Thinking without Concepts: The Aesthetic Role of Logical Functions in Kant's Third Critique

Defense Date

4-7-2016

Graduation Date

Spring 1-1-2016

Availability

One-year Embargo

Submission Type

dissertation

Degree Name

PhD

Department

Philosophy

School

McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts

Committee Chair

Jennifer Ann Bates, Claudia Bickmann

Committee Member

Daniel Selcer

Committee Member

Kristi Sweet

Keywords

Aesthetic Judgment, Critique of the Power of Judgment, Logical Functions

Abstract

I defend an understanding of Kant's theory of Geschmacksurteil as detailing an operation of the faculties that does not violate the cognitive structure laid out in the first Critique, even though one would not easily anticipate it from the standpoint of that work, nor would one initially expect aesthetic judgment to be of transcendental interest to Kant. My orientation is primarily epistemological, elaborating the determinations that govern the activity of pure aesthetic judging so as to specify it as a bestimmte type of judgment without transforming it into einem bestimmenden Urteil. I focus on identifying how the logical functions from the table of judgments operate in the pure aesthetic judgment of taste to reveal "the moments to which this power of judgment attends in its reflection" (Critique of the Power of Judgment, §1, 5:203). In the course of doing so, a picture emerges of how the world is not just cognizable in a Kantian framework but also charged with human feeling, acquiring the inexhaustible, inchoate meaningfulness that incites "much thinking" (Critique of the Power of Judgment, §49, 5:315). The universal communicability of aesthetic pleasure serves as the foundation that grounds robust intersubjective relations, enabling genuine connection to others through a shared a priori feeling.

Format

PDF

Language

English

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