The Benefits of Beauty

For my response I chose the following passage:

" A vase crafted by Galle---in whose surface dusky blue plums and purple leaves hang in the soft brown light---can, although nonsentient, be harmed by being mishandled. Noticing its beauty increases the possibility that it will be carefully handled.
Now it may be objected that a less beutiful poem or vase or god may, by receiving less attention, receive less careful protection." (pg.65)

This passage caught me because I have never thought of the benefits of beauty in this way. When looking at something beautiful, in her example a vase, you begin to notice its characteristics and with establishing this, your view is passed to other objects like it. When a person actually stops to admire an object, unconsciously, you notice other objects of the same type.

For example: A person could walk through a forest a hundred times and not be able to tell you a single characteristic of anything he or she passed. But when one walks thought the forest or a garden just before dusk in search of admiring the flowers or trees and spots a creature of beauty, they analyze its characteristics. The color of the leaves catch there interest, or the way its branches or stems are grown. Once finished with admiring this tree they glance at the next, observing its own characteristics in search of another object of beauty. All of the objects of the same type begin to catch the viewers eye.

http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/hfrr/HortImage/Acer_truncatum,_Shantung_Maple_Fall_Color_3.jpg

People can go through life without noticing the beauty and awe of the things around them. Through this piece I have come to realize something I always knew, although unconsciously. I have learned that beauty comes to justify objects. It helps us to notice objects and there true beauty. An objects warmth, or fragility, its sound, or even its movement are all things that are obtained through this justice. Beauty helps us give attention and notice to our surroundings and to objects or species or genres that individuals deem important and of deserving admiration.