[Aiwendil]

I know that I may seem to be picking at insignificant points and generally being quarrelsome. I can't help it; it's my nature. I think I understand what you're saying, and I am actually in agreement with your main original point: open-mindedness. Nonetheless, I still disagree with most of your general discussion of art. Forgive me if I seem over-contentious.

The call on which opinion weighs more lies with the individual. I said “somewhat” because different people will value different things.

Very well. However, I don't think that what you've just described is really objective at all. It seems to me to be entirely subjective, based on which "different things" the "different people" value. One's opinion is then only "better" with regard to another individual; it is not universally better. If you want to elevate that diverse subjectivity of opinion into an objectivity (which I'm not sure whether you want to do), the only way to do it is to say that the popularity of an opinion makes it better.

I am saying better in the sense that it was created from better origins.

Now you revert to the objective language. As you may have guessed, I take issue with your term "better origins". Better how? This language seems to be inconsistent with what you said before, that "different people will value different things" - unless you ammend it to ". . . it was created from origins that the individual in question values more" (because the same opinion can be valued differently by different people).

Of course, the upshot of this is that if I don't value Robert Jordan's opinion, then, to me, my opinion is superior to his.

Who would honestly say they would ever weigh the truck drivers opinion on art above Michelangelo's?

Well, you get this extreme result only because you've taken an extreme example. It's not inconceivable that a person could value the truck driver's opinion more. Certainly if we take a less extreme example, like Robert Jordan vs. an average nerd, there are people who would value the latter's opinion more.

Thought and experience are what an opinion is made of.

Yes, but if there is no objective value to art, why are thought and experience objectively valuable in judging art?

And you still haven't responded to my hypothetical scenario - the truck driver who spends all his time on crude and vulgar signs. What would your analysis of his opinion be?

How about we turn this around? You demostrate to me how art is objective.

I don't know that I can. I don't have a proof of art's objectivity from first principles. What I do have is a consistent theory of objective art. I think a consistent theory of subjective art is also possible, but I think that your formulation is inconsistent in that it mixes contradictory subjective and objective traits.

Actually, my belief about art is a little more complicated than simply saying that "art is objective". Obviously, art is not an inherent quality of the universe; it is on some level invented by humans. I would define art as aesthetic beauty, and beauty is (according to Aquinas) "that which pleases the senses" ("senses" here meaning "apprehension", not just the five physical senses). So on some very deep level, art is subjective. However, I think that there is a nearly objective implicit consensus on what is aesthetically pleasing. "Good" art is that which is the most aesthetically pleasing. However, there are other factors that interfere with a person's ability to assess the aesthetic beauty of a work of art. These are things like accessibility, reputation, and familiarity. These contribute likings or dislikings for works of art that are not based on aestheticism, and since these factors vary significantly from person to person, while aestheticism is nearly objective, they introduce an apparent subjectivity into considerations of the quality of art.

Just so that I don't appear hypocritical: by "nearly objective" I mean that the range of subjective aesthetic standards is extremely small. This is a postulate, and I of course cannot prove it.

But I think saying "I don't like Jordan's work" and saying "Jordan is a bad writer" are two different things.

According to your opinion, you would be compelled to say that the statement "Jordan is a bad writer" is meaningless. There's no such thing as one, in your view. Just as an exercise: would you accept the statement "I think that Jordan is a bad writer?" If so, I don't see how you can object to the voicing of that thought: "Jordan is a bad writer." The "I think" is necessarily implied, since I am the one that's speaking.