Sunday, February 3, 2013

Contemplation, Beauty, Communicability

According to Kant, 'X is beautiful' means 'The private pleasure that attends the contemplation of X is universally communicable", with the 'contemplation of X' consisting in an interaction of Imagination and Understanding.  In contrast, according to Schopenhauer, Contemplation is an event entailing loss of subjectivity.  On that basis, any subsequent evaluation of X that is based on a private feeling is antithetical to the engagement with X that precedes it.  Now, Kant's Aesthetic theory, which is formulated entirely in terms of the cognitive faculties, lacks the resources for disputing Schopenhauer's description of that moment, on either factual or interpretive grounds.  Thus, even if the pleasure that attends the contemplation of X is universally communicable, Kant's meaning of 'X is beautiful', is not.

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