I think this actually illustrates the author's point and gets at the heart of the cultural malaise we are experiencing. If everything is subjective, nothing can be improved because nothing can be better than something else.
But this isn't the case.
The Mona Lisa is objectively better than anything I have ever painted.
Architecture is no different.
Some buildings quite literally are better than others and we can scientifically study this [1]. We can recognize that all opinions are valid, but that some are better than others. We do this in daily life too, if you are in the ER and the trauma team comes and tells you their opinion on your condition, you will value that opinion over the opinion of the person outside waiting for a ride. Art, music, architecture - no different.
Tens of millions of people visit the Notre Dame Cathedral.
Why?
Religious reasons of course, but many visit simply to marvel at the wonderful architecture. Contrast that with Rocky City Church [2] here in Columbus where I live. A big, bland, gray "modern" building that as our standards have dropped to nothing (remember everything is subjective so nothing can be better than anything else) we have come to accept as the norm.
This is the Nobody Cares phase of not just architecture but society as well.
[1] https://annsussman.com
[2]https://rockcitychurch.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/1.pngNo it isn't. If I saw one of your paintings and liked it better, there would be no way for you to prove me wrong. My opinion might be highly unpopular, but that wouldn't make it objectively incorrect.
Well, no, a better quarterback is just a member of a team. They don't dictate whether the team wins or not, they just contribute to it if they are good. Though we can't say whether a given quarterback is good or not because we don't have objective criteria to determine that. It's all relative and arbitrary - as I'm sure you'd agree with.
> What does a better painting do—win art contests?
Maybe? Why not?
> Judged by what objective criteria? Art doesn't have rules the way football does.
Football rules are arbitrary criteria, not objective.
> A painting can't "win at being art";
Why not? The Mona Lisa has the most viewers so maybe that means it is the best art?
Some cities are more beautiful than others. Prague is more beautiful than Detroit.
That said, a few posts back a commenter mentioned that the Mona Lisa is "objectively better" than anything they made; while I won't comment on aesthetics and appreciation, the assertion that the artist is more skilled in the arts than the poster is something definitely objectively true, simply because of education and experience. That's no guarantee that the outcome is better, but still.
If you look at historical architecture patterns (mostly pre-WWI) they mirror how art has changed over time.
It's not that Impressionism came about and Renaissance became shit, it's that both are good and important stylistic contributions.
It's not that Gothic architecture came about then all the Romanesque stuff sucked. Both were good and unique.
We run into the same problem as "all art is equal" when we tend to express the belief that because we live in the time period we're complaining about that if only we waited a few hundred years we would recognize that our current building patterns are actually really good. That's just not the case.
"Ugly architecture" is subjective. A lot of architects care very much, but they follow the academic line and lack the imagination and empathy to understand why elements of that aesthetic are unpopular and impractical - a completely different problem, even if it causes related outcomes.
Bugs are easy to write and hard to fix. MBA culture as a whole is fixated on quick extractive shareholder returns, not on celebrating supreme engineering quality. MBAs care very much too, but not about the things the author (and probably most of us) care about.
Some people do care but are simply not good at their jobs.
Even if you do care, people will assume you don't. Anyone who's done direct customer facing work or even just sold stuff online will know that people love to nitpick.
And so on.
The problem is narcissism vs empathy. Caring means trying to have some insight the experience of others. Narcissism is on a scale from blank unawareness of others to outright hostility, whether overt or covert.
There's a lot more of the latter than the former around at the moment, and corporate and economic values provide some conveniently expedient justifications for it.