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Single Idea 18547

[filed under theme 21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 2. Aesthetic Attitude ]

Full Idea

Kant is surely right that the experience of beauty, like the judgements in which it issues, is the prerogative of rational beings.

Gist of Idea

Only rational beings can experience beauty

Source

report of Immanuel Kant (Critique of Judgement I: Aesthetic [1790]) by Roger Scruton - Beauty: a very short introduction 1

Book Ref

Scruton,Roger: 'Beauty: A Very Short Introduction' [OUP 2011], p.27

A Reaction

I'm not sure how Scruton can say that Kant is 'surely right'. It is an interesting speculation. Are we to dogmatically affirm that bees get no aesthetic thrill when they spot a promising flower? Something in their little brains attracts them.

The 21 ideas with the same theme [distinctive frame of mind in aesthetic experience]:

18545 The disinterested attitude of the judge is the hallmark of a judgement of beauty [Shaftesbury, by Scruton]
18552 Forget about beauty; just concentrate on the virtues of delicacy and discernment admired in critics [Hume, by Scruton]
18547 Only rational beings can experience beauty [Kant, by Scruton]
20346 The aesthetic attitude is a matter of disinterestedness [Kant, by Wollheim]
22043 Hegel largely ignores aesthetic pleasure, taste and beauty, and focuses on the meaning of artworks [Hegel, by Pinkard]
21370 Schopenhauer is a chief proponent of aesthetic experience as 'disinterested' [Schopenhauer, by Janaway]
7194 Experiencing a thing as beautiful is to experience it wrongly [Nietzsche]
20424 Imaginative life requires no action, so new kinds of perception and values emerge in art [Fry]
20427 Everyone reveals an aesthetic attitude, looking at something which only exists to be seen [Fry]
23928 Good art produces exaltation and detachment [Bell,C]
5933 Aesthetic enjoyment combines pleasure with insight [Ross]
6606 Consider: "Imagine this butterfly exactly as it is, but ugly instead of beautiful" [Wittgenstein]
20342 Interpretation is performance for some arts, and critical for all arts [Wollheim]
20343 A love of nature must precede a love of art [Wollheim]
20443 The aesthetic attitude is nothing more than paying close attention [Dickie, by Giovannelli]
18546 The pleasure taken in beauty also aims at understanding and valuing [Scruton]
18550 Art gives us imaginary worlds which we can view impartially [Scruton]
12158 Aesthetic experience informs the world with the values of the observer [Scruton]
22703 We don't often respond to events in art as if they were real events [Jacobson,D]
22687 Maybe literary assessment is evaluating the artist as a suitable friend [Gaut]
20387 Aesthetic experience involves perception, but also imagination and understanding [Davies,S]