Aesthetic Ethics

To what degree are humans driven to aesthetic pleasure? Or, more importantly, to what degree are our moral foundations and ethics centered around aesthetic preconditions? I've been thinking about these questions recently, and have come to one, simple conclusion: a lot. Aesthetics, or the set of principles concerned with beauty, determines how we behave in relationship to one another and the world. I wish it were more complicated than that, but it really isn't. We know from studies on the Halo Effect that people perceive those with one good visual trait, such as beauty or handsomeness, as more likely to possess other good traits - honesty, integrity, strength. In contrast, those who possess one bad trait - unkempt hair, dirty clothes, bad breath, are more likely to be thought of as possessing more bad traits - laziness, etc. People exhibit more trust in those who appear more presentable than those who may be more trustworthy but look disheveled.

On a cognitive level, we're making snap decisions based on aesthetics to determine our first impressions of a person, and we're really good at it. So good, in fact, that most people don't know they're doing this, and even those who do have a difficult time seeing past it. The process is automatic. How did this happen? Unfortunately, it all relates back to that thing I call the Fundamental Problem: Complexity.

Man may be a rope between the animal and the superhuman, but evolutionarily, we're more of the former. As animals, particularly as prey and predator animals, we had to make quick judgments about our survivability in certain surroundings, and about certain people. If we trusted the wrong place, we'd sleep in a lion's den and get eaten. If we trusted the wrong people, we wouldn't wake up the next morning. We had to use limited sensory input to glean maximum information about a place or person.

So we began, subconsciously, using vision, scent, and audio to ensure we were safe in people's company. If they were dirty and looked sick, then best not to hang around them. If they were clean, strong, and healthy, then we may even benefit from their presence. Swiftly, we formed a set of aesthetic preconditions which we used to judge others.

That process remains unchanged to this day. There has been no poisoning or corruption of our minds which has led to it; we're just the same as we always were, and here, that's to our detriment. In fact, the increasing aesthetic complexity of the world has, if anything, further driven us to the trenches of this psyche. Our senses are so bombarded with data that we make even more snap decisions. Since we determine the way we treat someone at first by comparing them to this aesthetic standard, it has formed a base for our ethics and morality.

Is there a future in which this aesthetic base does not exist? Not in our lifetime, or likely in the lifetime of anything we could still refer to as Homo Sapiens. By that I mean the drive to simplicity is so deeply rooted in our animalistic brains that it will require a new type of creature to unchain themselves from it. These future beings will need to have the capacity to look at a person and formulate no opinion of them or their virtues before an extensive evaluation is performed, which may include conversation, or frankly, even telepathy, because this creature is so far removed from humanity that we may as well delve into the realms of fantasy and science fiction to describe it.

In fact, if anything this problem will get worse in humans far sooner than it will get better. The complexity of our world is a booming economy, as I've discussed at length in the past, and it's putting our instinctual brains into overdrive. While people can no longer rely on instinct to tell them what to do in the conscious realm, as many basal instincts are uncouth, their unconscious, separate from the subconscious, hastily devours instinct whenever it can. By the way, short-form content inducing decreasing attentiveness redoubles the problem. In an effort to make living just a little easier, the unconscious will take aesthetic sensory information and formulate a picture of a person, cross referenced with archetypes and recessed memories. A reflection of this picture will be cast on the subconscious, and therein our conscious mind picks up on it and extrapolates the persona we give to the person. This process takes seconds, if that.

Is there anything we can do to stop it from ever occurring? Not really, but there are things we can do to mediate the response. To avoid sounding like someone giving an STOP (Stop Teasing Other People) talk at a middle school, I'll refrain from any platitudes too inane and innocent, but there are a few recommendations.

First, make yourself holistically observant. Try to take in the first impression of somebody as a whole, rather than focusing on one aspect, good or bad. If a person exhibits conventional attractiveness through having good hair, try not to zoom in on that. Conversely, if someone comes up to you with a coffee stain on their shirt, don't assume them to be sloppy. Take the positive tact; perhaps they just had a poorly shut lid from Starbucks.

Next, force yourself to remain open to a person for as long as possible. Red flags exist, of course. Sometimes you should rely on instinct to protect yourself from possible threats. If a stranger walks up to you at night looking intense and poorly groomed, don't engage them in conversation, hoping for the best. However, in situations where the level of danger seems to be low, try to keep the conversation as friendly and fluid as possible. If there's no compatibility, or if their appearance is indeed cluing into their personality, then the option of politely extricating yourself from the budding relationship still exists. Instinct, and the aesthetic precondition, can be useful tools when kept in check, but don't let them dominate your perception of the world. Mindfulness goes a long way in limiting the aesthetic impact on morality and ethics.