Aesthetic Pleasure and Harmony

According to Kant, the source of Pleasure in Aesthetic experience is a "harmony" that is an ingredient in the contemplation of Beauty.  However, his analysis of the experience reveals two such harmonies--that between Imagination and Understanding, and that between that interplay and the object of Beauty.  So, his precise attribution of Pleasure likewise vacillates between those two possible harmonies, e. g. both possibilities are plainly cited in part VII of the Introduction to the 3rd Critique.  Now, regardless of how he conceives the two harmonies as systematically related, e. g. as identical, or as one derived from the other, it is latter type that is paradigmatic in his theory.  For, it is only a comparison of the object with subjective processes that is a representation that is exclusive to Reflective Judgment, and it is only insofar as the object is judged as designed to stimulate those processes that it is 'Purposive'.  But, if the main thesis of his Aesthetic Theory is 'The contemplation of Beauty is constituted by a Reflective Judgment that derives Pleasure from the seeming role of the object of Beauty as stimulating subjective cognitive faculties', it is unclear if the claim is factual or normative.  If factual, it seems plainly false, because Beauty has been contemplated over the centuries without that dimension entering into the enjoyment, and, if normative, the requisite criterion would convert all judgments of Taste to Determinative ones, contrary to the fundamental premises of the theory.  Furthermore, the particular implication that the enjoyment of human-made Art is Purposive is false--at least many artists devise their products with an audience in mind, which means that such objects of Beauty are 'purposeful', not 'purposive'.  So, the attribution of Aesthetic Pleasure to a Purposiveness that is conceived only in Reflective Judgment, seems to serve only one function in Kant's theory--as preparation for conceiving Happiness as a divine reward, a Theological function that, as has been previously argued, and as this analysis confirms, is extrinsic to Aesthetic appreciation

Undeserved Pleasure and Deserved Happiness

While the title of #59 of the 3rd Critique is "Of Beauty as the Symbol of Morality", in the body of the section it is, more precisely, the "morally good" that Kant characterizes as the object of that symbol.  But, the implicit equation between Morality and the Good, i. e. between the principle of Pure Practical Reason and Happiness Proportionate to Virtue, conflates two concepts that are sharply distinguished in the 2nd Critique, an imprecision that is typical of the entire section, e. g. the cryptic reference to God, and the scattershot explanation of the proposed analogy between Beauty and Morality.  Now, insofar as Pleasure is produced by the contemplation of random natural formations, it can be characterized as an 'undeserved', indeterminate, event.  However, if such Pleasure were conceived as a reward, then it would be a 'deserved', determinate, event.  So, absent an alternative explanation from the Kant, the precise analogy between Beauty and the Good that his doctrine systematically entails is that between Undeserved Pleasure and Deserved Happiness.

Aesthetics Without Theology

In #58 of the Critique of Judgment, Kant explains how the process of "crystallization" can account for the production of natural Beauty, without the involvement of a "purpose" to serve as a concept in that production.  So, insofar, as "nature gives the rule to" (#46) the human production of Art, a human artist is, likewise guided, purposelessly and without a concept, in the creative process.  Finally, at #61, Kant cites the fundamental characteristics of Beauty as "diversity and unity".  So, these three passages, taken together, provide a basis for a theory of Beauty as objective and concept-less, i. e. 'X is beautiful' denotes the configuration of Diversity and Unity in X.  Thus, Aesthetic Judgment can be neither Determinative nor Reflective, which means, notably, that the Antinomy of Taste can be resolved without recourse to Reflective Judgment.  But, the latter is the entry in the presented theory to the supersensible realm, and, hence, to the theological premises that condition the theory.  So, from within Kant's system, there is the potential for an Aesthetic Theory that is independent of his theological commitments.

Aesthetics and Theology

As has been previously discussed, Kant previews, in the 1st Critique, beginning at B833, the 3rd Critique as an answer to the question "If I do what I ought to do, what may I then hope?'  Now, that 'hope' is a cognition, the object of which is Happiness, a natural event that entail two references to the Supersensible realm.  First, it is proportionate to Virtue, and second, its cause is God.  So, a primary task of the Critique of Aesthetic Judgment, in particular, is to establish a transcendental basis for that synthetic cognition.  As it turns out, that basis is Reflective Judgment, from which both references are derived.  First, it isolates, in the contemplation of the analogical presentations of Beauty, a proportionality between Imagination and Understanding.  Second, it projects, via its concept of Purposiveness, God as the ultimate source of objects of Beauty.  For, God is the creator of Nature, and all Beauty, even human-made, to which "nature gives the rule", as he asserts, at #46 of the 3rd Critique, is fundamentally a product of Nature.  Thus, for Kant, the cultivation of Aesthetic appreciation is a part of religious training, as defined by his concept of Moral Theology.

Teleology and Theology

Kant's characterization of the concluding sections of the 3rd Critique, starting at #79, as an "Appendix", suggests that the main theme of that section, Moral Theology, is an extrinsic afterthought with respect to the study of Teleology that precedes it.  However, a preview of that Critique that he presents in the 1st Critique indicates that, quite to the contrary, the inverse is his priority.  For, there, he projects the completion of the Critical trilogy as answering the question "If I do what I ought to do, what may I then hope?" (B833), via a presentation of Nature as a system of the "purposive unity of all things" (B843), which "in its widest extension becomes a physico-theology." (B844)  In other words, as fascinating as it is, his examination, in the 3rd Critique, of the role that Teleology plays in the development of Natural Science, is, qua part of his system, no more than an extrinsic prelude to his explanation of how the object of Hope--Happiness, which is a natural event, can be conceived as purposive, i. e. as a reward, the cause of which is a God, the existence of which is necessarily posited by Reason, according to the 2nd Critique.

Poetic Justice and Reflective Moral Judgment

While the object of the observation 'X deserved that', either a happy or an unhappy event, is often characterized as 'poetic justice'. and is a source of pleasure to the detached observer, it is a Judgment that cannot be classified as 'Aesthetic' in Kant's system.  For, regardless of the 'poetic' rubric, it is not an attribution of Beauty to a work of Art.  Furthermore, as pleasurable, and as referring to a singular event, it cannot be classified as 'Teleological' in the system, either.  Instead, it is a 'Moral' Judgment, but one that is distinct from 'X deserves such-and-such', in which a specific consequence is derived from a given general rule.  Thus, it is not a 'Determinate' Judgment, according to the system.  Rather, since it supplies a singular natural event with a possible purposive rule that governs its occurrence, the Judgment is 'Reflective', in the system.  In other words, so-called 'poetic justice' is the object of what, according to Kant's system is a Reflective Moral Judgment, even if he seems to overlook the possibility of that kind of Judgment.

Spirit, Art, Morality, God

Appearing in #59 of the Critique of Judgment, Kant's cryptic reference to "something that is neither nature nor freedom . . . in which the theoretical and the practical powers are in an unknown manner combined", seems a surprising development in a system that is generally presented as dualistic.  However, the referent of the passage is likely the 'God' of the 2nd Critique, the existence of which is posited in order to account for the possibility of Freedom having causal efficacy in Nature.  Furthermore, a similarly cryptic allusion to a "supreme understanding", in #78 of the 3rd Critique, tends to support that hypothesis.  Thus, in the context of an explanation that Art is conditioned by Morality, the passage can be interpreted as containing a veiled subordination of creative Spirit to theological premises, Kant's derivation of which from Reason is, as has been previously argued here, questionable.