What is the (true) meaning of beauty?
So I have been thinking about this recently. I'll start by sharing the experience that served as a catalyst for my current interest in this topic, so please bear with me for now.
It was a while ago when I was riding the bus. I was sitting by a window, listening to music. That's when the bus took a halt at a stop, and I looked outside.
That's when it hit me.
The vibrant azure blue sky on that day rendered me awestruck. It was devoid of clouds, high up above, even more so complemented by strong, tall buildings in a clear tone of white or beige, some of them with their many windows reflecting the surroundings. Around them a few trees; reaching up towards this endless expanse of blue.
Now looking down I saw ever so green patches of grass gradually beginning to be covered by the many orange, red and yellow leaves that come with fall.
In combination with the song I had on, I was somehow deeply moved by this seemingly simple, urban view before me.
"Beautiful.", was the first word that came to my mind then. However, what I had felt and seen seemed much more profound than just one word, which I would say only captured/described but a fraction of this moment.
As I later on realised, this had marked the first time in quite a while that something made me think of the word 'beautiful' by just looking at it.
Afterwards I started to wonder:
What really is beauty? What does the word beautiful even mean?
When was the last time you used the word 'beautiful' because you really thought it? Not just as a compliment for a nice bouquet of flowers, someone with good or hot looks, nor for a good-looking dress -
When was the last time you truly were struck by something as 'beautiful'? (Emphasis on the keyphrase "be struck by something", as in not actively thinking about or looking for a word to describe what you are observing, but rather a word coming to your mind as more of a 'passive reaction' to what you experience).
All this thinking about when, why and how we perceive something as beautiful made me question what 'beauty' itself even is or what it really means.
"Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder.", is a well-known saying that might come to mind here. Considering that everyone has a (sometimes more or less) quite varying view on what they think of as 'beautiful' or not, what exactly connects all these 'different beautifuls' (forgive this play of words) together?
What and how much exactly do these unique perceptions of beauty of individuals have in common and why?
Thank you for reading (I apologise if it was hard to understand or ambiguous at times, feel free to ask if so). Perhaps I have overthought this and there are simple answers (or not) to this and I am merely lacking knowledge here. Perhaps there's some more interesting science or studies about this topic that I am not yet familiar with. If you know of any related, interesting sources, studies or research about this please do recommend, I'd greatly appreciate it.
Whatever it may be, I am very interested in hearing any points or thoughts on this.
It was a while ago when I was riding the bus. I was sitting by a window, listening to music. That's when the bus took a halt at a stop, and I looked outside.
That's when it hit me.
The vibrant azure blue sky on that day rendered me awestruck. It was devoid of clouds, high up above, even more so complemented by strong, tall buildings in a clear tone of white or beige, some of them with their many windows reflecting the surroundings. Around them a few trees; reaching up towards this endless expanse of blue.
Now looking down I saw ever so green patches of grass gradually beginning to be covered by the many orange, red and yellow leaves that come with fall.
In combination with the song I had on, I was somehow deeply moved by this seemingly simple, urban view before me.
"Beautiful.", was the first word that came to my mind then. However, what I had felt and seen seemed much more profound than just one word, which I would say only captured/described but a fraction of this moment.
As I later on realised, this had marked the first time in quite a while that something made me think of the word 'beautiful' by just looking at it.
Afterwards I started to wonder:
What really is beauty? What does the word beautiful even mean?
When was the last time you used the word 'beautiful' because you really thought it? Not just as a compliment for a nice bouquet of flowers, someone with good or hot looks, nor for a good-looking dress -
When was the last time you truly were struck by something as 'beautiful'? (Emphasis on the keyphrase "be struck by something", as in not actively thinking about or looking for a word to describe what you are observing, but rather a word coming to your mind as more of a 'passive reaction' to what you experience).
All this thinking about when, why and how we perceive something as beautiful made me question what 'beauty' itself even is or what it really means.
"Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder.", is a well-known saying that might come to mind here. Considering that everyone has a (sometimes more or less) quite varying view on what they think of as 'beautiful' or not, what exactly connects all these 'different beautifuls' (forgive this play of words) together?
What and how much exactly do these unique perceptions of beauty of individuals have in common and why?
Thank you for reading (I apologise if it was hard to understand or ambiguous at times, feel free to ask if so). Perhaps I have overthought this and there are simple answers (or not) to this and I am merely lacking knowledge here. Perhaps there's some more interesting science or studies about this topic that I am not yet familiar with. If you know of any related, interesting sources, studies or research about this please do recommend, I'd greatly appreciate it.
Whatever it may be, I am very interested in hearing any points or thoughts on this.
Comments (56)
Another word is "sublime"
From Edmund Burke: Delineating the Sublime and the Beautiful
Yep; good catch.
In us, beauty is found; sublimity is excited.
Consider the following post from a (2022) thread On the beautiful and sublime
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/722906
also a (2019) post from a thread The Goal of Art
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/345235
Beauty is a property of the object perceived by mind, and has psychological nature. In that sense, beauty is more subjective judgement rather than objective value.
If you find a scenery with the sunset or sunrise beautiful, that means your psychology is uniting with the image not just visually but also emotionally positive way because of the various psychological factors such as your past experiences connecting to the scenery, objects or person or personal aesthetic taste or deep religious faith, which reminds the deity or peace of mind from the images you see.
Of course the visual effect would be a critical factor in the aesthetic judgement, but more importantly the subjective psychological or emotional state responding the the sensory perceptions in aesthetic way plays critical part in judging and feeling beauty on something.
I am not sure if rationality or reasoning could be also basis for judging something as beautiful. I would guess Kant would say Yes, but Nietzsche or Schopenhauer might say No.
Whether the notion of beauty always has to arise in correlation with rationality or not is an interesting thought.
Perhaps it's usually a mix of rationaliy and emotion.
Though since usually beauty is seen as a type of feeling, could we still perceive it if we were completely rational beings? Or on the contrary, entirely emotional? Makes me wonder..
Beautiful describes the scene itself. If a very good artist painted it, everyone who saw it would probably think 'beautiful'. But the more profound part is what the beholder adds, in that moment, in his present frame of mind. Why the same scene affects each beholder differently is the subjective component.
Humans invented a large number of words for pleasing sensory input, because the appreciation of it is something we generally share - and want to share. Beauty is one word that describes an exceptionally pleasing visual or auditory input. There is quite a broad consensus among people of various times and cultures about what is considered beautiful, and an even more consistent one within each culture.
Very broadly, beauty as understood by most humans is harmony, proportion, balance, 'rightness' - that is, a sense of things fitting together into a coherent whole. Things that make us feel at peace within ourselves and our environment.
There are different extensions of beauty - into passion, lust, awe, reverence, yearning - but these are of the dimension we individually bring to the contemplation of something beautiful.
The art critiques would use rationality and reasoning in analysing the art objects such as paintings and sculptures. In this case analysis based on the fine observation on the colours, shapes and themes of the art would be the objects for their analysis for writing their artistic praise or critiques.
If you are to compare art works of different artists such as Picasso and Dali, or Van Gogh and Gogang, then you would heavily depend on your rationality and reasoning for making the critical analysis to come to the comparative commentaries on their works too.
But if you are perceiving the art objects or beautiful scenery in ordinary daily life, then I would reckon your aesthetic judgements on them would be more likely based on the emotional responses to the objects or scenes.
The reasoned beauties could give you the rational reasons why Picasso suits better than Van Gogh for the space with the modern furnishings, however, it might not be able to offer the psychological pleasure, ecstasy and peace of mind you would get from the purely emotional judgements and feelings of the beautiful objects or scenery you encounter in your daily life.
The reasoned beauty tends to be objective and universal in its quality and value, because that is the prime property of rationality and reason.
The emotional side of beauty would be subjective and personal. If you are feeling stressed out in your mind due to some daily life problems, then you might not feel the same from the objects which you used to feel beautiful.
Can a child who paints a painting of value to many but takes little skill be considered by it's true beauty of having that child-like quality, less a property of an artist and more a nature?
"That would fall under the perview of your conundrum of philosophy."
-The Engineer
Sorry, couldn't resist. To answer the question though, I think beauty, despite ultimately being largely subjective, boils down to "a thing that you like looking at because it makes you feel something." A lot of that is built on visual symmetry, cultural patterns, biological preferences and what have you, but I think beauty if more about the individual's reaction to it than an objective force/thing in and of itself.
Sounds like you had an emotional reaction. I have felt that way about peeling paint on a mental fence when lit by a setting sun. Does it mean anything more than the experience you had?
The significant question about beauty is whether it is a transcendental or not - does it reflect fundamental properties of being, e.g., truth, goodness and beauty? Do they reflect in some way a divine reality? Do you think beauty is something that transcends contingent human experience and says something deeper about reality?
I prefer that Picasso to many more sentimental paintings others might readily call beautiful. I struggle with the notion of art as beauty. I generally think the best art has vitality and a visceral impact. Beauty (as I see it) generally seems soft and cloying.
In your title, you ask what is the (true) meaning of beauty. That requires we know what is true! But we have to settle for a subjective truth, because what is beautiful for one may not be beautiful for another. And I think this is because what we call beautiful is what arouses pleasurable feelings in us, and of course this varies from person to person.
I agree. I think that the distinguishing feature of art is that it has an aesthetic.
Such an aesthetic can either be beautiful, when non-threatening, such as paintings of roses and sunsets or ugly, when threatening, such as paintings of scorpions and war.
When a good aesthetic becomes a great aesthetic then it becomes sublime.
The aesthetic, being a certain combination of balance within variety of form can apply to all disciplines, whether painting, dance, music, architecture, as well as the design of cars.
What is good and what is bad in the universe. Is the root. But, excuse me, my vocabulary is not that good at my age and it's other word and good and bad.
And that can be a scary thought, for some people. (Hi, by the way. Great Thread)
Why would that phrase be scary? Well, think of the following hypothetical scenario. A group of friends get together to play tabletop D&D. Meanwhile, a lone person in her room is playing a computer RPG. That person visually encounters a beholder, in her game. But, she's smart. She knows that the very concept of a "beholder" is intellectual property of Wizards of the Coast, the parent company that owns the Dungeons & Dragons game, and nearly all of its licenses. She shrugs, and randomly thinks "Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder. Yeah right, so what is beauty to these guys?" ("These guys", that she's referencing, are the spherical, multi-eyed beings that she encounters and usually fights against in her game.
Now, imagine a different scenario. A group of friends gets together once a week to play tabletop Pathfinder, the largest competitor that D&D has, as a brand. Imagine that this group of friends are somewhat superstitious (i.e., they believe in luck, just as a Christian would believe in God). Why do they believe this? I have no idea. One can establish a conversation in that context, while playing some dumb tabletop game. All I'm saying is that tabletop games are, by their very nature, social games. Computer games are not (controversial statement, I know).
I don't really subscribe to this idea of the sublime (awe and wonder?). I'm not sure if I have experienced this.
I see things which have impact - and I greatly enjoy them (if that's the right verb). This is about as far as I'd go.
I may well quiver with pleasure when I see the facade of a particularly extravagant art deco building lit by moonlight, but my companion may look at the same edifice, shrug and say 'whatever'. The experince is not transcendental. It's a personal reaction.
Your question about beauty being a transcendental or not, or whether it perhaps says something deeper about our reality is super interesting imo.
It makes me wonder when taking this idea that Corvus mentioned earlier in this thread into account:
Quoting Corvus
So pretty much something being thought of as beautiful, and this having two different, possible reasons for occurring: The first being objective/rational and reasoned, the second being based on subjective experiences, emotions, current mood, outlook on life, etc... .
I thought that maybe, through this definition/separation of why we perceive something as beautiful, the answer to the question of whether the concept of beauty is simply a man-made construct or (as you said it) "if it reflects in some way a divine reality, something that transcends contingent human experience and says something deeper about reality?", might become more evident.
I feel like one could argue that both, in a way, could be transcendental, but also not. Not sure what you'd think of this separation of beauty into a subjectively and a more objectively based and shaped beauty and the thought of it being a transcendental.
I definitely think one can argue this and many philosophers appear to do so (Roger Scruton seemed to be a particular enthusiast) - the transcendentals being truth, goodness and beauty.
While I don't argue that transcendentals do not exist, I don't believe the case has been made that they do exist. How would we demonstrate them? My own bias is that the idea of the divine (which can mean a plethora of things) has also not been demonstrated.
In the meantime, I see no reason to consider beauty to be more than a contingent factor of culture and experince. Certainly there is intersubjective agreement on the subject. Hardly surprising that cultures/communities share views on beauty. This all seems rich enough to me.
There is no one meaning of the word "sublime". From Wikipedia - Sublime (philosophy)
Not only is it a personal reaction to which definition of the word "sublime" one accepts, but even if accepting one particular definition of the "sublime", it remains a personal reaction to one's experiences of the "sublime" as defined.
Yes, interesting. Would you say beauty could be also from the other aspect of the world or situations?
Yes, and what I'm saying is I have not had that reaction. By any definition I've seen. :wink:
The idea of beauty could be much effected from situations. For example, a beautiful person in the dental chair getting her teeth scaled may not look beautiful at all, as she would when she is dancing in the night club.
Likewise an ordinary looking person can look more beautiful when just out of shower or working out hard in the gym sweating than formally dressed and greeting her customers in the office.
Some situations can make beauty to climax, while other situations could decrease it. These situational aspects seem to indicate the idea of beauty is a contingent psychological feelings on the perceived objects.
I submit you will yearn to repeat it, but the yearning belongs to the label, and this discourse. You cannot repeat it. But it can return. When it does, like the moment you described, it will surprise you and make you feel something real...until the nanosecond after, when, again, you acknowledge it with "beautiful."
You mentioned this example with people and how they might seem more or less beautiful depending on the situation and if this were the case, that beauty would be more of a contingent thing. Then again, doesn't this idea with your example above assume beauty would have to be a property or an attribute in order for it not to be random/subjective? That it must always be applicable to an object after it once has been designated as beautiful?
Regarding your example, I also think when it comes to things we perceive with our eyes, aesthetics play a big role in our judgement of them as well. Not sure how much this overlaps with beauty or our judgement/perception of/on it. (While we might find the aesthetics of an object pleasing, does this necessarily mean it is beautiful?)
Also what if we take, say, a song for example. A lot of people might find this certain song beautiful. Where- or whenever it is played, it will still be perceived as beautiful. In this example outside factors or different situations might not influence the perception of beauty at all imo.
That's a very interesting point there.
I've often wondered how much of a word's 'true meaning', or that of what this word in question is trying to really describe gets lost through this process of trying to categorize and put a label on everything in this world.
Please correct me if I've misinterpreted your comment;
You mean to say that basically this experience, which I (or others too) had, is not something as 'simple' as the word "beautiful" or at very least cannot be encapsulated within a single word? In fact, that what this experience in essence really is might not be describable in mere words (at all)?
Therefore, as soon as we label this moment as 'something' (for example as the word 'beautiful') it loses some (or all) of its' actual 'meaning'/essence of what it is?
As if forcing a cage (man-made construct) onto something far too big for it to actually fit inside (and in the process only catching a glimpse/fragment of its' real manifestation or maybe nothing at all due to the real nature of this moment being lost)?
Yes, exactly. I would dare to go as far as your parenthetical 'not at all'. Your experience was one thing: real, natural, felt organically by the real you in the present, i.e. the only 'place' where reality is. Then--owing to the human condition, I.e. that we have built a cage and locked ourselves in it:Mind--that feeling in its entirety, is displaced by the construct, say, 'beautiful', which in turn begins a process of triggering more 'constructs' by association, then triggering other feelings, all of which are utterly not that initial so called 'beautiful' feeling long gone.
But as you say, we all do this. And I suggest inescapably, and autonomously, Mind being that process of triggers leading to responses, in a continual feedback loop which we think of as time.
Without Mind, but only consciousness, like our advanced cousins among the animals; that real feeling would have been present to our aware-ing, but only in its presence. There would have been no dragging it with the Subject into the future by attaching it to a word, nor looking back, both a function of attachment and desire, and both at best, re-presented but no longer real.
That's as briefly as I am capable of putting it. I do think you already got the gist.
The constructs are useful as hell, but they are also what has alienated us from always feeling that bliss. Ironically, you were, at that moment, not expecting it; thus, not paying (conventional) attention and so reality was able to slip through. Lucky you!
Quoting ENOAH
So according to you, the mind as in, our ability to think ("Reason") is what made us more or less incapable of enjoying such moments for what they really are due to this once started, unstoppable chain of associations and so on being triggered, tainting the 'real' experience.
But don't you think this is maybe more of a problem of language and not the mind itself?
Not as in our language not being precise enough or whatever, but that us acquiring language (words for also more complex ideas) is the main source and cause of this process?
Because after all if we didn't have words nor language, (but maybe some other means of communication instead?), wouldn't this 'problem' be 'solved'?
Thank you for this new perspective by the way, no need to apologise!
This reminds me, perchance a bit off topic, but: I read somewhere that they had found out or at least assume (through observation) that bears, too, enjoy landscapes and sceneries, seemingly as also able to appreciate them. Take this with a grain of salt though. I don't remember the details.
That aside, though, you also mentioned that I (applying to others as well) was "Quoting ENOAH
Regarding that: Do you think there is a way (or ways) for us to actively stop this process from happening or at least try avoid it in order to enjoy such moments and experiences for what they truly could be?
I tried to find some studies about this however, along the way I found out that there hasn't yet been any extensive research done on this, though many seem to have observed this seemingly rather 'odd', or so far inexplicable behaviour of bears (them sitting in the same spot for prolonged periods of time without doing too much, just staring off into the distance), possibly indicating that they possess a to us similar' "sense of beauty" (but of course, who knows, could also be attributed to something else).
Just thought I'd clarify that.
Without the extensive explanation required, and which you are entitled to. Yes, precisely. But I think Mind is structured by/emerged with (or out of) language ( using that word very broadly).
Quoting Prometheus2
Very briefly; only as glimpses. You indeed, had such a glimpse. But you cannot do that through language (e.g. don't think of 'monkey'--if you are familiar with that little gem). But I don't fret. 1. Mind and Language obviously have their pros. 2. A glimpse might be enough to raise the awareness so that attachments and desires are put in their place, and Nature/Reality can at the very least be appreciated.
Again, all to brief, likely dissatisfying, but what can we do?
Thank you.
My thinking is that my dog did that too. And likely other advanced animals. Likely, if it werent for thinking, any spare time we had prehistorically/pre-advanced-linguistically, would have been occupied in a blissful bonding with Nature.
I have thought about this concept again, and it seem to me that beauty could be very much closely related to bodily sensory perceptions, which cause aesthetically pleasing emotions in us.
When we see beautiful scenery, person or flowers, they pleases our eyes via the visual sensations and perception. When we hear beautiful music or songs, they please our ears or hearing.
Likewise, smells, tastes and touches could be described as beautiful, if they give us pleasing sensations.
You may ask, what about the reasoned beauty from the works of Picasso, Van Gogh, the famous Mona Lisa by Da Vinci,..etc? We may say, they please our brains.
Therefore we may conclude that beauty is an aesthetically pleasing emotions arising from our bodily sense organs in perceiving the objects or situations? Not sure if you would agree, or see the point. I would be interested to hear about your opinions on the point.
On reasoned beauty:
Do you think we reason to an aesthetically pleasing emotion?
I agree...for what it's worth
I think it was Aristotle who originally claimed we have 5 senses (sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell).
At first thought, I would have said that we most commonly call something beautiful which we either see and/or hear, e.g. a sunset, scenery or a song. While our other senses (touch, taste, smell) can contribute to this process of perceiving something as beautiful, I do not think that this thought of something being beautiful can stem out of these other 3 senses of touch, smell and taste (Feel free to prove me wrong here). A delicious meal might please our sense of taste and smell. However, does this automatically make it beautiful? Call it delicious maybe, but I feel like it is something different from the concept of beauty.
I'd see the sense of taste, smell and touch much more as amplifiers, instead of direct causes of enabling the perception of beauty.
Therefore I wonder. If we take these senses of vision and hearing away:
In what type of situation would a person with this dual sensory impairment (no vision or hearing)
label something as beautiful?
Or does such a person simply experience beauty in a completely different way?
I think someone without any sensory faculties could not feel or perceive beauty at all.
Consequently I have to agree with you. In my opinion, we at very least need our senses (vision and hearing) to be able to grasp beauty. (I'm not so sure about the other senses.)
Quoting Corvus
I don't think art, which we analyse, necessarily 'pleases' our brain, but rather that, through thorough reflection about it and contemplation on the object itself, we reach a (reasoned) conclusion regarding its' qualities, like that it is beautiful.
I do agree with you though that beauty seems to be intrinsically linked to our sensory perception.
I think we can reason on all the contents of our perception no matter how trivial they are. When you are asked "What does it feel like?", you explain the nature of the feeling using your reason reflectively. e.g. "It feels like coming home." or "Unbelievably interesting".
But in the case of aesthetically pleasing emotion, reason could offer a lot more explanation on the object in analytic and critical way. Most of the art critique essays are in the form of explanation based on reasoning.
You could be right. Reasoned beauties cannot please our brains like the bodily sensory beauties please our bodily organs. Could it be because of the fact, brain is located inside body under the skin and skull hidden away from the external stimulation?
I still believe that brain feels and knows everything which is fed via the sensory organs, as the centre of the mental events where all mental operations take place. But maybe the way brain feels pleasure of reasoned beauty might be different from the way our eyes or ears feel pleasures from the sensations? In what what would it be different? Or does it have anything to do with the reasoned beauty at all?
Agreed, but does that make to reason on content the same as to reason to emotion?
It looks to me as if youre hinting they are not, and if they are not, it may be because we dont reason to emotion at all. To do so is equivalent to thinking a feeling, which would be difficult to explain.
On the other hand, I can see here I might reason to an emotion Ive already felt, given a cause Ive already experienced. But this is mediated emotion, rather than immediate affectation, so in these cases, Id be less inclined to question the idea.
Anyway .thanks.
I am definitely aware of my emotions in most times. I can feel happiness when seeing the newly arrived parcels, and when I opened them, the contents inside of the parcel were what I was expecting and satisfactory in quality. I feel satisfied and happy about them. I go to the online store, and leave a positive feedback reflecting my satisfaction and happiness on the goods delivered. This whole process is based on my reflective reasoning.
But as you pointed out, whether the content of perception is identical with the emotion seems a bit unclear. And what would be the nature of the reasoning between those different mental events?
Could emotions be classed as a type of perception? Or are they different events altogether? If so, how different?
Quoting Mww
Yes, this is it. We can reflect and reason the felt emotions after the experience of emotion. Hence it looks like our emotions could be the subject matter for reason. According to Kant, reason can even reason about reason itself, which is then pure reason. In that case, why couldn't reason reason on the emotions or the content of emotions?
When emotional experience has gone through the analytic investigation of reason, it can be looked as in "the content" of reason, because then we can describe it in linguistic form.
Quoting Mww
Anytime Mww. Thank you.
Quoting Prometheus2
Dr. V.S. Ramachandran, Director of the Center for Brain and Cognition and Distinguished Professor with the Psychology Department and Neuroscience Program at the University of California.
In this 1 hour long talk, dr Ramachandran explains in his typical humorous way how strucures in the brain give rise to our experience of beauty and aestetics. I think this is what you are looking for.
Quoting Corvus
Yes, perhaps it is when we feel that something is beautiful when looking at it, this is a direct response to the thing we are perceiving, closely tied to our senses. However when we reach, after reflection, the conclusion that something is beautiful, isn't this different (Beautiful as a 'direct' response to an observation vs. Beautiful as a response/conclusion of our thoughts about this observation)?
Or this reasoned beauty simply a bit of a longer process with more active thinking?
As I see it, when it comes to 'reasoned beauty', the object/subject looked at is associated with the notion of beauty by thinking more thoroughly about observations, unlike when looking at something and immediately feeling that it is beautiful.
But then again: Don't both, reasoned and emotional beauty, require thinking or at very least the use of our brain? One bases its' association with the word "beautiful" off of a (often short and quick) impression as (maybe) a direct response to our feelings, while the other ("reasoned", so we called it) associates the observation with the notion of beauty only after some extensive contemplation.
Some beauty can be reasoned out via our contemplation, reflection and analysis, and it is definitely reflective thought process which requires time and revisiting.
Quoting Prometheus2
If you choose to reason, then I guess you could reason on anything even on the trivial passing feeling of a moment in daily life, as well as the works of Picasso, Dali or Van Gogh.
It's tempting to say that beauty is an objective thing "out there", which we have the privilege to access to on occasion. But I don't think it's quite right.
At its most basic, what's beautiful is what strikes as being beautiful at a given occasion. For whatever reason some occasions happen to be far more profound than others. But I don't think we can universalize from ourselves to the world at large.
We see examples of animals finding certain things at least attractive (if not beautiful, then close to it) which we can't make much sense of. How dogs greet each other, or how certain birds look for mating partners etc.
We find it puzzling to see such behavior, but I'd wager other creatures can't find beauty or attraction, in many of the things we find them in. Maybe there's some overlap somewhere, but it's hard to know.