
Film – Foreground: Dialogue, Lead Actor/s. Background: Scene, Background Music, Background Sound Effects
Music – Foreground: Melody, Lyrics, Lead Instrument. Background: Harmony, Background Instruments, Sound Effects
Poetry – Foreground: Primary Message. Background: Deeper Meaning, Rhythm and Rhyme
Comedy – Foreground: Setup and Punchline. Background: The narrative of the joke
Stories – Foreground: Character Experiences and development. Background: The environment in which the story takes place

There are many more examples of this in the arts.

The balance between foreground and background is essential in the arts in order to ensure that the consumer of the art is able to intelligibly distinguish between message and context. And many of the rules of art are put in place to ensure that this balance is right. In particular the rules of composition in visual arts and the rule of frequency usage in music.

Finally the medium of a particular form of art constrains the relationships between its elements. In other words, they constrain the way the artistic story can be told. This in effect constrains the analogical expressiveness of the art form, in other words what analogies will work within the medium and what analogies won’t work.

Examples of structural constraints include,

Painting & Photography – All elements need to be present in the scene at the same time. All interactions need to be represented visually.
Film – All presently interacting elements need to be present in the scene at the same time. However unlike static visual arts, interactions can be based on past scenes. All interactions need to take place sequentially (in general. There are clever plot twist techniques used, but each scene must be sequential).
Music – All elements have to operate sequentially.
Poetry – Constrained by the readers ability to see the deeper meaning. Can have multiple meanings which can constrain precision. Therefore elements may be poorly defined or misunderstood.
Stories – Same as film. Constrained by the listener’s imagination. The listener might for instance imagine a character’s appearance incorrectly. Therefore elements may be poorly defined or misunderstood.

Let’s now perform a Teleological analysis of art.

Teleology of Art:

Teleology is about understanding the purpose of something.

So, what is the purpose of art from a PoS perspective.

I think one way of answering this question is from a psychological perspective. I am of the view that the reason we can relate to art is rooted in the way the human unconscious mind works. Specifically I am referring to Dreams.

When we dream, our unconscious mind creates, in my view, an analogical model of reality. Dreams portray real-life events or simulated real-life events. These events are analogous to reality and have a particular meaning relative to the dreamer.

For instance, in dream dictionaries, dreams of flight of indicate freedom or the need to be free. This particular meaning, is however relative to the individual dream. As, the dreamer may just really wish they could fly.

When the dreamer takes time to interpret their dreams, by analysing the scene, the actors and the events. And then linking them to their life experience, they are able to identify the analogies at play. They are then able to gain a deeper perspective on their life.

I would like to propose that art works in much the same way.

We have an artist, who forms a particular view of reality. They then express this view in the form of an analogy through the medium of the artform. The consumer of the art, is then expected to interpret the art, buy discovering the analogy and linking it to some form of reality.

One interesting dimension mentioned in the discussion was pure fantasy such as unicorns. Or my personal favourite, Superman.

Again these are analogies of reality. Superman represents personal power to me, so I feel strong when I watch Superman be strong.

And in fact, that was the original purpose of the creation of the Superman character in the first place.

And I think that is the purpose of all art. To create deep unconscious change, by forcing the unconscious mind to engage with art, and to therefore see the world differently.

Therefore, I propose that ultimately art is most powerful when it is a medium of change.

Conclusion:

It appears that the philosophy of science has much to add to our understanding of art. I also believe that art is a mechanism for directly communicating with the unconscious mind of the consumer of the art. Art is therefore one of the most powerful change mechanisms we have in society.

Art can be understood technically from a PoS perspective, but ultimately it is about the artist creating and the consumer interpreting.

And that is why, in my view, every human should create and consume art.