tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post8008675172448231819..comments2024-03-04T02:09:30.979-06:00Comments on One Man's Pony Ramblings: Objective QualityUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger19125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-62488993790497214582015-08-27T16:41:09.932-05:002015-08-27T16:41:09.932-05:00"I think it'd be pretty egotistical of me..."I think it'd be pretty egotistical of me to say that a work is bad solely because I don't like it, or that it's good just because I do like it, at least if we do so without the additional qualifier, "In my opinion..." The problem a stance like that is that it denies a work of fiction any claim to having value and identity of its own. If I only define the world in relation to myself, and say that its nature is determined by my opinion, then that would be refusing to acknowledge that which exists outside of my own narrow view."<br /><br />I can only describe the world in relation to myself. If I say, "That ladder is 6 feet tall," I'm only describing it in relation to myself. To someone passing by at half the speed of light, it's 5'2".<br /><br />And yet I have described an objective fact.<br /><br />I'm not futzing with physics like those doofuses who say quantum mechanics means you have a soul. I'm pointing out that all facts are known to a person only insofar as that person can measure them from her point of view.<br /><br />Saying "That story is good" is much like saying "That ladder is good." I may be an apple farmer who mainly uses ladders to pick apples. I may have especially short or tall apple trees. I may be especially short or tall myself. I like lightweight ladders because I have to carry them all around the orchard. I don't care if they conduct electricity. I want a platform that can hold a bushel basket. So when I say that ladder is good, I really am talking about objective truths about the ladder, given what I want it to do.<br /><br />Many of the disagreements about how good stories are, are disagreements about what stories should do for us. People do all sorts of things with words and call them "stories". This is sometimes misleading. To talk about objective quialites, we really ought to state the kind of story we're talking about.<br /><br />Some properties are very general. Ladders that are wobbly or missing rungs are bad for most everyone. But the more general a property is, the more obvious and less interesting it is.Bad Horsehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10735227563256689679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-80360996439512391142015-08-21T03:43:49.963-05:002015-08-21T03:43:49.963-05:00@Unremarkable Pony
The class wasn't mandatory...@Unremarkable Pony<br /><br />The class wasn't mandatory, but the 5-6 critiques per page were, even if you didn't think there was anything wrong in particular, as was <i>participation</i>. Terrible, horrible participation. Other than that, yes! It was the worst. I also took that nonfiction writing class I mentioned earlier, and it had the exact same setup. The teacher was better though, so at least the unhelpfulness was streamlined.<br /><br />I was willing to pay for the classes because I thought that if an official institution made specifically for teaching people things was willing to charge so much for something, then they must have at least some sort of results backing them up to justify it, but I was wrong. School is dumb. I still want to believe that somewhere out there is a place that puts in actual effort to teach things right without wasting student's time with meaningless busywork and trying to scam them out of as much money as they can, but I've never found it. Oh well.<br /><br />Also I don't know of any way to edit posts post-post, so your irony is excused.SVnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-22059088945656923272015-08-20T20:11:44.832-05:002015-08-20T20:11:44.832-05:00So you're saying that because you haven't ...So you're saying that because you haven't read them, you'd feel like you're not fully aware of the world anymore if you took them as canon? ...I guess I can understand that. I certainly wouldn't want to have to read every mediocre comic in IDW's library just to feel informed, because some of them <i>are</i> legitimately awful. But I read them all anyway, because I just generally enjoy the series.<br /><br />For my part, whenever I write fanfics nowadays, I adhere to comic canon as best I can. But ignoring the comics is the popular thing to do right now, so I'm not bothered by it in stories.* I don't want to get on everyone's case for not knowing the same obscure knowledge that I do. For me, being a comic reader just means the occasional moment of satifcation when I'm reading a story and recognise a comic reference.<br /><br />*People in forums actually trying to argue what Equestria is canonically like, on the other hand...<br />DannyJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13273313206696087395noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-39607793147645014302015-08-20T18:31:31.997-05:002015-08-20T18:31:31.997-05:00amateurs*
Is there an "edit" option I c...amateurs*<br /><br />Is there an "edit" option I can't find.<br />And yes I see the irony in this.Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-80594407367091609222015-08-20T18:29:02.503-05:002015-08-20T18:29:02.503-05:00@DannyJ
That's a way of seeing it I hadn'...@DannyJ<br /><br />That's a way of seeing it I hadn't thought of before.<br />And I'll admit to not considering the comics (head-)canon, but that's mostly because I don't want the fact that I haven't read them to stop me from enjoying the MLP world. It wouldn't bother me to have to change that head canon if the contents of the comics became somehow important.<br /><br />@SV<br /><br />Wait, are you implying that there was a writing class that was somehow mandatory, that cost hundreds of dollars, that was full of only armatures, and that you got kicked out of for giving harsh but constructive criticism? Good God am I glad I didn't go to your school!Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-68466554519583090322015-08-20T07:19:59.012-05:002015-08-20T07:19:59.012-05:00@SV
I also got spoken to about the harshness of m...@SV<br /><br />I also got spoken to about the harshness of my critiques once, and honestly, I still don't get what I said wrong now. Far as I recall, I just said that it's bad practice to leave out explaining elements that are crucial to understanding the story. Maybe they just didn't like my tone or something. I don't really remember.<br /><br />And yeah, you can observe that effect on the internet all the time. Fanfic.net is a great example of what happens when you get a bunch of amateur writers in one place. It turns into a hugbox, because they all spend too much time patting each other on the back rather than being blunt and critical with each other, partially because none of them have much knowledge to pass on. And without experiencing and getting used to criticism, those people become fragile and easily upset.<br /><br />@Unremarkable Pony<br /><br />If Shakespeare's works WERE created by monkeys entirely by coincidence with no intended meaning behind them, then I think that fan interpretations do become important, because they can't conflict with anything. Same with works written by authors who themselves believe in Death of the Author and deliberately leave their works ambiguous. Some art really does rely on its audience to impose meaning onto it.<br /><br />But for me, I don't like Death of the Author because I think that any author who DOES have intentions becomes a part of their work, whether they want to or not. Rejecting the author's intent for a work, for me, is like rejecting a part of the work itself. Some people are fine with that. You see it in this fandom all the time, such as when people argue that the comics aren't canon despite what Hasbro says.<br /><br />I'm not fine with that. I think that it's not my place as a fan to decide what is and isn't a true part of the story, because the actual writers who make the story aren't working by my interpretation, but by theirs, and so theirs is what becomes canon if they ever continue a work. I say "Rarity's parents are dead." The staff say, "No, they aren't." I say, "Death of the Author." Then they make season 2, and Rarity's parents show up and have speaking lines.<br /><br />Death of the Author has done me no favours there, and I'm forced to either rescind my interpretation, or progress onto saying that canon itself isn't canon because I prefer my own ideas that were just contradicted. And by that point I may as well stop using words like "canon" at all, because I'm just making up whatever I like with no regard to the reality of the work that started all this.<br /><br />I get that this is probably not a popular opinion I'm arguing here, but that's how I see it. I think that it's a very blurry line between interpretting a work differently than how the author intended, and ignoring the work itself. An author and their creations are just too closely linked for me to feel comfortable ignoring the author.<br />DannyJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13273313206696087395noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-7221129002372910182015-08-20T06:31:23.188-05:002015-08-20T06:31:23.188-05:00@DJanny
I got kicked out of that class for my cri...@DJanny<br /><br />I got kicked out of that class for my critiques being too mean. I was trying to be fair though, so I guess go me for sticking it to the man!<br /><br />Also the whole "getting a bunch of amateurs together" scenario doesn't speak too well for the internet, but hey, at least on the internet it isn't mandatory, nor does it cost hundreds of dollars.SVnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-46400891618579424742015-08-20T06:14:13.623-05:002015-08-20T06:14:13.623-05:00"I'm not really a proponent of Death of t..."I'm not really a proponent of Death of the Author, as you might've guessed."<br /><br />I am, with pitchforks and torches if necessary.<br />(I kid, of course)<br /><br />But if, somehow, a monkey at a typewriter produced a copy of Shakespeare's work (and Shakespeare had not; the monkey's was the only copy we had.) I think it would be strange to say that it's not a good work just because the monkey didn't know what it was doing. It doesn't make the monkey a good writer, but the work's merits shouldn't be ignored.<br /><br />Though I could understand not wanting to ignore the author's intent. The author has put a lot of time and work into what they created, and disregarding their own take on it seems like a slap in the face to the person who we have to thank for the story existing at all.Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-40843277530616762052015-08-20T06:06:51.971-05:002015-08-20T06:06:51.971-05:00@SV
I've also attended creative writing class...@SV<br /><br />I've also attended creative writing classes, and that sounds very much like the kind of experience I had there, too. Not the writing about themselves thing, but just the general mediocrity of class assignments. And yeah, having amateurs critique other amateurs helps nobody. I know that from experience. If anything, getting a bunch of inexperienced writers in one place stifles improvement rather than fosters it, because they're too quick to reassure and defend each other rather than critique.<br /><br />@Oats<br /><br />Well, I was generalising when I made that statement. There are always outliers who really might miss something and thus not like it, which, yeah, isn't the author's fault. A work isn't bad for having outliers. But if the author is saying "You just don't get it!" to every third commenter, that's a pretty clear indication to me that it's their fault for failing to get their message across, not the reader's.<br />DannyJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13273313206696087395noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-38256311852277780602015-08-20T03:26:27.419-05:002015-08-20T03:26:27.419-05:00Darnit. I'm apparently still working on clicki...Darnit. I'm apparently still working on clicking the right button for a reply.Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-21816819125335743732015-08-20T03:25:13.378-05:002015-08-20T03:25:13.378-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-45750029514160286762015-08-20T03:10:35.770-05:002015-08-20T03:10:35.770-05:00While most people who throw around the phrase &quo...While most people who throw around the phrase "you just don't get it" are bad writers/artists/whatever, it is possible for someone to not get something without it necessarily being the creator's fault. I've certainly experienced moments where I finally grokked something and was able to appreciate it, and while I sometimes think more could've been done to help me, I can also feel like I didn't give the work its due attention. Kinda like finally solving a well-designed puzzle and realizing that they did, in fact, give you all the clues needed<br /><br />As for authorial intent, I'd say that only matters insofar as its influence on the text. If it's bad at that, but somehow good at something else (which is unlikely, since the author's intention will guide their creation), then it's still good<br /><br />Something that's "so bad, it's good" is just that: bad. <i>The Room</i>, for instance, is an absolutely terrible movie, to the point that it's funny (at least to a point. I'd recommend sticking to highlights rather than watching the whole thing). That clearly wasn't Tommy Wiseau's intention, despite his claims to the contrary. However, I wouldn't call it a good comedy, either. The key here might be that it isn't consistently funny. Had a competent director deliberately made such a comedy, the result would've been differentHolly Oatshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01703437987958922954noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-90568393693036974062015-08-20T02:22:45.267-05:002015-08-20T02:22:45.267-05:00This is a bit of a tangent, but DannyJ's paren...This is a bit of a tangent, but DannyJ's parenthetical comment reminded me. I took a fiction writing class once where everyone had to take turns writing stories that the rest of the class would critique (because obviously the best way to learn how to write is to have a bunch of people that don't know how to write give you a mandated 5-6 critiques per page), and I would say probably 80% just wrote little autobiographical blurbs about random things that happened to them. In a <i>fiction</i> writing class.<br /><br />One guy wrote about how he taught his daughter to drive a truck. One girl wrote about when she had a baby. Another guy wrote about his construction job. There was a nonfiction class in that same room right after that one! I don't understand why people <i>do</i> that. Not only were they obviously not fiction, but most of the time they were also reeeally boring. Is it school? Does school just condition people to do assignments wrong? I don't know. Whatever the case, it was weird.SVnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-14706929185001707942015-08-20T01:49:32.395-05:002015-08-20T01:49:32.395-05:00And so the student has become the master.
Somewhe...And so the student has become the master.<br /><br /><i>Somewhere in the distance, an ancient Chinese gong sounds.</i>SVnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-31204523724109838492015-08-20T01:13:33.093-05:002015-08-20T01:13:33.093-05:00Judging quality by how well a work achieves its in...Judging quality by how well a work achieves its intended purposes seems logical. I especially like that if we go by this definition, then authors who claim to critical readers that they "just don't get it" are indeed bad writers, since by their own admission they would be failing to get across the message they intended to impart.<br /><br />Of course, when it comes to so-bad-it's-good works, I think the bottom line is that it's still bad by this measure, even if it can still be enjoyed. It may be that it's good at achieving a different purpose than originally intended, but just in my opinion, I think that the original purpose should be the only one that matters if we judge quality in this way.<br /><br />Maybe we can question if the author's stated goal was truthfully what the work's actual purpose is (such as if they claim that they're just telling a story but it's obvious there's a lot of real life allegories), but I don't really believe that it's the place of fans to redefine a work's purpose in contradiction to the creator's actual intent. I'm not really a proponent of Death of the Author, as you might've guessed.<br />DannyJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13273313206696087395noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-1777494770810182472015-08-19T20:32:42.000-05:002015-08-19T20:32:42.000-05:00So, subjective good, eh?
Let's take a step bac...So, subjective good, eh?<br />Let's take a step back from "subjective" to "good."<br /><br />Quite possibly the most interesting thing I heard in that one philosophy class was a proposed definition for moral and non-moral good. As best I can remember it:<br /><br />A is a good X if A is, or does, what X-s are supposed, or required to be or do. (non-moral)<br /><br />A is good if A is, or does, what things are required to be or do. (moral)<br /><br />But while the rest of that class went on to discuss the moral good, I think the non-moral definition of good here is the more interesting idea. It would mean that something cannot be good in a non-moral sense except insofar as it is good for some given purpose. And that purpose, I would argue, would have to be provided by someone, because something cannot have a purpose without someone intending that it be for that purpose. So something also cannot be good in a non-moral sense except insofar as someone intends it to be for some given purpose.<br /><br />So if we're talking about good writing, then writing needs a purpose. Of course there are a few it can have: getting some sort of emotional reaction from the reader, getting the reader to think about something in a new way, etc. And while complaints that "you just don't get my story" are common, I'd expect that more often than not people agree about the purpose of a story. I mean, if a writer is even the slightest bit competent, then hopefully what the story is good at will make it clear what the story is meant to do. (Or not, there's always that stuff that's so bad it's funny, which is good for a not-the-original-intention purpose.)<br /><br />Then, to the extent that we can agree on what the purpose of a story is, we can argue on a more-or-less objective basis how well it accomplishes that. You don't have to like a story to see that what it sets out to do it does well, and you can enjoy a story that you clearly see did not do what it set out to.<br /><br />The stuff you called objective (good grammar, plot makes sense, etc.) it stuff that aids almost any purpose that writing could have, which is why it seems like a universally good thing in writing, whereas some specific characterization, tone, etc. can be good for one purpose but not for another. When people say "It was a good story." the purpose of the story is only implied, and if readers disagree about the purpose of the story, then someone's going to shout SUBJECTIVE! and the discussion will go nowhere, at least in my experience. But for any given purpose this "subjective stuff" (specific characterization, tone, etc.) is largely objectively good (i.e. effective at) or not good. And a story as a whole, given some specific purpose, can also be objectively good at that purpose or not.<br /><br />Or at least, that's my opinion.<br /><br />Of course, this all gets hellishly more complicated when someone says "Story A is better than story B." Especially when the stories have different purposes, and especially especially when people start thinking that one of those purposes is a more worthwhile purpose than the other.<br />Unremarkable Ponyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12490181982921850794noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-40513137555490092522015-08-19T17:42:06.887-05:002015-08-19T17:42:06.887-05:00I feel like that last paragraph is advice I could&...I feel like that last paragraph is advice I could've used a lot sooner in my life.DannyJhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13273313206696087395noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-46801993750377530982015-08-19T09:39:45.158-05:002015-08-19T09:39:45.158-05:00Haha! I knew it was you all along. Who's cleve...Haha! I knew it was you all along. Who's clever and handsome now, Danny boy?!<br /><br />As far as opinions go... I dunno. I don't really care. People <i>have</i> them, but they don't matter unless someone actually listens to them, whether they're subjective or not. The only time I ever see the argument of subjective vs. objective pop up is when someone makes a negative comment about someone's work, and then that person responds by saying that everything is subjective, so their opinion doesn't matter. It seems like an insignificant point.<br /><br />I feel like if you have at least some understanding of how stories work it's pretty obvious if any specific one is good or not. There's a quote by G.K. Chesterton that says, "A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author," and I think that's about right. Humans are good at picking up on other human's motivations, and when you read someone's writing, it's usually pretty clear whether they were actually trying to do a good job or just phoning it in. You can't fake craftsmanship, after all.<br /><br />Point being, I think it's more important to use good judgement to decide <i>who</i> you want to try to encourage/help more than it is to worry about if what you say is subjective or objective, because you never know how anything you say is actually going to be taken anyway. Spend your time and energy wisely. Don't be a toolbag. Do that and hopefully it'll work out okay in the end.SVnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8184562969471581744.post-91160076898860611762015-08-19T07:30:27.326-05:002015-08-19T07:30:27.326-05:00Hmm, what do I think about this? Seems I might hav...Hmm, what <i>do</i> I think about this? Seems I might have put together some thoughts for a well-written blog that has handsome guest columnists. Or I might just be feverish again. The ague takes, and she gives as well. Maybe something will magically appear here on Friday?Pascoitehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05861834765162800926noreply@blogger.com