the value of aesthetics
I got new glasses today. The last time I bought a pair of glasses must have been 5 years ago. They were Warby Parker. And they cost $100. This new pair was significantly more expensive than that. By orders of magnitude. But I bought them because a) Warby Parker doesn't exist here and b) being able to see is important. And if I consider that it'll likely be another 5 years before I get another pair of glasses, the investment seemed worth it.
"Worth it" is an interesting concept when it comes to aesthetic objects. Because when you buy an aesthetic object (anything that augments your visual appearance in any way) it's hard to quantify what /value/ you're getting out of them.
Or at least I thought so until today.
Today, I have come to a new understanding of aesthetic augmentation. And only because I've done a lot of it recently.
I think that there's two main functions of aesthetic augmentation.
The first is to deal with the the kind of dysmorphia that we all experience on some level - to close to gap between the platonic vision of ourselves and the self that exists in reality. I feel more like myself with bleach blonde hair and tattoos. Even though I was born with a full head of brown hair and unblemished skin.
The other function is (and I'm being very honest here) to make ourselves more visually attractive.
And so when we're investing money into aesthetic augmentation (whether they be permanent like tattoos, semi-permanent like glasses, or temporary like a pair of pants) it's actually quite easy to understand what the outcome should be.
Whatever we pay for an aesthetic augmentation or object, we should feel proportionately /more/ like the platonic ideal of ourselves, or proportionately /more/ attractive.
By that litmus test "worth it" becomes easy to measure.
Was my new chest tattoo worth it? Yes. Not only do I feel €180 more like myself. I also feel €180 more attractive.
But were my glasses worth it? By this measure. No.
And, to be fair, it would be hard to push the needle as much as it they would need to in order to qualify. I look like myself, sure, but I also look like myself /without/ the glasses. The glasses don't make me look €300 /more/ like myself. Nor do they make me look €300 more attractive.
They look like glasses. And I look like a guy who needs them to see.
Does that mean that I shouldn't have bought them? Maybe. I'm sure there are glasses that could make me feel more of both of these things. But €300 more? Probably not. I think for glasses the maximum improvement in either of those fields maxes out at around €100. Which, coincidentally, is how much the frames cost by themselves. (The additional €200 is because of the Zeiss lenses).
Is this a bulletproof theory? Probably not. But it's a functional one. Next time I'm deciding on any sort of aesthetic investment, I'm going to ask the question: "Does this make me feel €[xx] more like myself or €[xx] more attractive?"
Because those are both things worth paying for. And it's also an easy way to understand if something is over or under valued.