One learning goal of my learning agreement is to produce an interface with a high quality aesthetic. Because of this, I tried to understand the meaning of beauty, which is a part of aesthetic or a synonym of aesthetic.
Platon, a Greek philosopher and student of Sokrates, described in his symposium the feeling that anything that is beautiful is related to a high concept of beauty. This concept is developed during a learning phase in the younger ages. A young person learns that a special form is beautiful. Then the person tries to find this beautiful form the first form in other forms. In this process the person develops its high concept of beauty.
According to Platon, the high concept of beauty is on the top of a hierarchy. Below in the hierarchy are all material things. In the middle of the hierarchy are the invisible things such as the beauty from inside. On an equal level to the higher concept of beauty are perfect things like mathematical formal, law and institutions (Platon, in Jowett, 2011).
The last two examples law and institutions are irritating for me, because I do not see beauty in them. The reason for this might be that Platon lived in the past and he thought that in the future law and institutions could be perfect. However I know, as a person from the modern time, that law and institutions can never could be perfect. Based on this fact, I cannot identify beauty in law and institutions.
Related to the idea of the high concept of beauty and transferred to the area of interaction design, a higher concept of beauty is also excising for interaction solutions. This concept is also developed based on experiences. Therefore it is possible to differentiate between two interaction solutions and to decide which solution is more beautiful. It is the solution with is closer to the high concept of beauty in the area of interaction design.
Jowett, B., 2011: Platon Symposium. Available at: http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/symposium.html [Accessed 23 May].
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