Is there a hierarchy to the various modes of perceiving beauty?

It’s simply the fact that visual beauty is easier to detect than the other forms. It is the most apparent, it is the one that screams out at you at first and can often be so beautiful that the other ones are not even detected. Visual beauty you can detect right away. Inner beauty is something you are going to have to work at to get to. You can’t just get it right away. As far as I’m concerned, a relationship will not work if the inner beauty isn’t strong enough.

That said, I don’t think visual beauty is inferior to the other forms just because it is often more obvious. Paintings, photos, and landscapes are beautiful and just because you can see that right away doesn’t mean it is somehow less powerful. Additionally, visual beauty can be quite deep and goes beyond what is seen on the surface.

People might not see past the surface right away, that is asking a lot of the mind. It takes a little time to see past the surface and discover what lies beyond the surface. Once they discover how beautiful that truly is, then it may end up being much more important than what is on the surface.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and in what is familiar.

@DominicX ”Once they discover how beautiful that truly is, then it may end up being much more important than what is on the surface.”

Have you ever done that in your life? If you have done it, how often, compared to sticking to surface beauty (first impressions)? Can you describe the situation where inner beauty ended up being more important that surface beauty?

Visual beauty is a good sign that the individual is healthy and of good stock.

When I first saw my husband’s pics, I thought ‘well, huh, I’m not sure’ but we fell in love through words, mental links…then when we saw in each IRL, he was the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen because of his whole being. Now, I don’t even know what I was thinking those first few moments – he is perfection, to me. So if you have inner beauty and not outer (according to you anyway) then the former can produce the latter. So, for me, inner beauty trumps outer beauty.

I think there is beauty which is biological in appreciation – the Golden Ratio being one of them, fractal forms being another, and this is immediately pleasing to the eye. This does not mean it is simple, however. I would say that this is attractiveness more than beauty, though, if I were to be strict about my definitions.

Then there is the beauty we perceive (apperceive?) through investigation, knowledge and comprehension.

For example, before I started teaching English, I knew that English could be used to produce beautiful things – Shakespeare, Hume, etc… – but the more I study the language and linguistics, the more I appreciate that any language is beautiful in and of itself; almost fractal in complexity, effectively infinite in variety. (I could have punctuated that sentence probably ten different ways, and each would have had slightly different overtones and attracted slightly different judgments)

An otherwise attractive building – built to the Golden Ratio – can be rendered ‘ugly’ in that the associations it holds sour the perceiver’s apperception of it.

Generally I’d say visual beauty is the most prominent, but really that doesn’t mean anything if you feel awe and inspiration through some other means.
People can and do, and a lot of what passes as beauty through general opinion is superficial and just empty glamour anyways. Or is it?
The beholder and alla dat.

I find the epiphany that inner beauty can birth outer beauty and not so much the other way around to be inspiring

@Simone_De_Beauvoir that’s beautiful

@tragiclikebowie—it really did just hit me. it’s good to have epiphanies. thanks @wundayatta—

I know that I have become attracted to some people only after getting to know them. I mean there’s like a day where someone literally just becomes smoking hot all of a sudden, because I’ve gotten to know him, and his ‘inner beauty’ at least supplements his ‘outer beauty’.

Likewise I have been attracted to people at first and, shortly after, gotten over them after learning what they were like. I’m sure we’ve all been there. Our senses deceive us after all (each of them does; not just sight).

This is the power and importance of inner beauty to me. It’s totally necessary.

My experience tells me that getting to know a person’s personality, sense of humour, values and character over time and across situations can produce such a compelling sense of someone’s inner beauty that when you see them, their appearance in of no real importance. I see my wife’s inner beauty and her appearance to be is so linked to who she is inside that I never fail to see her as beautiful. I do not care whether she agrees with me on that point. I need no one else to validate that perception for it to be true to me.

I doubt your assertion that you lack outer beauty but even if it were true, it is a matter of little consequence. You should only have the opportunity to discover the inner beauty in yourself and a potential partner and to get to know each other and you will never feel unbeautiful again!

I wish you joy and the good fortune to find someone who will be delighted to be in your company!

true story: my best friend and I have been friends for over 7 years…couple of weeks ago, I had a couple of dreams where he and I did sexual stuff and now I can’t stop thinking about him in that way, though we never did anything except drunk making out…so I informed him that the next time he visits, I might have to pounce on him a little bit…then again, he likened me to PETA as a joke and now he’s not so hot anymore, lol

@Simone_De_Beauvoir You’re welcome.

@Dr_Lawrence My wife and I have been a couple for 20 years, and for much of it I felt that I was distasteful, if not ugly to her. Even now when she tells me she is attracted to me, I don’t always feel that.

I think she likes my inner beauty a lot more than my outer, and for most of my life, no one ever told me I was good looking, except my mother or my grandmother when I was dressed up for church, and I felt ugly because of those awful clothes. In any case, it seemed like it was the clothes they thought were handsome, not me.

Now it is possible that I am not entirely ugly, or I might even be good looking, but I have never truly felt that way, and mostly I have felt ugly, so it was inner beauty for me, or nothing, in my mind. The only time I ever felt beautiful is when someone was making love to me.

Hmmm, that’s some very excellent observations.

Beauty is quite the trickster! I’m still figuring that one out, but here’s a thought.

I think beauty is quite amazing and often illusive, mysteriously unique yet powerful human program designed to stimulate your attention and lead to igniting some kind of wonderful desire in the brain. Like two inactive substances mixing alchemically together.

(If an esthetically beautiful woman walks alone in a forest, and nobody sees her, is she still beautiful?)

I have noticed that Beautys effects are not long lasting on any level (physical, touch, taste, sound, mind, spirit) and even the most beautiful woman can become rejected by her observer for any number of reasons. Like a match that burns brightest at first, then eventually goes out. To quickly to be taken for granted. Or a piece of jewelry or art that I absolutely MUST buy one day, just becomes another piece with time.

And that’s also to say that not everyone will agree on who’s/what’s the most beautiful. Like at beauty pageants. Very beautiful people and models get divorced? The beauty is still there, but, the relationship did not last. How come?

Is Beauty like a high maintenence five pointed star? that has to be constantly polished and fed and watered and maintained on every level?

Is beauty in the Ear of the beholder? ....Or the Skin of the beholden?

Noticing how I feel while in the presence of experiencing beauty makes me wonder, does beauty activate Growth Hormones in me? Is that what I’m really attracted to?

@Simone_De_Beauvoir That was lovely.

@Trillian thank you

I do think that there is a “hierarchy” to beauty, with visual at the top, but I think “visual” doesn’t necessarily mean “how perfect your skin is”. I’ll use an old high school friend as an example: this person had the very unfortunate experience of being burned in a fire and was permanently disfigured by it. However, they had such a great personality and outlook on life that they were a joy to be around and had many friends. In this instance, I believe their inner beauty was extended outward so much as to be visual beauty: you could see that they were popular and fun to be around as immediately as you would see that they obviously had a rough past. Certainly, I would say that this person was more beautiful than many of the “stereotypical” popular people in school with fair exteriors.

I can tell you for sure that I would rather spend a lifetime with someone who cherished me and had inner beauty covered by a plain or even ugly exterior than the reverse. So yes, there is a hierarchy, and inner beauty sits atop it. As @DominicX said, outer beauty is easy to perceive and our mating drive seems hardwired up to it, but for the long haul, give me inner beauty every time.

Imagine that if there is a Creator you are transported into oneness with that being and are able to converse with and learn from the power that set the entire universe in motion and laid down its laws. Would it matter what the Creator looked like?

Some people rather look for the beauty of the mind.

Gadzooks, I have found that anything you can be manifested in a tangible form, visual beauty trumps them all. One cannot usually get to the inner beauty if they are not attractive enough to attract; why else would they cal it attractive? Other than writing, or music, which you cannot see humans are a very visible species. Why do you think children’s toys are brightly colored? They stimulate sight, more than, if it were all black or beige. If you met the person over chat, did not see them until you have had many conversations, and got to experience their inner beauty it might make their outer vestige appear better. If you were at a BBQ it would be whom ever was closest to what they called scientific beauty. Sound would be about 3rd, which is why songbirds always do better in talent competitions than dancers or magicians who put in more work and had to work their talent to be good or great and not just be blessed with good tone and range.