>>11111966I don't want to make strong claims about general aestetics (read Schopenhauer for that, or one of those philsophers).
But as you're on the /sci/, we can make the plain boring rationalist/materialist observation that I think I saw Daniel Dennett make render best in one of his talks (Ted talk or whatever):
Baby faces and perky big tits aren't inherently cute or sexy - that is to say, cute and sexy isn't an Platonic ideal that just gets realized by small children or young women.
Instead, we play the game of survival where desire to protect your children and mating with healthy partners helps you win, and thus we get tuned to enjoy and want it. Perceived beauty is thus reduced to an instinct tuned by game theoretic reality of things.
As such, you might not get an erection when you see that round butt in pic related, but the money boy knows what's up.
In any case, you can savior (German) idealism by sticking with realism on one side, and identifying the evolutionary process that gives rise to the above, the "will" that manifests in game winning self-modifications, with the Hegelian spirit. Land then calls this noumena "Capital".
