Abstract

The paper endeavors to provide a perspective on aesthetics that proceeds from the original Greek meaning of “aesthetics” as “what is perceived by the senses.” It then introduces a potential dialogue between Confucian and Gadamerian hermeneutic philosophical insights on the importance of “making more sense,” i.e., developing a particular human ethico-aesthetic “sense” for the continuous generation of harmonious communities by partly fusing the two schools of thought. Since the focus of the paper is on early Confucian philosophy, the paper also discusses the relational ontology of classical Chinese philosophy, Confucian considerations of learning, cultivation, emotions and humanization, but also touches upon broader East Asian philosophical notions of “everyday aesthetics,” i.e. how aesthetics is integrated into everyday life, for instance in ritual, dance, calligraphy and other fields that are too often set aside as belonging to a separate category of “art”.