Subjective Universality: Kant and Burke on the Beautiful and the Sublime - PowerPoint Presentation

Slide1

Subjective Universality: Kant and Burke on the Beautiful and the Sublime

Brian Dominguez Berry

30 April 2018

Slide2

Kant’s Claim

“There must be attached to the judgment of taste, with the consciousness of an abstraction in it from a all interest, a claim to validity for everyone without the universality that pertains to objects, i.e., it must be combined with a claim to

subjective universality

” (Kant,

Critique of the Power of Judgement

97).

Slide3

Overview Kant’s Claim

Key Terms

Philosophical Precedents (Baumgarten, Aristotle, Longinus)

Burke on the Beautiful and the Sublime

Kant on the Beautiful and the Sublime

Slide4

Anti-Kant

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

De gustibus non est disputandum

: In matters of taste there can be no disputes.

Preferences are subjective/relative.

The subjective is particular.

Only objective concepts can be universal.

Slide5

Key Terms

Aesthetic (Gk αἰσθητικός): pertaining to feeling or the senses (sense perception).

Judgement: an assertion or proposition (any linguistic or metalinguistic expression).

A priori (Lt “from the earlier”): something known from reason alone, e.g. independent of experience.

A posteriori (Lt “from the later”): something known only after experience.

Slide6

Alexander Baumgarten

Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (1714–62)

German Philosopher

“Philosophical Considerations of Some Matters Concerning the Poem” (1735)

Aesthetica

(1750)

Slide7

Baumgarten on Aesthetics

“The Greek philosophers and the Church fathers have always

carefully distinguished between the

aistheta

[objects of sense]

and the

noeta

[objects of thought]…

noeta

are the object of logic,

the

aistheta

are the subject of the

episteme aisthetike

or

AESTHETICS [the science of perception]” (Baumgarten,

Meditationes

§CXVI).

Slide8

Aristotle on the Universality of Poetry

“The distinction between historian and poet is not in the one writing prose and the other verse—you might put the work of Herodotus into verse, and it would still be a species of history; it consists really in this, that the one describes the thing that has been, and the other a kind of thing that might be.

Hence poetry is something more philosophic and of graver import than history, since its statements are of the nature rather of universals, whereas those of history are singulars. By a universal statement I mean one as to what such or such a kind of man will probably or necessarily say or do

—which is the aim of poetry, though it affixes proper names to the characters; by a singular statement, one as to what, say, Alcibiades did or had done to him” (Aristotle,

Poetics

§9).

Slide9

Longinus’s Sublime

The Sublime, wherever it occurs, consists in a certain

loftiness and excellence of language

, and that it is by this, and this only, that the greatest poets and prose-writers have gained eminence, and won themselves a lasting place in the Temple of Fame.

A lofty passage does not convince the reason of the reader, but takes him out of himself.

That which is admirable ever confounds our judgment, and eclipses that which is merely reasonable or agreeable. To believe or not is usually in our own power; but

the Sublime, acting with an imperious and irresistible force, sways every reader whether he will or no.

(On the Sublime)

Slide10

Universal Sublime in Longinus

It is proper to observe that in human life nothing is truly great which is despised by

all elevated minds.

….

It is natural to us to feel our souls lifted up by the true Sublime, and conceiving a sort of generous exultation to be filled with joy and pride,

as though we had ourselves originated the ideas which we read.

But when a passage is pregnant in suggestion, when it is hard, nay impossible, to distract the attention from it, and when it takes a strong and lasting hold on the memory, then we may be sure that we have lighted on the true Sublime. In general we may regard those words as truly noble and sublime which always please and please all readers. For when the same book always

produces the same impression on all who read it

, whatever be the difference in their pursuits, their manner of life, their aspirations, their ages, or their language, such a harmony of opposites gives irresistible authority to their favourable verdict. (Longinus

On the Sublime

)

Slide11

Edmund Burke (1730–97)

Irish Philosopher and Statesman.

Criticized the British treatment of the American colonies.

Opposed the French Revolution.

Slide12

The Sublime and the Beautiful

Burke’s 1757 treatise was the first to clearly and completely separate the sublime and beautiful into separate categories.

In the tradition of the English philosophical treatise, particularly inspired by Locke’s empiricism.

Inspired Kant’s

Critique of the Power of Judgement.

Slide13

Discovering the Human Mind Through the Passions

“The first and the simplest emotion which we discover in the human mind, is Curiosity.

By curiosity, I mean whatever desire we have for, or whatever pleasure we take in, novelty

….But as those things, which engage us merely by their novelty, cannot attach us for any length of time, curiosity is the most superficial of all the affections; it changes its object perpetually…

Curiosity blends itself more or less with all our passions

.” (Burke,

The Sublime and the Beautiful

I.1)

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Independence of Pain and Pleasure

“It seems then

necessary towards moving the passions

of people advanced in life to any considerable degree, that the objects designed for that purpose, besides their being in some measure new, should be capable of exciting pain or pleasure from other causes.” (Burke I.2)

“For my part, I am rather inclined to imagine, that

pain and pleasure

, in their most simple and natural manner of affecting, are each of a

positive nature

, and by no means necessarily dependent on each other for their existence. The human mind is often, and I think it is for the most part, in a state neither of pain

nor pleasure, which I call a state of

indifference

.” (Burke I.2)

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Removal of Pain ≠ Pleasure

“I own it is not at first view so apparent, that

the removal of a

great pain does not resemble positive pleasure

; but let us recollect

in what state we have found our minds upon escaping some

imminent danger, or on being released from the severity of some

cruel pain. We have on such occasions found, if I am not much

mistaken, the temper of our minds in a tenor very remote from

that which attends the presence of positive pleasure; we have

found them in a state of much

sobriety

, impressed with a sense of

awe

, in a sort of

tranquillity shadowed with horror

.” (Burke I.3)

Slide16

Delight as Technical Term

“

The affection is undoubtedly positive; but the cause

may be, as in this case it certainly is, a sort of

Privation

….Very extraordinary it would be, if these affections, so distinguishable in their causes, so different in their effects, should be confounded with each other, because vulgar use has ranged them under the same general title. Whenever I have occasion to speak of this species of

relative pleasure

, I call it

Delight

; and I shall take the best care I can to use that word in no other sense.” (Burke I.4)

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The Power of the Sublime

“The passions therefore which are conversant about the

preservation of the individual

turn chiefly on pain and danger, and they are the most powerful of all the passions….

Whatever is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of

pain and danger

, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner

analogous to terror

, is a source of the

sublime

; that is, it is

productive of the strongest emotion

which the mind is capable of feeling.” (Burke I.6–7)

Slide18

Natural and Sexual Selection

“The passions belonging to the preservation of the individual turn wholly on

pain and danger

: those which belong to generation have their origin in

gratifications and pleasures

.” (Burke I.8)

We might take Burke’s distinction between the psychological origin of the sublime and the beautiful as a precursor to Darwin’s natural and sexual selection.

Slide19

The capacity for the beautiful and the sublime

Darwin asks: Why does a species look like this?

Burke asks: Why do we have the capacity for beauty in the first place?

Slide20

Pursuit of Pleasure

“

The generation of mankind is a great purpose

, and it is requisite that men should be animated to the pursuit of it by some great incentive. It is therefore attended with a very high pleasure; but as

it is by no means designed to be our constant business

, it is not fit that the absence of this pleasure should be attended with any considerable pain.” (Burke I.9)

Slide21

Back to Aristotle: Sympathy and Delight

“

Terror

is a passion which always produces delight when it does not press too closely; and

pity

is a passion accompanied with pleasure, because it arises from love and social affection.” (Burke I.9)

“We have a degree of

delight

, and that no small one, in the

real misfortunes and pains of others

…. Do we not read the authentic histories of

scenes of this nature with as much pleasure as romances or poems, where the incidents are fictitious?” (Burke I.9)

Slide22

Are you not entertained?

“In imitated distresses the only difference is the pleasure resulting from the effects of imitation; for it is never so perfect, but we can perceive it is imitation, and on that principle are somewhat pleased with it.” (Burke I.15)

“It is absolutely necessary my life should be

out of any imminent hazard

, before I can take a delight in the sufferings of others, real or imaginary.” (Burke I.15)

Slide23

Back to Aristotle: Imitation

“For as sympathy makes us take a concern in whatever men feel, so this affection prompts us to copy whatever they do; and consequently we have a pleasure in imitating…. It is by imitation far more than by precept, that we learn everything; and what we learn thus, we acquire not only more effectually, but more pleasantly.” (Burke I.16)

“When the object represented in poetry or painting is such as we could have

no desire of seeing in the reality

, then I may be sure that its power in poetry or painting is owing to the power of imitation, and to no cause operating in the thing itself.” (Burke I.16)

Slide24

Obscurity as Source of the Sublime

Henri Fuseli, The Nightmare (1781)

“When we know the full extent of any danger, when we can accustom our eyes to it, a great deal of the apprehension vanishes. Every one will be sensible of this, who considers

how greatly night adds to our dread

, in all cases of danger, and how much the notions of ghosts and goblins, of which

none can form clear ideas

, affect minds which give credit to the popular tales concerning such sorts of beings.” (Burke II.3)

Slide25

The Obscurity of Language

If I make a drawing

of a palace, or a temple, or a landscape, I present a very

clear idea of those objects

; but then (allowing for the effect of imitation, which is something) my picture can at most affect only as the palace, temple, or landscape would have affected in the reality. On the other hand,

the most lively and spirited verbal description I can give raises a very obscure and imperfect idea of such objects

; but then it is in my power to raise a stronger emotion by the description than I could do by the best painting. This experience constantly evinces.

The proper manner of conveying the affections of the mind from one to another, is by words

; there is a great insufficiency in all other methods of communication…. In reality, a great clearness helps but little towards affecting the passions.” (Burke II.3)

Slide26

The Boundless Sublime

“The ideas of

eternity and infinity

are among the most affecting we have; and yet perhaps there is nothing of which we really understand so little.” (Burke II.4)

“

Hardly anything can strike the mind with its greatness, which does not make some sort of approach towards infinity;

which nothing can do whilst we are able to perceive its bounds; but to see an object distinctly, and to perceive its bounds, is one and the same thing. A clear idea is therefore another name for a little idea.” (Burke II.4)

Slide27

Beautiful

Sublime

Small

Vaste in dimensions

Smooth and Polished

Great, Rugged, and Negligent

Shuns Right Lines (Angles)

Sometimes Angular

Not Obscure

Dark and Gloomy

Light and Delicate

Solid and Massive

Founded on Pleasure

Founded on Pain

Slide28

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)

Central figure of modern German philosophy whose work continues to inform all fields of philosophy.

His three principle works, the three Critiques, cover the fields of epistemology, ethics, and aesthetics.

Brought about a “Copernican” revolution in philosophy, wherein the human mind is seen to shape our experience of the world.

Slide29

Kant’s Three Critiques

Title

Topic

Faculty

Key Idea

Critique of Pure Reason (1781)

Epistemology

cognition

Our knowledge of the world is conditioned by our cognitive faculties.

Critique of Practical Reason (1788)

Ethics

desire

Act according to the maxim that you would will to be a universal law.

Critique of the Power of Judgement (1790)

Aesthetics

pleasure and displeasure

Judgments of taste make a claim to subjective universality.

Slide30

Critique of Pure Reason (1781)

Kant’s magnum opus and the principle work of modern epistemology.

Often seen to reconcile the empiricist and idealist strains of European philosophy, addressing both Descartes’s skepticism of the existence of the world, and Hume’s skepticism of inductive knowledge (causality).

Responds to skepticism with what is variously considered a Copernican revolution or a Kantian compromise: we forego our claim to knowledge of things-in-themselves (noumena) for our knowledge of phenomena which is determined by our cognitive capacities (synthetic a priori).

Slide31

Types of Knowledge

a priori

a posteriori

Slide32

Critique of Practical Reason (1788)

The compliment to the first critique, which deals with theoretical reason, the second critique deals with practical reason, our capacity to decide how to act.

Best known for its categorical imperative: Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.

Slide33

Critique of the Power of Judgement (1790)

Kant’s so-called third critique informs and unifies the first two critiques, even though it is not clear that Kant had conceived it as he was drafting the first two critiques.

Although held in high esteem by Kant himself as one of his central works, the third critique puzzled Kant’s contemporaries, since it deals with aesthetic experience and judgement, which were not generally taken to be possible objects of rigorous philosophical inquiry.

Slide34

The Antinomy of Determinism and Free Will

The reason the first two critiques need unifying is that they elaborate a fundamental antinomy in our thinking about human thought and action: whether it is entirely determined by external causes or the result of individual free will.

Theoretical philosophy or the philosophy of nature (1st Critique) falls within the domain of the Understanding, which operates according to determinism.

Practical philosophy or the philosophy of action (2nd Critique) falls within the domain of Reason, which operates within the concept of freed will.

Our capacity for Judgement overlaps with both the Understanding and Reason.

Slide35

The Problem as Stated in the 3rd Critique

“The

concept of nature certainly makes its objects representable in intuition, but not as things in themselves

, rather as mere appearances, while the

concept of freedom in its object makes a thing representable in itself but not in the intuition

, and thus neither of the two can provide a theoretical cognition of its object (and even of the thinking subject) as a thing in itself, which would be the supersensible, the idea of which must underlie the possibility of all those objects of experience, but which itself can never be elevated and expanded into a cognition” (Kant,

Critique of the Power of Judgement

63).

Slide36

The Problem cont.

“Now although there is an incalculable gulf fixed between the domain of the concept of nature, as the sensible, and the domain of the concept of freedom, as the supersensible, so that from the former to the latter (thus by means of the theoretical use of reason) no transition is possible, just as if there were so many different worlds, the first of which can have no influence on the second: yet the latter

should

have an influence on the former, namely the

concept of freedom should make the end that is imposed by its laws real in the sensible world

; and nature must consequently also be able to be conceived in such a way that the lawfulness of its form is at least in agreement with the possibility of the ends that are to be realized in it in accordance with the laws of freedom” (Kant 63).

Slide37

The 3rd Critique’s Solution

“But in the family of the higher faculties of cognition there is still an intermediary between the understanding and reason. There is the

power of judgement

, about which one has cause to presume, by analogy, that it too should contain in itself

a priori

, if not exactly its own legislation, then still a proper

principle of its own for seeking laws, although a merely subjective one

; which, even though it can claim no field of objects as its domain, can nevertheless have some territory and a certain constitution of it, for which precisely this principle only might be valid” (Kant 64).

Slide38

Examples of (Aesthetic) Judgments

This wine is red.

This wine is a garnacha from southern Spain.

This wine is good.

This wine has hints of currant and blackberry.

This wine is a summer afternoon in Sevilla.

Slide39

Determining and Reflecting Judgements

A judgement is the faculty for thinking of the particular as contained under the universal.

Determining Judgement: the universal is given and the particular is subsumed under the universal (deduction).

Reflecting Judgement

: only the particular is given for which the universal is to be found (induction).

Slide40

The Purposiveness of Nature

We take pleasure in the thought that the laws of nature are consistent and unified, and that nature has a purpose or an end (teleology).

“That the

concept of the purposiveness of nature

belongs among the transcendental principles can readily be seen from the maxims of the power of judgment… which nevertheless pertain to nothing other than the possibility of experience… as determined by a manifold of particular laws… various

rules whose necessity cannot be demonstrated from concepts

… ‘Nature takes the shortest way’ [etc.]” (Kant 69).

Slide41

The Pleasure of Purposiveness

“Now this

transcendental concept of the purposiveness of nature is neither a concept of nature nor a concept of freedom

, since it attributes nothing at all to the object (of nature), but rather only represents the unique way in which we must proceed in reflection on the objects of nature with the aim of a thoroughly connected experience, consequently it is a subjective principle (maxim) of the power of judgement; hence we are also

delighted

(strictly speaking, relieved of a need) when we encounter such a

systematic unity among merely empirical laws

, just as if it were a happy accident which happened to favor our aim, even though we necessarily had to assume that there is such a unity, yet without having been able to gain insight into it and to prove it.” (Kant 71)

Slide42

The Aesthetic Representation of Purposiveness

“The subjective aspect in a representation

which cannot become an element of cognition at all

is the

pleasure

or

displeasure

connected with it…. Now the purposiveness of a thing… is also not a property of the object itself…. Thus the purposiveness that precedes the cognition of an object … is the subjective aspect of it that cannot become an element of cognition at all.

The object is therefore called purposive in this case only because its representation is immediately connected with the feeling of pleasure

; and this representation itself is an aesthetic representation of purposiveness.” (Kant 75)

Slide43

The Universality of Reflecting Judgements

“That object the

form

of which (not the material aspect of its representation, as sensation) in

mere reflection

on it (without any intention of acquiring a concept from it) is judged as the

ground of a pleasure in the representation

of such an object—with its representation this pleasure is also judged to be necessarily combined, consequently not merely for the subject who apprehends this form but

for everyone who judges at all

. The object is then called

beautiful

; and the faculty for judging through such a pleasure (consequently also with

universal validity

) is called

taste

.” (Kant 76)

Slide44

(However) Beauty is Subjective

“In order to decide

whether or not something is beautiful

, we do not relate the representation by means of understanding to the object for cognition, but rather relate it by means of the imagination (perhaps combined with the understanding)

to the subject and its feeling of pleasure or displeasure

. The judgment of taste is therefore not a cognitive judgment, hence not a logical one, but is rather aesthetic …

cannot

be

other than subjective

. Any relation of representations … can be objective … but not the relation to the feeling of pleasure and displeasure.” (Kant 89)

Slide45

The Judgment of Taste is Disinterested

“The satisfaction that we combine with the representation the

existence

of an object is called

interest

…. If someone asks me whether I find the palace that stands before me beautiful…. One only wants to know whether the mere representation of the object is accompanied with satisfaction in me” (90–91).

“One must not be in the least biased in favor of the existence of the thing, but

must be entirely indifferent

in this respect in order to play the judge in matters of taste” (91).

Slide46

You Can’t Eat Your Cake and Judge It Too

Slide47

The Judgement of Taste:

Is a reflecting (not determining) judgment.

Grounds the concept of the purposiveness of nature.

Relates to subjective pleasure and displeasure.

But nonetheless claims universal validity.

Is disinterested.

Slide48

Three Kinds of Satisfaction

The Agreeable: That which pleases the senses in sensation.

The Good: That which pleases by means of the reason alone, through the mere concept.

The Beautiful: That which, without concepts, is represented as the object of a

universal

satisfaction.

Slide49

The Agreeable

“With regard to the

agreeable

, everyone is content that his judgment, which he grounds on a private feeling … be restricted merely to his own person.” (97)

“When he says that sparkling wine from the Canaries is agreeable, someone else should improve his expression and remind him that he should say ‘It is agreeable

to me

.’” (97)

“With regard to the agreeable, the principle

Everyone has his own

taste (of the senses) is valid.” (97)

Slide50

The Good

“With regard to the good … judgments also rightly lay claim to validity for everyone; but the good is represented as an object of a universal satisfaction only

through a concept

, which is not the case either with the agreeable or with the beautiful.” (98)

Slide51

The Beautiful

"

It would be ridiculous if

… someone who prided himself on his taste thought to justify himself thus: ‘

This object

(the building we are looking at, the clothing someone is wearing, the concert that we hear, the poem that is presented for judging)

is beautiful for me

.’ For he must not call it beautiful if it pleases merely him…. Hence he says that the

thing

is beautiful, and does not count on the agreement of others … but rather

demands

it of them.” (98)

Slide52

Universal Voice

“The taste of reflection, which, as experience teaches, is

often enough rejected in its claim to the universal validity

of its judgement (about the beautiful)… while those who make those judgements

do not find themselves in conflict over the possibility of such a claim

, but only find it impossible to agree on the correct application of this faculty in particular cases.” (99)

“In the judgement of taste nothing is postulated except such a

universal voice

with regard to satisfaction without the mediation of concepts, hence the

possibility

of an aesthetic judgment that could at the same time be considered valid for everyone. The judgement of taste does not itself

postulate

the accord … it only

ascribes

this agreement to everyone.” (101)

Slide53

Kant on the Sublime

“The beautiful in nature concerns the form of the object which consists in limitation; the sublime by contrast, is to be found in the formless object insofar as limitlessness is represented in it, or at its instance, and yet it is also thought as a totality: so that the beautiful seems to be taken as the presentation of an indeterminate concept of the understanding, but

the sublime as that of a similar concept of reason

…. [The pleasure of the sublime] arises only indirectly, being generated, namely, by the feeling of a momentary inhibition of the vital powers… it deserves to be called negative pleasure.” (128–29)

“

That is sublime which even to be able to think of demonstrates a faculty of mind that surpasses every measure of the senses

.” (134)

Slide54

Taste as Sensus Communis

Not ‘common sense’ in our usually use of the term.

“By ‘sensus communis,’ must be understood the idea of a

communal

sense, i.e., a faculty for judging that in its reflection takes account (

a priori

) of everyone else’s way of representing in thought, in order

as it were

to hold its judgment up to human reason as a whole and thereby avoid the illusion which, from

subjective private conditions

that could easily be held to be objective, would have a

detrimental influence on the judgment

” (173).

“One means by

‘sense’ the feeling of pleasure

. Once could even define taste as the faculty for judging that which makes our feeling in a given representation

universally communicable

without the mediation of concepts” (175).