Great taste requires bounded originality beyond copying what one ought to like

Evidence

Deep knowledge opens the door to better taste, and congruence reveals our commitment to a high-status sensibility. But the truest marker of excellent taste is bounded originality. As we learned before, the highest-status individuals can’t imitate anyone lower on the hierarchy and, therefore, must make distinctive choices. Great taste requires uniqueness. Moreover, there is no skill in copying others’ choices. Scholar of Kantian aesthetics David Berger writes, “To like what one ‘ought’ to like is not to exercise taste.” — W. David Marx, Status and Culture, 256

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Imitation and distinction operate as complementary forces rather than opposites — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 165; Taste is read as a holistic gestalt, not signal-by-signal — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 248; Taste earns status only when proven anchored to a life history — W. David Marx, Status and Culture: How Our Desire for…, 267 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Astute taste in others excludes what creativity requires #complicates (0.85) — Karl Ove Knausgaard, A Death in the Family, 1332
• Eclecticism of contemporary culture signals a general slackening of taste #exemplifies (0.75) — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 486