the dove is the name for a standard subject in christian art.
the dove is the name for a standard subject in christian art.
the name for a standard subject in christian art?
the dove
the coronation of the virgin or coronation of mary is a subject in christian art, especially popular in italy in the 13th to 15th centuries, but continuing in popularity until the 18th century and beyond. christ, sometimes accompanied by god the father and the holy spirit in the form of a dove, places a crown on the head of mary as queen of heaven. in early versions the setting is a heaven imagined as an earthly court, staffed by saints and angels; in later versions heaven is more often seen as in the sky, with the figures seated on clouds. the subject is also notable as one where the whole christian trinity is often shown together, sometimes in unusual ways. although crowned virgins may be seen in orthodox christian icons, the coronation by the deity is not. mary is sometimes shown, in both eastern and western christian art, being crowned by one or two angels, but this is considered a different subject.
coronation of the virgin
a famous author of conceptual analysis at its best is bertrand russell's theory of descriptions. russell attempted to analyze propositions that involved "definite descriptions" (such as "the tallest spy"), which pick out a unique individual, and "indefinite descriptions" (such as "a spy"), which pick out a set of individuals. take russell's analysis of definite descriptions as an example. superficially, definite descriptions have the standard subject-predicate form of a proposition. for example, "the present king of france is bald" appears to be predicating "baldness" of the subject "the present king of france". however, russell noted that this is problematic, because there is no present king of france (france is no longer a monarchy). normally, to decide whether a proposition of the standard subject-predicate form is true or false, one checks whether the subject is in the extension of the predicate. the proposition is then true if and only if the subject is in the extension of the predicate. the problem is that there is no present king of france, so the present king of france cannot be found on the list of bald things or non-bald things. so, it would appear that the proposition expressed by "the present king of france is bald" is neither true nor false. however, analyzing the relevant concepts and propositions, russell proposed that what definite descriptions really express are not propositions of the subject-predicate form, but rather they express existentially quantified propositions. thus, "the present king of france" is "analyzed", according to russell's theory of descriptions, as "there exists an individual who is currently the king of france, there is only one such individual, and that individual is bald." now one can determine the truth value of the proposition. indeed, it is false, because it is not the case that there exists a unique individual who is currently the king of france and is bald—since there is no present king of france (bertolet 1999).
philosophical analysis