Aesthetic experience and judgement practice questions.

A collector says that a landscape painting pleases her because owning it raises her standing among rivals and because it will sell well next year. On Kant's account, why does this pleasure fail to ground a judgement of taste?

• Her pleasure is bound up with an interest in the existence and use of the object
• Her pleasure is felt rather than reasoned, and beauty must be settled by argument
• Her pleasure is private, and Kant treats beauty as a measurable property of surfaces
• Her pleasure concerns a landscape, and Kant restricts beauty to human artefacts

Answer: Her pleasure is bound up with an interest in the existence and use of the object

Kant requires the satisfaction in a judgement of taste to be disinterested, that is, indifferent to the existence, ownership or usefulness of the object. Disinterest is not indifference: the beautiful still pleases, but unlike the merely agreeable it does not please because it satisfies a desire.

In Hume's essay on the standard of taste, what settles a dispute about whether a work is beautiful?

• A rule derived from the physical proportions common to admired works
• The agreed verdict of qualified critics who meet stated conditions
• The preference held by the greatest number of listeners in a period
• An a priori principle of taste that every rational judge can deduce

Answer: The agreed verdict of qualified critics who meet stated conditions

Hume grounds the standard empirically in the converging verdicts of true judges, whom he characterises by delicacy of taste, practice, comparison, freedom from prejudice and good sense. Unlike Kant, who locates the demand for agreement in the form of the judgement itself, Hume argues from the observed authority of qualified critics.

Sibley argues that a person who knows every non-aesthetic fact about a painting still cannot work out from those facts alone that it is graceful. Which claim does this support?

• Aesthetic terms merely report the private feelings of the speaker and describe nothing in the work
• Aesthetic terms can in principle be derived from a full physical description by stated rules
• Aesthetic terms cannot be entailed by non-aesthetic descriptions, so applying them requires taste
• Aesthetic terms are disguised judgements about the moral character of the artist who made the work

Answer: Aesthetic terms cannot be entailed by non-aesthetic descriptions, so applying them requires taste

Sibley's claim is about the logic of aesthetic concepts: non-aesthetic features can count towards an aesthetic description but never entail it, which is why critics point, compare and contrast rather than deduce. This is not subjectivism, since Sibley holds that such descriptions can be correct or mistaken.

A cinema-goer weeps at the death of a character she knows perfectly well never existed, and she makes no attempt to help. Which problem is standardly raised by this case?

• The paradox of tragedy: why audiences seek out works that arouse painful emotions
• The problem of aesthetic testimony: whether a verdict can be taken on trust
• The intentional fallacy: whether the maker's aims settle a work's meaning
• The paradox of fiction: how we can be moved by what we believe does not exist

Answer: The paradox of fiction: how we can be moved by what we believe does not exist

Radford's puzzle concerns the belief condition on emotion: fear or grief normally requires believing that its object is real, yet fiction moves us in the absence of that belief and without prompting the usual action. It is distinct from the paradox of tragedy, which asks why we choose such experiences at all.

Audiences pay to watch tragedies that leave them shaken and in tears, and afterwards report having valued the experience. Hume treats this as a philosophical puzzle rather than a curiosity because

• no reliable evidence shows that audiences actually feel distress during such performances at all
• tragedy has been staged in many societies, which is a fact about history rather than about value
• people ordinarily avoid distress, so a preference for what distresses them calls for an explanation
• the emotions produced by fiction are not real emotions, so nothing about them requires explanation at all

Answer: people ordinarily avoid distress, so a preference for what distresses them calls for an explanation

The puzzle is generated by two claims that are each plausible: distress is avoided, and this distress is sought. Hume's own answer appeals to the pleasure taken in the artistry, which converts the painful passion — an answer that is contested, unlike the puzzle itself.

Kant requires a judgement of taste to be disinterested. Which of the following verdicts would therefore NOT count as a judgement of taste on his account?

• 'This painting is beautiful, and I would say so even though I have no wall at home on which I could ever hang it.'
• 'This vase is beautiful; I would not want it changed in any respect.'
• 'This building is beautiful, though I shall never have occasion to enter it.'
• 'This design is beautiful, by which I mean that it will raise the value of the property considerably.'

Answer: 'This design is beautiful, by which I mean that it will raise the value of the property considerably.'

Disinterestedness concerns the ground of the pleasure, not the absence of feeling: a verdict that rests on what the object will do for the judge's purposes, such as raising a property's value, is an interested one and so a judgement of the good or the agreeable. The other three verdicts merely note that the judge cannot use or possess the object, which leaves the pleasure free of interest.