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Frank Sibley

Frank Sibley was a British philosopher who taught at Cornell and then at Lancaster University. His 1959 paper 'Aesthetic Concepts' argued that terms such…

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On the Coordinates: 5.3 Taste and Judgement

1923 – 1996 · Ithaca, New York; Lancaster

Traditions: Analytic

Frank Sibley was a British philosopher who taught at Cornell and then at Lancaster University. His 1959 paper 'Aesthetic Concepts' argued that terms such as graceful, delicate or garish are not governed by conditions: no list of non-aesthetic features is ever sufficient to guarantee that one of them applies. Applying such concepts takes taste, a kind of perceptiveness, and critics succeed by getting others to see what they see. The paper became a founding text of analytic aesthetics.

Key ideas

  • Aesthetic concepts are not condition-governed: no set of non-aesthetic features logically suffices for their application.
  • Aesthetic qualities nonetheless depend on non-aesthetic ones, which is why pointing out features can help someone see them.
  • Applying aesthetic concepts requires taste or sensitivity, a perceptual ability rather than a rule-following one.
  • Critical reasoning aims at getting others to perceive, not at deductive proof.

Major works

  • "Aesthetic Concepts" (1959)
  • "Aesthetic and Nonaesthetic" (1965)
  • Approach to Aesthetics: Collected Papers on Philosophical Aesthetics (2001, posthumous)

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In the Coordinates

The questions of philosophy where Frank Sibley takes a place, from The Coordinates of Thought.