Develop Aesthetic intelligence

[LastThursday]

7 hours ago, gengar said:

I disagree with your sneaky relativising of aesthetic principles.

I disagree with your disagreement, obviously. Are aesthetic principles god given absolutes? What is a pyschological mesotrend anyway?

8 hours ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

How would you seperate style vs trend?

There a slow trends and fast trends. I'd say a particular style is borne out of the current set of trends or takes elements from it at least. There may be other reasons for trends other than aesthetics (maybe money), but in art and fashion and design it's largely driven by aesthetics. New aesthetic values are invented, Cubism, Brutalism, Bauhaus, Sans Serif, Zen Gardens and new trends are started. One feeds into the other.

9 hours ago, Natasha Tori Maru said:

I haven't noticed rules for good, balanced composition change. Usually principles such us; rule of thirds, vanishing points, light/dark grade, focal point etc all follow a similar theme that contributes to 'aesthetic' appearance.

The rule of thirds depends on the canvas or photograph which is nearly always rectangular, and so comes out of the constraints of a medium, rather than being inate or absolute as such. But we do like easy fractions and find them aesthetic visually and in music (fifths, octaves etc).

I'm not trying to be a complete relativist however. We do have a predisposition to find things in nature beautiful, and so we consistently grab motifs from there and find it aesthetically pleasing. We also have inbuilt biases in our perceptual systems, and those come through in our aesthetics too: light versus shade, focal points, movement etc. And we especially are prone to finding human bodies and faces aesthetic, and they are indeed everywhere in art and fashion and advertising. So if we have an "aesthetic intelligence" then it comes out of these biases. And some of those biases are probably universal.

[Natasha Tori Maru]

1 hour ago, LastThursday said:

The rule of thirds depends on the canvas or photograph which is nearly always rectangular, and so comes out of the constraints of a medium, rather than being inate or absolute as such.

No way! This applies to everything !

Rule of thirds balance (just one example here) is not nearly always constrained to a rectangular 'canvas'. It is a balance of proportion. I see everything in this way. It is simply a matter of being able to make the distinction.

And I suppose as the topic is 'Aesthetic intelligence' my argument would turn to me to state, I have it. To be able to see in an artistic way.

I was born being able to see things in a way that meant I could tweak a small element to enhance the pleasing nature of the visual experience. The fine motor skills were also there, and were enhanced with training. I believe there is a genetic component to having this vision innately - but it can also be learned. 

Anyway not sure what my point is, other than I think some of these rules are consistent. 

[Natasha Tori Maru]

I will add though, strickly speaking, while I think the principals of easthetics are consistent, they aren't inherent to reality ie direct experience. Just in my view.

[Joshe]

On 1/15/2026 at 2:05 PM, integral said:

Worked as a web designer for many years and you always end up working with some of your clients who have horrendous taste, and they gravitate towards things that convert really badly. They do not understand how a thing makes them feel and the level of beauty something is at.

You might think this is completely subjective. And it's not. You can have different categories of things, but they will always be a hierarchy from a lower end of aesthetics to a higher end of aesthetics.

If you have super low aesthetic taste, you're deeply out of tune with how things make you feel and you have huge gaps in your sense making. I'm not exactly sure why this is the case but it's as clear as day when you interact with people they're aesthetic Intelligence closely relates to their level of consciousness.

Your level of consciousness and your aesthetic intelligence are closely connected.

The more conscious you are the finer you could see every aesthetic qualities to something.

There's many insights here that I haven't had yet to really understand why a person's level of consciousness is so directly linked to aesthetics. 

The most annoying thing is you can never communicate to them that they're wrong. 😑 LMAO

I feel you. I've done a good bit of visual design work and it's a pain in the ass trying to explain decisions to clueless people. I can't stand when they're like "change it to blue" when it should be neutral.

One thing I could never understand is why most B2B and enterprise designs (like Salesforce) are almost always shit compared to something like a polished SaaS app. But then I learned it's intentional. B2B doesn't like fancy and they tolerate imperfection and boring much more than other domains,. So what you might call "bad" design in one domain can be good and convert better in another. That didn't sit well with me because I'm like "NO!!! You cannot do that!!" 

On some level though, once you get past basic design fundamentals, a lot of it is subjective and designers often get carried away being concerned with minor details. 

To your main point: there are plenty of talented designers who are not what you might call "conscious". I've seen no connection aside from the general level of competence that often accompanies higher consciousness. 

I've collected thousands of screenshots of great designs and just marveled at them and used them for inspiration in trying to create my own designs. That process + learning design fundamentals and tips I think is sufficient. Eventually, you know a good design when you see one. I feel like most people are capable of this, regardless of conscious development. 

One cool thing having visual design sensitivity is that you can tell how much effort people are putting into things. For example, the actualized.org website isn't responsive in the year 2026. lol.

Edited 6 hours ago by Joshe

[Leo Gura]

27 minutes ago, Joshe said:

when they're like "change it to blue" when it should be neutral.

Change it to Absolute Blue!

[Joshe]

2 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Change it to Absolute Blue!

😂