A Philo-HOP-ical Question . . . .

Camus would say there's no meaning to craft beer. Screw Camus.

 

From my profile page:

The search for the perfect beer is like the search for the perfect wave or for perfect powder. One eventually finds that perfection does not exist, and that by looking for perfection a long and delightful succession of nearly perfect examples has been discovered and enjoyed. Cheers!

 

Possibly one of the most inane threads I've seen.

 

No joke--spoken like a true analytic philosopher.

But I'll throw in my beer/philosophy related question: is beer good because it shares in the form of the Good, i.e. (according to Boethius at least) because it participates in the divine nature? Or is it good because it fulfills its function as a beer, in much the same way that a "good" watch is one that keeps time and such?

 

that is why i drink what is good and the to hell to the hunt.Cheers

 

I love a majority of styles, and would someday like to be a master of all of them. Some days I feel like an IPA, some days Doppelbock, some days Barelywine; you get the picture. There is no perfect beer in my field of view.

 

nietzsche - beer is dead

 

The unexamined beer isn't worth drinking...

 

People love beer
Beer loves only me
Therefore I am beer

 

Already asked that one. I put it more simply.

 

I don't care if I find a beer that I deem to be perfect and love more than any other beer I've ever had before and it sits on the shelf available to me all the time. I'd still seek out others.

It's why celebrities cheat on their supermodel wives...sometimes you just want something different even though what you have is awesome.

 

I was referencing Aristotle and Boethius, not Plato's Euthyphro.

It clearly didn't go over correctly...the suggestion was that beer might be God.

 

Ah, I see. Just skimmed it quickly. Good reference. Still influence of the forms.

 

I found the perfect powder once: I skied China Bowl (Vail) first thing on a brilliant sunny day (not a single cloud in the sky) with 10+ inches of fresh powder. When I started there was not a single track on the thousand+ acres of skiable area. I just skied China Bowl all morning and it was thing of beauty!

The next time I skied China Bowl (years later) it was all mush (mashed potatoes). I forlornly thought back on the previous wonderful day of skiing China Bowl.

Cheers!

 

This thread is the wet dream of any beer drinker that took Philosophy 101 in college.

 

Camus, I think, would say that the drive to hunt for good beer is an absurd condition, but one which must be satisfied. He would argue that ignoring the condition and giving into it are the same thing, but that by giving in you give yourself the chance to live a productive life.

 

And Kierkegaard would say that constantly seeking out different beers in the hopes of "experiencing the new beyond the expectation of the new" is tantamount to aesthetic damnation — living by rotation.

 

For years I was buying the new beers all the time, but lately I've been sticking to the ones I love because it's what I crave. I've found that if I buy a different beer other than what I'm craving, then I'm typical disappointed in it even if its a good beer. But the ones I crave are so many that its still a variety, it's not like I'm drinking the same IPA every day.
When I go somewhere new, I like to try whatever is local to the place rather than buy what I know is great just for the thrill of getting something new that I can't get back home.

 

Haha, love the philosophical references. The idea of using beer to demonstrate how imperfect is the quest for finding an absolute of quality based on the ephemeral subjectivity of perception is both ridiculous and excellent.