On Aesthetics - Is Beauty in the DNA of the Beholder?

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

I don’t see what you’re referencing, cp.

- Doc

[canpakes]

I don’t see what you’re referencing, cp.

- Doc

Regarding honor’s question, “ ... identify visual mitigation needs for projects in settings where there are so-called "sensitive viewers". What makes a person a sensitive viewer?

... the doc provides this definition, from section Sensitivity Level Analysis:

1. Type of Users. Visual sensitivity will vary with the type of users. Recreational sightseers may be highly sensitive to any changes in visual quality, whereas workers who pass through the area on a regular basis may not be as sensitive to change.

Viewer ‘sensitivity’ is considered along with Scenic Quality when assessing a given project approach. The rest of the doc speaks to how Scenic Quality in project zones is assessed and assigned a rating. It’s subjective, and (to honor’s point and in my opinion) dependent on “some shared sense of ‘beauty’that isn't just cultural but innate to human viewers.”

[huckelberry]

In the past I have noticed that many clear cuts are ugly. It probably does not require refined aesthetics to notice this. I realize cutting forests is socially necessary but that does not mean all forests need to be cut. I have wondered if it would be possible to figure out less ugly ways of harvesting timber.

I am not up close on policy but I have not noticed any marked change from doing clear cuts with straight line geometric shapes with no relationship to land forms in any aesthetic sense. In my neighborhood the majority of recent clear cutting has been in relatively flat forest sections where the shape of the cut is not as visible as on a mountain side or in a canyon. I still have seen many a mountain side with block chunks of forest removed