Taste:

Taste comes primarily from perception (sentience) ... the word ‘aesthetics’ is derived from the Greek ‘aisthētikos’, from ‘aisthēta’ (meaning ‘things perceptible by the senses’), which comes from ‘aisthesthai’ (meaning ‘perceive’).

Thus aesthetics are, fundamentally, based upon the human body and its relationship with the environment at large: this flesh and blood body, for instance, is of the male gender; has a heterosexual orientation; is of Caucasian stock; and is 6' 2" high and weighs 12.5 stone ... change any of those bodily characteristics and aesthetic appreciation alters accordingly.

Further to that point, the quality, quantity and disposition of photosensitive receptors called rods (about 130 million cells which detect size, shape, brightness and movement) and cones (about 7 million cells which detect fine detail and colour) in the retinas varies from body to body and affects visual appreciation ... colour blindness being the most obvious instance. Similarly for auditory appreciation the range of frequency (hertz), or pitch, and intensity of tone (decibels), or loudness, can vary from person-to-person ... the phrase ‘tone-deaf’ bespeaks of the most extreme example. Also gastronomic appreciation (flavour) depends not only upon the quality, quantity and disposition of the taste buds (papillae) on the tongue, palate and throat/ larynx but upon the olfactory and tactile receptors as well – flavour is actually a combination of texture, temperature, taste and smell (the coolness of peppermint, the ‘bite’ of mustard or pepper, the warmth of cloves, and the astringency of spinach are all tactile, or touch, sensations of the lips, tongue and mouth in general) – and a surprisingly large number of people have some degree of ‘taste-blindness’.

Consequently, just as I do not even attempt to adjudge anybody according to my tastes (the aesthetic appreciation which this flesh and blood body enjoys), when someone seeks to impose their tastes on me – which also includes instinctual drives and, most likely, unexamined cultural aesthetics/fashionable vogues as well – it all slides off me like water off a duck’s back.

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Gastronomic Appreciation:

gastronomic appreciation (flavour) depends ... upon the olfactory receptors as well:

For example: a blind-folded person with pegged nostrils cannot ascertain just what a mouthful of powdered cinnamon is.

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Which also includes instinctual drives:

There is more to real-world taste than the bodily characteristics ... much, much more: ugliness, for just one example (ugly=of unpleasant or unsightly appearance; repulsive, objectionable or displeasing in any way ~ Collins English Dictionary), has as much to do with feeling disgust (repulsion/ repugnance/ revulsion) as anything else – feeling disgusted by a fetidity (a.k.a. a fetor or fetidness) for instance – and thus plays its part in determining what is felt to be beautiful (alluring/ enticing/ desirable) ... this taste-distaste dichotomy has its origins in the biological imperative (in the basic attraction-aversion instinctual impulse).

‘Tis not for nothing that aesthetic appreciation is commonly referred to as ‘taste’ ... it is an appetitive appreciation at root.

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