of “quality”, or “ideal form” that motivated the trends of people, but the models upon which these qualities were imposed. Quality itself might as well not exist, if aesthetics were not there to “draw one’s attention” to certain things.There are certain points which could make one wonder about the validity of Wittgenstein’s ideas, however. Wittgenstein seems to think that quality does not exist by itself, that man imposes the idea of quality upon things that are deemed acceptable by the masses. Would this argument still make sense if you could define quality on its own terms, in and of itself? Even Wittgenstein seems to think not, otherwise he would not have pointed out the very fact that this autonomous quantification was impossible. But it seems that just to prove the existence of quality, however undefined, would raise a strong doubt about his theory. Quality is viewed as different things from different perspectives, it is true. As I see something I deem to be beautiful, another could very well see vulgarity. As I view goodness, another can perceive ugliness. But the fact is that as a whole, a large group of people can always come to a decisive decision over the differences between beauty and ugliness. There is always a majority who will decisively choose the beautiful thing. It is true that as the differences between the subjects gradually becomes harder and harder to see, the majority will begin to shrink, and the thoughts will grow closer, but that is because the amount of quality in each thing comes closer together. As Robert Pirsig said, the proof for the existence of quality lies simply in this thought: remove the idea of quality from anything, and that thing will become one thing. If all aesthetic quality were removed from all of the shoes in the world, for instance, soon every person would be wearing the same pair of shoes. It would be the longest-lasting, least expensive shoe,...
