The Greatest Of All Time
The Greatest of all Time is the ongoing fight for every generation — I suppose for the reason laid out here
Of course nobody really care about bad art, other than avoiding it. About Art one only wants to know if it is good
And if all one really cares about is knowing if the art is good or not knowing if the art is the absolute best is the perfect example of this, everybody must essentially want to know what is the best just because that is what one should read, listen to, or see first.
Of course also people argue about what is the best, for obvious reasons, but also because people often are unable to consider that something may be good if it is not to their taste. People only ever argue for the greatness of things that they like, some few may be able to acknowledge that something is good despite not liking it, but there is nobody so perverse that they would argue for the greatness of works they actively dislike.
Given these factors and others we see that the idea of an overarching Greatest cannot be accepted, there may a be a greatest in any particular field for one particular property, but it cannot be that one is greatest in all things, the world is too big and varied -with too many beings in it — for that to be the case.
This point was also made in recent articles rethinking how Musical listicles should function
Hey remember the article Sincerity Beats Absurdity To Death! Well, you should probably go read it because I’m gonna keep linking it until someone does. Anyway here is a quote from the article:
as I like to say once you get to the top there is no greatest, there are a number of greats up there orbiting each other, individual but informing each other through that individuality.
Now I really mean that, and I think it is an essential quality of a critic to realize that at some point our human tendency to rank fails, is not able to capture every possible condition or requirement. If you ask me my 10 favorite songs at any point there will be variance, even though there is some underlying unity.
And if it is true that there is no absolute top it implies that there is no absolute middle or bottom, there are works or artists that hover at those positions as well.
It is just not possible that there. can be a Greatest of All Time in any particular discipline, because disciplines are composed of greatly varying component parts, and each component part is affected by their environments, to be the greatest fighter in a fight that goes to the swift is to be the swiftest, but to be the greatest fighter in a fight that goes to the strong is to be the strongest in that fight, and to be the greatest writer in comedic verse makes it highly unlikely you can write the greatest tragical verse.
Muhammed Ali lost fights to people at one time that he won later or that he had won before, no ability stays equal through all time
There are many people who struggle and rise to the top of the mountain, but at the top of the mountain and looking over the world they then do not climb any higher by fighting to balance atop each other’s shoulders.
They have gone as far as they can, and are essentially at the same level.
There is no greatest of all time.
The original framing of this article was taken from the notebooks of IG Agent 81 written while still a student at Stanford, with some additions and notes by IG Agent 13.
