In Chapter 16 of our book, Wartenberg informs us of Weitz's claim that there is no set definition of art because art is an open concept and depends on the viewer's "criteria of evaluation." Weitz goes on to claim that all art does not have common properties, which is quite an exaggeration.
The following quote I found in my research that relates to Weitz's point of view;
"The idea that in order to get clear about the meaning of a general term one had to find the common element in all its applications has shackled philosophical investigation."
-Ludwig Wittegenstein
Finding a precise definition of art may be impossible. There is no known common element found in every single work of art. There are only common properties shared among select work of arts. Weitz, as well as Wittegenstein make this very clear. But does this mean we cannot use the concept of art?
Weitz continues to compare the concept of art to the concept of games. Just because we cannot define these concepts precisely does not mean that we cannot put them to use. We employ the concept of art as well as games to a certain function at a given time and by doing so we do not close the concept, but set some sort of a boundary. So, even with open concepts we can set limits in order to use the concepts.
While reading Chapter 16 about Weitz's view on art I wondered what Weitz's take on the intentionality thesis would be.
What do you think Weitz would say of the intentionality thesis?
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