Raindance's Journal: Logical Elegance and its worth

I just came back from coffee with a friend, and we came up with an interesting theory/analogy about what a theory's 'logical elegance' means.

By 'Logical Elegance' I mean two things:
- Simplicity
- Scope of application (which I will be focusing on)

The context is that I'm revising a philosophy paper for (ideally) future professional publication. The paper presents various Models of Philosophy to explain the purpose and place of analytic philosophy in the intellectual community. (If anyone would like a current copy of the paper for review, I'd love to send it- and love even more to get comments back. Email me with the subject 'Models of Philosophy' if so.)

In a recent conversation it came to my attention that these five models of analytic philosophy could elegantly be applied to existential philosophy with only a minor twist.

What I *want* to conclude is that my five models of philosophy are stronger for this.

Can I? Well, over coffee this analogy came up:

A woman has five dresses. She has a dress for every occasion and no unneeded dresses. Her aesthetic sense is 'elegant'. Her aesthetic sense is better than it would be if she didn't have such a set of dresses.

Now, suppose she goes to a different country, having a different culture-- and she still has a dress for every occasion and no unneeded dresses. Wouldn't her aesthetic sense be more 'elegant' and hence better than if her dresses only worked in one culture?

Now, models are not so much correct/incorrect as applicable/inapplicable and elegant/inelegant. Thus, the worth of the woman's aesthetic sense and the worth of a set of models is linked- the valuations seem almost identical.

An aethetic sense which functions in multiple cultures would be better than one which only functions in one; likewise, a set of models which are applicable in multiple contexts is better than a set only applicable in one.

I think it works.