What an interesting question!  Because another respondent began with the
Greek and Latin perspectives on authenticity, I wondered if I might
indulge in the views of a few more philosophers.

The sixteenth century brought profound changes in production technology
which had significant ramifications on social and philosophical thought.
 The french philosopher Descartes  (1596-1650) summed it up this way:  we
cannot accept anything as being true unless we can clearly and distinctly
perceive it.  To achieve this can require the breaking down of a compound
problem into as many single factors as possible.  Then we can take our
point of departure in the simplest idea of all.  This sounds like the
Latin interpretation of "original" where the object is merely the point
of departure for an authentic experience.  Incidentally, Descartes
thought there were very few things that could be clearly and distinctly
perceived beyond the existence of the self and that of God or some
perfect being (longer discussion not relevant here).

David Hume (1711-76)  believed that we receive information in one of two
ways: impressions and ideas.  Impressions are immediate, you burn
yourself on a hot stove and feel pain.  Afterwards you can recollect that
you burned yourself -- this recollection he called idea.  The difference
between an impression and an idea is that an impression is stronger and
livlier than your reflective memory of that impression.  You could say
that the sensation is the original and that the idea, or reflection, is a
pale imitation.  Mind you, neither the impression or idea is an absolute.
 I never see the object -- innate in its entirety.  I receive an
impression of the object (first layer of interpretation) and later
remember the idea of the that impression (second layer of interpretation)
but I always start with one foot on the stairway so to speak.   All of
our knowledge of the world comes through sensations but sensations are
produced by us, not the world of objects around us.

Immanual Kant (and I swear this is the last one) took Hume's empiricism
one step further by  making a clear delineation between "the thing in
itself" and "the thing for me."  He agreed that we can never have a
certain knowledge about things "in themselves."  We can only know how
things "appear to us."  On the other hand, he also believed that prior to
seeing any object, our perceptions would be shaped by our capacity for
reason, innate to all people.  This innate reason includes our need to
see objects as products of time and space (for the museum field the
question might be asked, which time and which space -- at time of
creation, subsequent use, collection, or display.  Regardless, we see
objects as products of time and space) and the need to identify causes
for events.  Rarely do we look at an object without asking a why question
"why was it made"  "why these materials" "why this form" "why this time"

The original question about authenticity is an interesting introduction
to not only how people see objects in museums -- but how they see objects
in general.

Thanks.  I'll step down now.

Michelle L. Craig
Traveling Psychology Exhibition
Washington, DC
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