Welcome to European Tribune. It's gone a bit quiet around here these days, but it's still going.
Display:
I think so

I first noticed this with airplanes.  Those that looked fast almost always were.  Then I noticed it with sailboats, and with cars.  One day it dawned on me that anything that operates in a fluid will have an aesthetic value that is actually predictable.

I believe that aesthetics has an evolutionary basis.  For example, baby anythings are so cute and adorable they actually cause parents to care for them.  And of course, the concept of infinity does not begin to describe what men will do to have sex with an attractive mate.

So, since aesthetics can be used to explain human behavior, I have wondered what other applications a lust for beauty can put to.  Hence my interest in the shapes produced from the study of fluid dynamics.

Rembrandt and I happen to think windmills are beautiful.


"Remember the I35W bridge--who needs terrorists when there are Republicans"

by techno (reply@elegant-technology.com) on Wed Aug 1st, 2007 at 04:14:56 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Since you can negotiate Veblen's prose, I should suggest to you D'arcy Thompson's On Growth and Form, a book I haven't read but I have seen mentioned in every serious discussion of physical constraints to builogical form. And, on the subject of growth, there's Julian Huxley's Problems of Relative Growth, another classic which I have read and found fascinating.

Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed Aug 1st, 2007 at 04:59:28 AM EST
[ Parent ]
You might enjoy the writing of Paul Graham on 'design'. Also, Geezer in Paris (when he's back online after the summer) would have a lot to talk with you about the aerodynamics of planes, sails and boats.

Can the last politician to go out the revolving door please turn the lights off?
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Wed Aug 1st, 2007 at 05:44:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Display:

Occasional Series