For example, threading a needle, playing a video game, or witnessing a flash of lightning. Although these can be extremely concentrated experiences for the duration of the activity, threading a needle, seeing lightning strike, or playing a video game rarely involve as much time spent in contemplation of the experience or reaction to the experience as, say, the experience of death. While these experiences appear to involve intense concentration while the activity is taking place, outwardly visible concentration is only a very little bit of the effect of an experience. The concentration involved in the examples I mentioned is of lesser duration, if not lesser intensity, than that involved in our greatest life experiences. Therefore we are correct in not considering those experiences to have significant aesthetic quality.
Concentration is the only universal defining characteristic of aesthetic experience.
The intensity and duration of the concentration on the experience can be used to determine the quality of the aesthetic experience. The positive aesthetic experience The positive aesthetic experience is concentration on an experience in which there is no desire for greater control of the experience. I support this idea by discussing the negative aesthetic experience, then I give examples of the positive aesthetic experience. Briefly let us consider the negative aesthetic experience. In the most depressed or terrifying times of our life we are not content with our situation.