Kant: Concepts, Imagination, and Aesthetic Appreciation
Nova University Lisbon
Keynote speaker: Angela Breitenbach (University of Cambridge)
Kant’s requirements for a judgment to become a judgment of taste are often viewed as especially limiting. He has been taken to rule out almost any judgment of beauty that is grounded on concepts or aimed at them. And yet, a number of readings of the Critique of the Power of Judgment suggest that Kant’s aesthetic theory is particularly inclusive. From flowers to representational paintings, and from mathematical demonstrations to moral statements – anything, in principle, can become an object of aesthetic appreciation. A common denominator of such readings of the third Critique is reference to the freedom of imagination: as long as imagination acts freely and moves in a free play, then aesthetic appreciation is possible. This is despite the involvement of concepts – or indeed, some commentators even claim that this is due to the participation of concepts. It is the main aim of this conference to consider arguments in favor and against the possibility of aesthetic appreciation which takes concepts into account.
Download the programme here.
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Rachel Siow Robertson, University of Cambridge / The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion
António Marques, Nova University Lisbon
NOVA FCSH
FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia
10:15 - 11:00 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
11:45 - 12:15 Robert Clewis (Gwynedd Mercy University), ‘How to Distinguish and Reconcile Sensitive and Conceptual Taste’
12:15 - 12:45 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
14:30 - 15:00 Senthuran Bhuvanendra (University of Cambridge), ‘Exercising free lawful imagination through the dynamic feeling of life’
15:00 - 15:30 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Lisboa)
16:15 - 16:45 Rachel Siow Robertson (University of Cambridge / The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion), ‘Kant on Embodiment and Aesthetic Appreciation’
16:45 - 17:15 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
18:00 - 18:30 Lou Agosta (Ross Medical University), ‘A Rumor of Empathy in Kant’s Aesthetics and Critique of Judgment’
18:30 - 19:00 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Maia)
09:30 - 10:00, Aviv Reiter (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin) & Ido Geiger (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev), ‘Kant’s Analytic of the Beautiful and the Question of its Application to Fine Art’
10:00 - 10:30 Discussion (Chair: João Lemos)
11:15 - 11:45 João Lemos (Nova University of Lisbon), ‘Unpacking 5: 327 using Kant’s lectures’
11:45 - 12:15 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
14:00 - 14:30 Larissa Berger (Hannover Institute for Philosophical Research / Massachusetts Institute of Technology), ‘Why there must be a Kantian conception of ugliness, and why there cannot be one’
14:30 - 15:00 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Lisboa)
15:45 - 16:15 Júlia Vernet (University of Barcelona), ‘The Gemüt in the third Critique of Kant as a key to understand the relation between imagination and freedom’
16:15 - 16:45 Discussion (Chair: Rachel Siow Robertson)
17:30 - 18:00 Semyon Reshenin (University of Tartu), ‘Aesthetic experience as a condition for the moral practice’
18:00 - 18:30 Discussion (Chair: Francisco Maia)