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"