𝔎𝔯𝔦𝔱𝔦𝔨 𝔘𝔯𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔦𝔩𝔰𝔨𝔯𝔞𝔣𝔱 #23 - Taste on Trial

FOR NEXT TIME

We got through our last assigned section pretty fast, so it's great that we can move on to the second part of Kant's discussion of aesthetics concerning the dialectic of taste.

For next time, please read Sections 56 thru 59, or paragraphs 5:338 thru 5:351 (pages 214 to 225 in the Guyed translation),

IN OUR LAST EPISODE

We wrapped up our classification of the arts.

§52 - Combining different kinds of art

• Plays, operas, songs, and dances
• The distinction between poetry and instrumental music rest on the distinction between the intellectual and the sensual
• Aesthetic judgment is compatible with and bears some relation to moral judgment.

§53 - Now let's rank these arts

• Poetry considers, even judges, nature.
• First place goes to poetry; second place goes to visual art; and third place goes to music.
• The Gettysburg Address would have been a lot better had it rhymed.
• Poetry announces itself up front as illusion so that unlike rhetoric, we are not deceived by it.
• Music is diversion, less serious than poetry, but even poetry has a sensual element.
• Games are a kind of art that blend social enjoyment with some other utility, like making money in poker.
• Music, like poetry, can evoke ideas, but not with the same force and lasting impression as do the visual arts.
• The art of comedy results in a release of tension which we call laughter and upon which we can reflect.
• In order for comedy to work, tension must be resolved into nothing or into harmless absurdity, but not into an opposite tension.
• Comedy is a more difficult art and tragedy (probably because more wit is involved).
• But comedy contains an element of tragedy.

COMING UP

05/18/25 - Session 23 - Start the Second Section, the Dialectic
06/01/25 - Session 24 - Finish the Second Section
06/15/25 - Session 25 - Start Part Two concerning teleology