By transcendental aesthetic, Kant means “the science of all principles of a priori sensibility” (A 21/B 35). These, he argues, are the laws that properly direct our judgments of taste (B 35 – 36 fn.), i.e. our aesthetic judgments as we ordinarily understand that notion in the context of contemporary art. Thus the first part of the Critique of Pure Reason, entitled the Transcendental Aesthetic, enumerates the necessary presuppositions of, among other things, our ability to make empirical judgments about particular (...) works of art. These presuppositions are sensible rather than intellectual because on Kant's view, all intellection that considers objects of any kind, whether abstract or concrete, must at base connect to actual, material objects with which we come into direct contact; and this we can do only through sensibility (A 19/B 33). Thus the following discussion explores what Kant claims must be true of us in order to make the sorts of aesthetic judgments we make, rather than any particular class or quality of aesthetic judgments itself. On Kant's view, what must be true of us in order to make aesthetic judgments is not different from what must be true of us in order to make any other kind of judgment about empirical objects. This last point is worth emphasizing, in order to correct an interpretation of Kant's account of aesthetic judgment in the Critique of Judgment that wrongly reads Kant as claiming that aesthetic judgments do not have to satisfy the same basic requirements of judgment that any other kind of judgment also must satisfy, such as the synthetic subsumption of such objects under certain necessary and hard-wired concepts of understanding, the internal coherence of such judgments with other, non-aesthetic ones of a more abstract and comprehensive character, the unified consciousness within which such judgments are intelligibly made, and the like. Of course Kant recognizes the special character of aesthetic judgments and unpacks it in the... (shrink)

This is the second volume of analytical commentary on Wittgenstein's masterpiece, the Philosophical Investigations. Like the first, it consists of philosophical essays and critical exegesis. The six essays deal comprehensively with various themes in Wittgenstein''s philosophy: the relationship between his mathematics and his philosophy of mind; his conception of grammar and rules of grammar; the relation between a rule and what accords with a rule; the characterization of rule-following as mastery of a technique manifest in practice; his notion of a (...) form of life, and of agreement in definitions and judgements; a comprehensive investigation into his account of logical and mathematical necessity and other topics. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Is a language necessarily shared with a community of speakers? Innate knowledge of a language Robinson Crusoe sails again Solitary cavemen and monologuists Private languages and ‘private languages’ Overview.

This chapter contains sections titled: The scaffolding of facts The role of our nature Forms of life Agreement: consensus of human beings and their actions.

This chapter contains sections titled: Initial compass bearings Accord and the harmony between language and reality Rules of inference and logical machinery Formulations and explanations of rules by examples Interpretations, fitting and grammar Further misunderstandings.

This chapter contains sections titled: Setting the stage Leitmotifs External guidelines Necessary propositions and norms of representation Concerning the truth and falsehood of necessary propositions What necessary truths are about Illusions of correspondence: ideal objects, kinds of reality and ultra‐physics The psychology and epistemology of the a priori Propositions of logic and laws of thought Alternative forms of representation The arbitrariness of grammar A kinship to the non‐arbitrary Proof in mathematics Conventionalism.

This chapter contains sections titled: The continuation of the Early Draft into philosophy of mathematics Hidden isomorphism A common methodology The flatness of philosophical grammar.