George Santayana [1863 – 1952] was a philosopher, essayist, poet, and novelist. He is popularly known for aphorisms, such as “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” “Only the dead have seen the end of the war” (often misattributed to Plato). The definition of beauty as “pleasure objectified.” Santayana was profoundly influenced by Spinoza’s life and thought of a devoted Spinozist. He wrote books and essays on a wide range of subjects, including philosophy of a less technical sort, literary criticism, the history of ideas, politics, human nature, morals, religion’s influence on culture and social psychology, all with considerable wit and humor. 

He held racial superiority and eugenic views. He believed superior races should be discouraged from “intermarriage with inferior stock.”

Although he declined to become an American citizen, Santayana is usually considered an American writer, resided in Fascist Italy for decades, and said that he was most comfortable, intellectually and aesthetically, at Oxford University. Santayana described himself as an “aesthetic Catholic.”

Santayana’s primary philosophical work consists of The Sense of Beauty (1896), his first book-length monograph and perhaps the first major work on aesthetics written in the United States; The Life of Reason five volumes, 1905–6 is his first extended treatment of pragmatism. The high point of his Harvard career; Skepticism and Animal Faith (1923); and The Realms of Being (4 vols., 1927–40). Santayana’s one novel, The Last Puritan, is a bildungsroman, centering on the personal growth of its protagonist, Oliver Alden. His Persons and Places is an autobiography. 

Like many classical pragmatists, and because he was well-versed in evolutionary theory, Santayana was committed to metaphysical naturalism. He believed that human cognition, cultural practices, and social institutions have evolved to harmonize with the conditions present in their environment. Their value may then be adjudged by the extent to which they facilitate human happiness. Santayana was an early adherent of epiphenomenalism, but also admired the classical materialism of Democritus and Lucretius. 

In large part, Santayana is remembered for his aphorisms, many of which have been so frequently used as to have become clichéd. His philosophy has not fared quite as well. Santayana’s passing is referenced in the lyrics to singer-songwriter Billy Joel’s 1989 music single, “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”

The Sense of Beauty was published in 1896 and divided into four parts: “The Nature of Beauty,” “The Materials of Beauty,” “Form,” and “Expression.” Beauty, as defined by Santayana, is an “objectified pleasure.” It does not originate from divine inspiration, commonly described by philosophers, but from naturalistic psychology. Santayana objects to God’s role in aesthetics in the metaphysical sense but accepts God’s use as a metaphor. His argument that beauty is a human experience based on the senses is influential in aesthetics.

According to Santayana, beauty is linked to pleasure and is fundamental to human purpose and experience. Beauty does not originate from pleasurable experiences, by itself, or from the objects that bring pleasure. It is when the experience and emotion of pleasure intertwine with the object’s qualities that beauty arises. Beauty is a “manifestation of perfection,” and as Santayana writes, “the sense of beauty has a more important place in life than aesthetic theory has ever taken in philosophy.” He describes sight as “perception par excellence” and form as usually visual experience to be almost a synonym of beauty.

 Santayana claims that pleasures derived from all human functions may become objectified. Hence, the beauty material is most easily done in vision, hearing, memory, and imagination.  Form, however, which needs constructive imagination, is preceded by the effects of color in vision. The example of sound serves as an example of the delicate balance between simplicity and variety that leads to the experience of beauty: Discrimination of tones from the chaos of sound is pleasurable, but the pure tone of a tuning-fork is dull. Santayana states that touch, taste, and smell are less likely to lead to “objectified” pleasure because they ″remain normally in the background of consciousness.” 

Santayana further distinguishes vital (bodily) from social functions with sexual instinct as an intermediate form. The latter is acknowledged to profoundly influence humans’ emotional lives, generating a passion that overflows to other topics if not directed towards another human. However, because of their abstract nature, Santayana regards social objects, such as success or money, as less likely to attract aesthetic pleasure because they are too abstract to be directly imaginable.

Santayana notes that sensuous material a) is necessary for finding or creating beauty (how else could one perceive the poem, building, etc. in question?), and b) can add to the experience of beauty as the sensuous material itself may elicit pleasure.

He identifies symmetry and a balance between uniformity and diversity as eliciting such a pleasing perceptual experience; as an example, he uses the beauty one finds in the stars. Santayana points out that memories and other predispositions (″mental habits″) contribute to the perception of an object and hence of its value – that may ultimately be beauty. Here, another distinction is made between ″value of a form″ and ″value of the type as such″; in the latter sense, an object also has a value in how well it is an example of its class.

″Everything is beautiful because everything is capable of some degree of excitement and charming our attention. Still, things differ immensely in this capacity to please us in contemplating them, and therefore they vary immensely in beauty. ″

In contrast to Plato and Socrates, Santayana does not necessarily see a relation between beauty and utility. 

The qualities that an object acquires indirectly using associations (such as with other concepts and memories), he calls “expression.”. The pleasures elicited by such an association are said to yield pleasure just as immediately as the perception of the object itself. However, an expression – which is merely a thought or meaning – cannot elicit beauty in and by itself; it needs an object that gives it a sensual representation. The aesthetic value may thus have two sources: 1) in the process of perceiving an object itself, called sensuous and formal beauty, and 2) value derived from the formation of other ideas, called beauty of expression.

What happens if an object’s expression is negative? Santayana answers that the object itself may nonetheless be beautiful. Thus, even if evil is portrayed, e.g., in a play or novel, we can experience beauty despite evil suggestions. 

To Santayana, an object’s price per se cannot add to its aesthetic value; only if the observer re-interprets the price as the human work and craft invested in that object can add to the object’s value. The utility of an object, in more general terms, is said to enrich or diminish the beauty of an object. If it fits its purpose well, this may add to the object’s beauty, but knowledge about unfitness for the given purpose may also spoil the experience of beauty.

″The intoxicatingly beautiful″ is said to take pleasure in contemplation, to sink into the object, the pure perfection of the sublime dissolves the object altogether. 

Santayana says that beauty cannot be described in words, except as ″the harmony between our nature and our experience″. Under the premise that perfection is ″the ultimate justification of being″, Santayana ends with the statement: ″ Beauty is a pledge of the possible conformity between the soul and nature, and consequently a ground of faith in the supremacy of the good.″

While I am also a Spinozist and a pragmatist like Santayana, I have a different view of beauty.  I agree with Santayana that utility is not essential for beauty, or else a hammer and a pair of pliers would be labeled as the most beautiful objects. However, I disagree with his assertion that beauty is a “manifestation of perfection.” Perfection is in the eye of the beholder as he agrees that the sight is the perception par excellence. No different than any other physical attribute, perfection is subjective and not universal. “Perfect” anatomy in one culture will be considered unacceptable in another.

According to Santayana, beauty is linked to pleasure. It is fundamental to human purpose and experience, and it does not originate from pleasurable experiences, by itself, or from the objects that bring pleasure. Here Santayana could have gone a step farther in defining what constitutes pleasure? Pleasure is a pure chemical reaction that was now well-described when he wrote his book; a chemical reaction release chemical of joy in the body is a physical experience or a pleasure of a beautiful thought. Santayana would not have been satisfied with this description because it raises the question, “why is it so?” We both agree that there is no hand of God in anything. Could this be a genetic coding to motivate us towards an object? And why would there be no universal definition of beauty? While a useful definition can be set aside, it cannot be ignored. Let us talk about the most widely used term, a “beautiful woman.” All physical attributes that help nurture the offspring are considered beautiful in most, but not all cultures. Men’s physical characteristics, physical strength, and ability to support family remain attractive, though they are not labeled as beautiful. It is all chemically driven, and it would not be improper to state that just like the human race has varied genes, they have varied stimuli for pleasure. There is nothing universal about it. It is only one of the thousands of mental responses.

In women’s case, beauty is also an element of genetic strengthening; being attracted to men who have better genes, the offspring come out better; this roulette is played widely every day without us realizing it. Santayana failed to address the basic emotional response—a lust that is most attributed to male species. You hear much about “dirty old men” but rarely “dirty old women” because men remain sexually active longer than their counterparts. The human species is not a monogamous species like any other animal; women must remain monogamous since they need to raise a child with support from the father. Further support for polygamy comes from the expected loss of attraction between couples due mainly to the monotony that is a diversifying factor leading to polygamy.

A comparison that may not go well with many is that men are antigens and women, its antibodies. Think.

Further complicating the resolution of being beautiful is the aesthetic suggestion that comes from perceiving an object itself, called sensuous and formal beauty. The value derived from the formation of other ideas is called the beauty of expression. I am not sure if we are qualified to determine a global standard of aesthetics. Being sensuous is so highly variable, so is the formation of an idea. A poet looking at clouds may see a divine message, a commoner looking to hide from the rain. 

What is beautiful is a question that cannot be answered equivocally, just like the question, why do we exist? Beauty, if it brings joy, is a remarkable tool of pharmacology; if it helps create a behavior conducive to species survival, it is noble; but if it draws usurping others’ rights, it can be just as devastating as the worst human instincts.