Poll: Objective Quality

[2012 Wont Happen]

While bored, skimming the Escapist, Cracked, Funnyjunk and Facebook, avoiding doing my Chemistry assignment due at 5 p.m. tomorrow, I began to wonder:

Is there such a thing as objective quality?

My example of this is Eddy Van Halen.

I do not like 80's style rock, the genre that he played. His backup band was pretty awful at times. I don't particularly like the way his music sounds. However, the idea of saying that he was bad seems absolutely ludicrous to me. While the style of music he played is not one I care for, he was a great guitarist. Quite likely to the degree where the statement "Eddy Van Halen" was a good guitarist is not a subjective opinion, but an objective fact.

So, my question is this: Do you think there is such a thing as objective quality? Are there people who are objectively good at what they do, regardless of personal bias or taste?

 

[Biosophilogical]

Depends. Does objective quality include unopinionated subjectivity? If it does then only something which is perfect at what it does would be of 'good quality' because anything else which performed the same role (let's say 'screwdrivers') would be of poor quality in relation to the perfect screwdriver. If objective quality is about whether or not it does what it is meant to successfully then yes, there is objective quality. For example, if a screwdriver that is meant to last 10, 000 screw ins/outs and lasts 15, 000, then it is good quality by its own standards (and its standards are objective in that they are constant regardless of any differing views or opinions.)

 

[Gigano]

I think there's certainly "objective" quality in regard to various aspects used to judge a product or person.

For instance, I subjectively did not care much for LBP, but recognized that the production values were high, and the game pretty family friendly (both "qualities"), nor did I like Killzone 2 much, yet recognized that the graphics of that game were (especially at the time) of the highest quality.

Since a thing only holds "quality" in regard to what it's supposed to be and do though, the term itself is pretty fragmented, even if it can be objective in those (many) regards. And that a thing is indeed of fine quality does of course not mean you can't subjectively dislike it to no end.

 

[zen5887]

Pop music is a pretty good example of this.

I am a firm believe in the fact that you can look at a pop song objectively.