Digital Commons@RISD Home > Division of Liberal Arts > Contemporary Aesthetics (Journal Archive) > Vol. 22 (2024)
Abstract
In their 2008 monograph, Functional Beauty, Glenn Parsons and Allen Carlson develop a theory of functional beauty account based on a selected effects theory of biological function and apply it to human-made artifacts. This paper contends that their selected effects theory falls short in capturing the inherently pluralistic nature of functional beauty (FB). The paper is structured as follows. First, it provides an overview of Parsons and Carlson’s FB argument, focusing on their attribution of proper function in artifacts. Second, it analyzes how aesthetic dysfunction is conceptualized in Functional Beauty, highlighting what I take to be shortcomings in their account. Finally, the paper proposes several strategies that could be pursued in response to the criticisms offered here.