Kant's Critique of Judgment (3)

Analytic of the Sublime - Notes

The feeling of the sublime arises when the purposiveness in the presentation of an object is attributed to the free play of the imagination with a concept to which no possible intuition can be predicated. Here, what triggers the sublime is not a qualitative but rather a quantitative relation between the imagination and reason (i.e. the faculty of producing ideas to which no possible intuition can be given.) So every analytic of the sublime must start with the examination of quantity.

Tangent: Nietzsche's talk of the greatness of the mountains and the abyss of the sea is only a poetic version of Kant's rigorous exposition of the sublime.

Two types of the sublime

1. Mathematical Sublime = the imagination plays with the idea of absolute largeness, i.e. absolute infinity
2. Dynamical Sublime = the imagination plays with the idea of absolute domination, or absolute fearfulness in the object

(1) is the quantitative sublime; (2) is the qualitative sublime.
Tangent: there are two other sublimes missing here, namely, the modal sublime and the relational sublime.

The sublime, like the beautiful, is found via reflective judgment.
Imagination + Understanding [Verstand] = Beautiful
Imagination + Reason [Vernunft] = Sublime

The feeling of the sublime is a "negative pleasure" which is preceded by the momentary inhibition of our cognitive powers. In beauty, the form of the object is purposive. In the sublime, the sensible form of the object is contrapurposive, i.e. it appears as a form for which no concept or purpose is adequate.

• Since we cannot like an object unless it is purposive (whether with or without a purpose,) no object in nature is sublime.

The sublime gives rise to an idea of reason through the awareness of the inadequacy of the sensible object for the demand of the idea.

A sublime object is too chaotic to be related to any concept of nature. For example, an astronomical mess would arouse the feeling of the sublime, since no concept can capture what is going on in that piece of observation.

In the sublime, purposiveness is felt not in nature but rather "within ourselves."

• Sublimity merely resides within our way of thinking.
• Thus, in terms of purposiveness of nature, the sublime is almost entirely marginal and irrelevant.
• The idea of the sublime makes purposive use of the mere presentation of nature.

The feeling of the sublime, contra beauty, arouses agitation which is nonetheless subjectively purposive.

• Agitation of the cognitive powers = quantitative or mathematical sublime
• Agitation of desire = qualitative or dynamical sublime

(1) On the Mathematically Sublime

Absolute largeness = mathematical sublime = large beyond all comparison = absolute infinity

Since no intuition can correspond to absolute largeness, this idea is not a concept of the understanding. This is because a magnitude in appearance or nature is always cognized in relation to a measurement or another magnitude, and as such is not absolutely large but rather bounded.

• "This just is large!" does not specify how large the object is, and so it is absolutely large.
• This judgment is subjectively purposive and thus is universally valid.
• The largeness of this object is not a concept, so the judgment is aesthetic.
• The liking associated with the sublime is not based on the harmony between our cognitive powers, but rather to the expansion of our imagination.

Large/small is a standard which could be applied to all possible objects, concepts, rules, ideas, etc.

The sublime is a largeness which has the standard for its own largeness within itself. In comparison to the mathematically sublime, everything else in nature is small. The feeling of the sublime is thus merely an attunement of the intellect through a certain presentation of nature.

The mere thinkability of the sublime signifies the supersensible powers of the mind.

What is the subjective purposiveness of the mathematically sublime?

• In the unbounded estimation of magnitude performed by the imagination, there is something purposive (since magnitude as such is already a purposive) yet there is no determinate purpose.
• Imagination (providing a unit of measurement) + Understanding (synthesizing intuition based on the unit thus provided) = an infinity with a unit, i.e. a set of an infinite number of identical units; this infinity is progressive, incomplete, and not-total (or "non-all.")
• Imagination (unit) + Reason (idea of totality) = absolute infinity (a boundlessness which is represented as one totality.)
• Absolute infinity cannot be represented as appearance, yet it is thinkable due to the demands of reason.
• Nature is sublime in those appearances whose intuition carries with it the idea of its own infinity.
• This idea can only be inferred from our experience of the inadequacy of our cognitive powers for the idea of reason.
• This must be an aesthetic estimation of magnitude, since no determinate unit is objectively cognized.
• Since the ground of the judgment is the inability or finitude of our mental powers, the sublime is a subjective phenomenon.

The sublime is commonly experienced through our feeling and sense of endlessness. Kant gives the example of progressively observing the mountains, the earth, the sun, and the Milky Way. The progressive observation arouses a sense of endlessness in the size of the world, which allows us to make an aesthetic judgment which generates the feeling of the mathematically sublime. However, what we experience at first as the boundlessness of nature is in fact, as this analysis shows, the boundlessness of the imagination as it tries to respond to the demand of reason.

The feeling of self-inadequacy in the face of an ideal is respect. Since the idea of absolute infinity is our own, the sublime is accompanied by a feeling of respect for the vocation which we demand for ourselves.

• Respect is an intuition which gives us an indirect clue to the superiority of reason over the imagination.
• To judge all possible objects of experience as small compared to the idea of absolute infinity is a law of reason.

Sublime → Displeasure (not purpose can fit the object) → Respect (due to the vocation of reason) → Pleasure (purposiveness of the idea of reason)

The alteration between pleasure and displeasure arouses agitation. This is because the thing is repulsive to sensibility (i.e. to the imagination) yet attractive to reason. This conflict is the ground of purposiveness. The quality of the feeling of the sublime is thus one of a pleasure conditioned by a prior displeasure, i.e. masochism.

(2) On the Dynamically Sublime

Might = relative power of one object over another.
Domination = a higher might which reigns over other objects with might.
Dynamic Sublime = nature as a might without dominance-over-us.

A judgment that an object is dynamically sublime arouses fear ex nihilo. This judgment is grounded in the quantity of resistance only, thus not a determinate concept.

• Here, the object is judged as being fearful, yet this does not arouse the emotion of fear within us with regard to the existence of the object.
• E.g. God is fearful even to a virtuous person, yet this person would not be afraid of God.
• Fear, as an emotion, is actually an obstacle to the universality of the aesthetic judgment which leads to the sublime.

The feeling of the dynamically sublime has two requirements.

1. We are safe from the dominating force of the object (e.g. a storm, thunder, or a volcano.)
2. The object nonetheless exhibits a might which would surely dominate us were it to become a real threat.

Tangent: feeling of the dynamically sublime (Kant) = being-toward-death (Heidegger)?

We feel pleasure in the fact that the absolute immensity of nature's dominance is nonetheless captured (i.e. further dominated) by the idea of our reason.

• By judging an object sublime, we call forth not our fear but our strength in the face of nature's immensity.
• All lesser mights of nature are made small compared to the sublime.
• E.g. trivial objects such as games, accessories, fine clothes, etc. are made ready to be dispensed with when the sublime calls for the imagination to respond to a higher vocation.
• The possibility of the dynamically sublime is confirmed even in the most common cases where we judge a person to be courageous in the fact of an absolutely fearful object.

Compared to the sublimity of war and adventure, prolonged peace merely gives rise to a commercial spirit.

The same object can be an object of fear for the coward and a sublime object for the courageous.

Compared to the beautiful, it is even more difficult to come to agreement (i.e. the construction of common sense) concerning our judgment of the sublime, since the latter requires a higher degree of imagination (i.e. the cultivation of our cognitive powers) as well as the cultivation of reason.

• However, this does not mean that the sublime is an empirically acquired feeling; rather, it rests on the a priori powers of reason, and thus demands everyone's assent.
• Failure to see the beautiful implies lack of taste; for the sublime, lack of feeling.
• Here, the sublime is derived from a necessary aesthetic judgment.

(At this point, Kant launches into a long and utterly unconvincing polemic on the relation between moral feeling (i.e. a feeling generated by our free act of making the moral law our principle for action) and the sublime. I will only cite Kant's "table of aesthetic judgments" (which is neither convincing nor consistent) and leave it at that.)

Table of Aesthetic Judgments

Quantity - the Agreeable
Quality - the Beautiful
Relation - the Sublime
Modality - the Good (this judgment gives rise to a moral feeling which is not strictly speaking aesthetic, since it is derived not from purposiveness but from the moral law (i.e. purposiveness with a purpose); nonetheless, the judgment is somewhat analogous to an aesthetic one, so, according to Kant, the Good "deserves" a place in this table.)

Tangent: this table is a mess. It should not be in the book at all.

Kant's Critique of Judgment (2)

Analytic of the Beautiful - Notes

Sensation = objective presentation of an object
Feeling = subjective phenomena accompanying the presentation of an object

What inner sense likes in sensation is called the agreeable. Agreeableness is thus the immediate effect of sensation onto our inner sense. The feeling of pleasure is thus prior to judgment. What reason likes through a concept is the good. A judgment that a thing is good is made when a presentation of an object conforms to a determinate concept. The concept of the object is thus prior to judgment. In either case, the x prior to judgment is the interest which conditions the judgment.

Beauty is neither the agreeable (since here the feeling of pleasure does not make any reference to the object's effect on inner sense) nor the good (since no determinate concept is presupposed.) Rather, the judgment that the thing is beautiful is grounded in the subjective act of reflection on the object.

The agreeable is not identical with the good.

• E.g. a hamburger may be agreeable to inner sense yet reason may fervently find it unpleasant due to its lack of conformity to the concept of good food.

Both the agreeable and the good share an interest in the existence of a determinate object. Thus, both are conditioned by desire.

A judgment of taste is indifferent to the existence of a determinate object. Thus, it is not conditioned by an interest or a desire.

Agreeable    -    Beautiful   -   Good
Gratification -    Liking        -   Esteem
Animal               Human          All rational beings

Only a judgment of taste is disinterested and thus unconditioned. This implies that it is also free.

Judgment of taste judges as if beauty was a property of the object, even if in reality the judgment is merely aesthetic. Thus, aesthetic judgments of this sort has universal validity even if no concept grounds it. Here, aesthetic judgment has subjective universality.

The agreeable is only agreeable for someone. "Everyone has his own taste for agreeableness."
Beauty requires impartiality. Here, the agreement with the opinion of others is not the conditions of the validity of aesthetic judgment., since the judgment merely refers to the formal aspects of the object.

• The taste for agreeableness is shared by others by virtue of its generality. The ground for this agreement is thus sociability.
• The beautiful demands universal assent, and the ground for this demand is not sociability but the presentation of the object.

Aesthetic judgments can be divided into two kinds.

1. Taste of sense (generally valid)
2. Taste of reflection (universally valid)

Disagreement concerning tastes of reflection arise not as to whether or not such judgments are universal, but rather as to how these judgments ought to proceed when reflecting on an object. Here, the disagreement is not about the properties of the object but rather about the feelings in the subjects. Taste of reflection thus has merely subjective universality without any objective validity.

• The proper domain of aesthetic judgments is the subjective feelings of the judging persons, not the judged objects.
• Since universal aesthetic judgments are not conditioned by concepts or interests, they are singular judgments.
• However, once this judgment is made repeatedly, we can compare these instances and arrive at a general concept of the beautiful object.
• E.g. by seeing beautiful roses on multiple occasions, we can construct the concept of a beautiful rose.
• Such a concept has merely general validity for those who share the experience of judging roses.
• Since aesthetic judgments are not conditioned by concepts, we cannot appeal to concepts in order to convince others that the thing is beautiful; the best we can hope for is that the presentation of the thing to another person arouses the same feeling of pleasure which leads to the same aesthetic judgment.
• A universal aesthetic judgment is thus merely possible but not necessary.

The "universal voice" which declares beauty is an idea (more to come on this later on.)

Key Question: In a judgment of taste, does the feeling of pleasure precede the judgment, or is it the other way round?

• If pleasure comes first, then the object is agreeable, i.e. liked not by reflection but by sensation. Thus, such a judgment has only general validity, which means that it cannot be a judgment of taste.
• In a judgment of taste, the act of judging must precede the feeling of pleasure.
• Thus, what is communicated in such a judgment is neither the feeling of pleasure nor the objective aspects, but rather the subjective aspects which is accompanied in the presentation of the object, i.e. our cognitive powers and their (i.e. the imagination and the understanding's) relation.
• In such a relation, no determinate concept restricts the play of the imagination.
• Here, the free play of the imagination in relation to the understanding is what is communicated in a judgment of taste.

The harmony of the imagination and the understanding yields a formal condition for cognition. This formal aspect is reflected in the object being judged. Such a form is thus the ground for the universal communicability of the judgment of taste.

The pleasure arising out of the act of communicating this form can be explained in terms of "sociability" through empirical psychology.

In making an aesthetic judgment, the imagination and the understanding are 'tuned in' for cognition, although such a tuning is an effect (not a cause) of the presentation of an object, and hence is not an objective but rather a merely subjective aspect in the presentation.

• Thus, the universal validity of a judgment of taste only extends to the subjective formal conditions of cognition.

Pleasure = that which maintains the subjective conditions of cognition, i.e. purposiveness.
Displeasure = that which averts certain other subjective conditions.

An object is purposive without a purpose only if the actuality of the object can be explained in terms of a hypothetically posited will = purpose. Since neither a subjective nor an object purpose can enter into a judgment of taste, the ground of such a judgment is a purposiveness without a purpose.

Since the universality of a judgment of taste requires that the subject is indifferent to the actualization of the object under consideration, the object of such a judgment must not be an actual cognition but rather the merely formal conditions. i.e. the subjective aspects, of an object's actuality.

The feeling of pleasure in a judgment of taste just is the consciousness that the imagination and the understanding are in a state of harmonious free play. This feeling allows us to maintain the specific harmony of our cognitive powers.

Charms (objective) and emotions (subjective) are both empirical and thus cannot serve as the ground for a judgment of taste. A pure judgment of taste is a judgment based merely on the formal purposiveness of the presentation of an object.

• Empirical aesthetic judgment = judgment concerning whether an object is agreeable or disagreeable.
• Pure aesthetic judgment = concerning beauty.
• E.g. the sensation of colour (matter) contains the frequency of the waves of light (form); a pure aesthetic judgment is grounded not in the sensation of colour per se, but rather in the purposiveness of the formal aspects of light which give rise to the cognition of colour.

Forms of beauty:

1. Shape (spatial) - Design and Composition
2. Play (temporal) - Play of shapes (dance) or play proper (music)

Apparently in Kant's time the popular view was that beauty is an imperfect version of the good. Kant sets out to refute this position.

Objective purposiveness = the aspect of an actual object which is realized on the basis of a purpose.

• The good is a concept which implies perfection.
• Perfection is a purpose.
• Since a judgment of taste cannot be grounded by a purposiveness with a purpose, the good is distinct from the beautiful.
• Moreover, perfection also cannot serve as a measure for beauty.

E.g. consider the following conversation:
"This line is perfect! (aesthetic judgment)"
"Perfect for what? (asking for the purpose)"
"I don't know, it's just perfect! (referring to a purposiveness without purpose)"
"Hey, in that case, you can't call the line perfect; you ought to say that it is beautiful! (Kant)"

Thus, the claim that the beautiful is a lesser version of the good is unfounded, since the two belong to different kinds of judgment.

Free beauty = an object is beautiful without  a concept which defines the perfection of the object.
Accessory beauty = a beauty conditioned by a determinate concept of perfection, i.e. what the object is meant to be.

• A judgment judging free beauty is a pure aesthetic judgment.
• Accessory beauty, since it is conditioned by the concept of perfection and thus by a determinate purpose, is thus a result of an empirical aesthetic judgment.
• E.g. there are many lines and structures that could be added to a building to make it beautiful, yet the concept of a church, for example, would restrict the play of our cognitive powers due to the implied concept of perfection, and thus will also hinder the realization of such free beauty in the addition of lines, structures, etc.

In accessory beauty, the beautiful plays merely a subordinate role to the good.

There can be no concept, and hence no objective rule, for determining which object is beautiful and which not.

The empirical criterion for distinguishing beauty is popularity. While this criterion cannot ground the universal validity as in free beauty, it nonetheless allows us to approximate the ideal of the beautiful.

The true criterion for judging the beautiful is not learned through imitation and habit (since such a route will only ground empirical and hence merely general validity) but rather by a spontaneous production of an idea, i.e. an "archetype of taste."

Idea = a product of reason.
Ideal = the presentation of an individual object which is adequate to the demands of an idea.

• The ideal of beauty is a harmonious state of our cognitive powers which lives up to the idea of beauty.

How do we attain to the ideal of beauty?

• An ideal can only be attained by a being who is able to invent a purpose freely yet can fix itself to purposiveness.
• The only being who satisfied this condition is a human being.

(I will skip Kant's highly unappealing exposition of the relation between morality and the ideal of beauty.)

The relation between the beautiful and liking is necessary, yet it is not an objective necessity. The object thus does not carry objective necessity; rather, here the necessity is merely exemplary, since we are unable to state the universal concept which grounds the universality of the beautiful in the object.

The subjective necessity of a judgment of taste is conditioned by the assumption that others will judge in the same way if they follow the same universal yet subjective rule of judgment (which cannot be stated explicitly in objective form.) Here, this agreement, which grounds the universality and necessity of such a judgment, is common sense.

• "Common sense" here does not refer to an empirical and contingent agreement among "vulgar" people; rather, it refers to the a priori conditions of cognition which is possible for all rational beings.

In making a judgment of taste, the imagination is free, and thus productive + spontaneous.

• E.g. in poetry, no determinate concept is given in the presentation of the "figures of speech."
• In a judgment of taste, the pleasure is derived from the furthering of our cognitive powers due to the quickening of the harmonious activity of the imagination with the understanding.

Tangent: this "quickening" explains why Dadaism and Surrealism are amazingly beautiful compared to standard Realism, precisely because the former goes far beyond any possible concept or a determinate purpose, yet nonetheless stimulates our imagination and understanding.

Anything with stiff regularity is thus counter to taste, since such an object quickly terminates the free play of the imagination.

• Tangent: modern factories and office buildings are all merely functional and thus terminates the above mentioned free play; in fact, essay-prose and the like are also insulting to our taste precisely because it minimizes free play.
• Another tangent: this also explains why sex is beautiful when the people involved lose all sense of purpose; sex becomes boring when the persons start to feel that they are following a certain "script" or purpose.
• E.g. fire is merely charming yet not beautiful, since the imagination merely indulges in fantasies aroused by the vague movements of the flames instead of apprehending their actual form. Nonetheless, since fire sustains the free play of the imagination with its complex movements, it is charming. (I don't get this at all.)

Kant's Critique of Judgment (1)

Notes for Kant's Critique of Judgment

"Introduction" (On Aesthetic Judgment)

The will (i.e. principle of action) is either a concept of nature or that of freedom.

• If the will is a concept of nature, then it is (1) technically practical; (2) mere precepts or maxims; (3) appearance which is cognized through the input of intuition
• If the will is a concept of freedom, then it is (1) morally practical; (2) universal and necessary practical laws; (3) thing in itself which has no corresponding intuition and thus no cognition in space and time
• The above distinction grounds the division between theoretical and practical philosophy (the former is grounded in the concept of nature, the latter in the concept of freedom)

Territory = an area of objects which can be cognized as a unified realm of cognition
Domain = an area of possible concepts which legislate the way objects appear in a unified way

• E.g. science has a territory (i.e. nature) yet has no domain (since nature cannot be legislated by our free will)
• A priori concepts have both territory and domain (i.e. a unity under one concept which also legislates the way objects appear for us)

The understanding [Verstand] and reason [Vernunft] are two different domains (i.e. domains of nature and of freedom) yet both legislate the same territory (i.e. that of nature.) Nonetheless, they do not interfere with each other. Refer to Kant's Third Antinomy in the Critique of Pure Reason for a rigorous demonstration of this point.

Things in themselves belong to the supersensible realm as the condition of the possibility of all experience. As such, the supersensible realm is boundless and infinite. Thus, the supersensible realm cannot be conceptualized as a territory, since no concept can unify its boundlessness.

It is as if the understanding and reason legislate different world (the sensible and the supersensible) -- the "as if" is crucial, since in actuality both legislate nature, i.e. the sensible world. Now in the Critique of Practical Reason Kant takes himself to have demonstrated that the form of nature (i.e. the a priori synthesis of the categories with space and time) can be in harmony with the form of the will (i.e. the categorical imperative.) The mediating link between the two powers is judgment. It is through judgment that this harmony is achieved.

The understanding deals with concepts, while reason deals with practical principles. Judgment deals with the feeling of pleasure or displeasure. Since here we have a distinctive realm for judgment, Kant thinks that judgment also must have its own a priori domain.

Determinative judgment = a universal rule, principle, concept, or law is given, and judgment subsumes the particular under them.
Reflective judgment = a particular object is given, and judgment reflects on this particular object in order to figure our the universal rule, principle, etc. which grounds the presentation of this object.

• Determinative judgment just is the synthesis of the understanding whereby intuition is synthesized with the categories and space and time in order to yield experience
• Yet the a priori laws of the understanding (e.g. quantity, quality, modality...) are too general to account for the diverse modifications of nature
• In order to account for this diversity, we discover empirical laws of nature which are not the laws of the understanding and thus are contingent and particular
• Yet in so far as these empirical laws also serve as the basis of our experience, these laws must be treated as if they are necessary and universal and thus are given by the understanding
• This is where reflective judgment plays a role: reflective judgment takes a particular object and judges it based on an empirical law which is further unified with other empirical laws as if they were given by the understanding
• In such reflection, judgment does not determine the way nature is first given to experience; thus, reflective judgment does not require that the empirical laws are actually given by the understanding; nor do these empirical laws have to be observed in the object
• Thus, reflective judgment merely regulates the way in which we subjectively reflect on nature according to empirical laws
• Here, reflective judgment must have an a priori principle for such a regulation

Purpose = a concept which contains the condition for the actuality of an object

• E.g. a concept of a hammer is a purpose, since without this concept a metal blob would not appear as a hammer
• Here, a priori concepts are excluded from Kant's consideration, since these concepts are dealt with not by reflective judgment but determinative judgment

Purposiveness = the thing's aspects which are harmonious with the aspects of an object which are made possible by a purpose

• E.g. the solidity of a thing is the purposiveness of a hammer, since the concept of a hammer makes possible a solidity to appear as a part of an object of hammering, and such solidity conforms to this concept

Out of the diversity of natural phenomena, reflective judgment seeks out certain aspects as the purposiveness for the empirical laws of nature. Thus, the concept of purposiveness is the a priori concept of reflective judgment.

(Kant then launches into his proof that the concept of purposiveness is the transcendental principle of reflective judgment. But the proof is long and tedious, so I will skip it for now. Please let me know if you are interested in the details and results of this proof.)

Purposiveness is neither (1) a concept of nature, since it does not determine the way an object is to be cognized, and (2) a concept of freedom, since it does not regulate a course of action. Since purposiveness has nothing to add to the way in which an object is determined, it is not an objective principle. Thus, purposiveness is a subjective principle.

• This principle is contingent objectively, yet it is necessary for judgment to construct a unified experience of nature according to empirical laws. For example, the diverse colour of grass in a football field does not catch the attention of a football player who unifies his own experience of the field according to certain concepts which determine the way in which nature is experienced. This player, while ignoring the irrelevant diversity of nature, may find purposiveness in the minute details of the movement of the football, of other players, etc. Such a unified experience is made possible by the principle of purposiveness, yet it is not objective but only necessary for the football player's subjectivity.
• In this sense, Kant calls the law of reflective judgment the "law of the specification of nature."
• These laws are neither determinative of the way nature is to appear objectively, nor derivable from observing nature as such

Tangent: Kant's purposiveness = Heidegger's "world" = Kuhn's "paradigm"?

Since empirical laws are diverse and contingent, many different purposivenesses can be experienced from the same necessary and universal experience of nature. For example, while the experience of the football field as a spatio-temporal object is universal and necessary for all, it is contingent that the football player sees the football in its minute details, while a tree lover may find the gradation of colour and the scent of grass in their minutiae while ignoring completely the way the football moves. For each subject, therefore, there is a purposiveness which unifies the diversity of such empirical laws of nature.

The fulfillment of a purpose, i.e. the discovery of purposiveness, is accompanied with a feeling of pleasure. Conversely, failure to fulfill a purpose is accompanied with a feeling of displeasure.

•  E.g. when the concept of bread finds a corresponding object and thus finds purposiveness (flour, water, fire, etc.) then we feel pleasant, while the displeasure of not finding anything edible while having the concept of food in mind is unpleasant beyond description.

If the purposiveness is an a priori presentation, then the feeling of pleasure accompanying such a presentation is universal.

• Such a purposiveness merely takes the cognitive powers for experience without the input of sensory data
• The discovery of the unity of multiple empirical laws is universally pleasant just for this reason, since such pleasure arises merely as a result of the reflective judgment dealing with the cognitive powers of a hypothetically posited understanding
• Kant thinks that these feelings pleasure wear away as we get into the habit of experiencing nature according to these empirical laws (this explains why, for example, sex becomes increasingly boring when the same routine is repeated over and over again)
• Thus, the consciousness of a purpose, as well as the risk of its unattainability, are necessary for the experience of the feeling of pleasure

Tangent: perhaps for Kant the progress of science, art, and technology is motivated by our feeling of pleasure with regards to the act of unifying the incomprehensible diversity of nature according to explicitly formulated empirical laws into a system of one big unified experience.

For Kant, the principles of judgment, i.e. purposivenesses, in so far as they are principles of reflective judgment, are boundless (unlike the categories of the understanding or the practical principles of reason.)

In an object of experience,

1. the aesthetic aspect is the subjective aspect in the presentation of the object, while
2. the objective aspect is that which is the ground of the determinate actuality of the object

Kant thinks that these two aspects occur simultaneously in every presentation of an object

• E.g. in the presentation of a hammer, the objective aspect would be the spatio-temporal figure of this object determined by the way in which space and time are modified according to the categories of the understanding, while the subjective aspect would be the purposiveness of this figure which is in harmony with the purpose of hammering and the consequent feeling of pleasure aroused in the subject.

The purposiveness of a thing is not the objective aspect of an object, since it is not necessary for the objective determination of the object. For example, the hammer-shaped thing can exist even if we do not have the concept of a hammer in our mind.

The feeling of pleasure is a sign or an indication that the object judged is purposive. This feeling is thus the aesthetic presentation of purposiveness. At this point, Kant asks the "only question left": is there such an aesthetic presentation at all?

If (1) the feeling of pleasure is connected merely with the form of the object, and (2) this form is not a concept which determines the actuality of the object, then the presentation of the objective has subjective grounds for its actuality. Here, the feeling of pleasure is connected solely with the cognitive powers which are brought into play as a result of our act of reflective judgment.

• Here we have an aesthetic judgment concerning the purely formal purposiveness of the object
• Here, the imagination (i.e. the cognitive faculty responsible for modifying the form of space and time) is compared to the understanding (i.e. the cognitive faculty responsible for modifying concepts) since the the feeling of pleasure implies that the object (i.e. the spatio-temporal form of the object) is in harmony with its purpose (i.e. the concept of that form)
• E.g. the form of the movement of a certain shape (which is generated by the imagination) may be in harmony with the concept of a bird (which is generated by the understanding); here, reflective judgment may judge an object, and as a result of such an act of judgment, we may experience the feeling of pleasure, which implies that the imagination and the understanding is in harmony; such a judgment would thus be an aesthetic judgment

An aesthetic judgment is not concerned with whether or not the object is a bird. Nor is it concerned with discovering the concept of a bird by observing the object. Instead, an aesthetic judgment merely discovers that the spatio-temporal form of the object is in harmony with a concept of the understanding.

Here, an aesthetic judgment is merely based on the presentation of the formal a priori aspects of the object. Thus, an aesthetic judgment is universally valid for all rational beings despite the fact that it is merely subjective.

• E.g. here, the presentation of a certain kind of bird is necessarily and universally accompanied by a feeling of pleasure and thus of an aesthetic judgment for all of those who judge the objective reflectively.

As a result of such an aesthetic judgment, the object is called beautiful.
The ability or capacity to make an aesthetic judgment is called taste.

On why the presentation of an object is necessary for an aesthetic judgment to take place:

1. The form of this single bird is pleasant, i.e. beautiful.
2. Yet the fact that this bird serves as the matter for this form is contingent.
3. Hence, the presentation of this bird as an object of experience is also the presentation of a purposiveness which however is not preceded by a purpose, yet the purposiveness is made explicit as a result of the feeling of pleasure which accompanies the act of reflective judgment on the object.
4. Since the reflective judgment on the object is thus the necessary condition for the discovery of the object's purposiveness, an aesthetic judgment requires the cognition of an object.

A judgment of taste is universally valid not by virtue of the empirical concept of the object, but rather by virtue of the feeling pleasure which is accompanied in the presentation of the formal aspects of the object. However, since the cognition of the object must precede the act of aesthetic judgment, in order to experience the beautiful we need to "try out" various modifications of the object. This is the fundamental motivation for doing art.

• E.g. the modification of sound in music is done in the hope of producing certain forms of time which excite the feeling of pleasure universally and necessarily

Aesthetic judgments which arise out of the harmony between the formal aspects of the object and a concept of nature are judgments of taste; on the other hand, aesthetic judgments which arise as a result of the harmony between the formal aspects of the object and a concept of freedom are not judgment of taste, but rather judgments which present to us the sublime.

Next up: "The Analytic of the Beautiful"