Schopenhauer and the Paradox of the Sublime

Author(s):  
Bart Vandenabeele

Schopenhauer explores the paradoxical nature of the aesthetic experience of the sublime in a richer way than his predecessors did by rightfully emphasizing the prominent role of the aesthetic object and the ultimately affirmative character of the pleasurable experience it offers. Unlike Kant, Schopenhauer’s doctrine of the sublime does not appeal to the superiority of human reason over nature but affirms the ultimately “superhuman” unity of the world, of which the human being is merely a puny fragment. The author focuses on Schopenhauer’s treatment of the experience of the sublime in nature and argues that Schopenhauer makes two distinct attempts to resolve the paradox of the sublime and that Schopenhauer’s second attempt, which has been neglected in the literature, establishes the sublime as a viable aesthetic concept with profound significance.

Author(s):  
Sergio Espinosa Proa

Las obras de arte son objetos materiales que al mismo tiempo y de modos misteriosos son objetos espirituales (a saber: inmateriales). Utilizando a Kant y a Schiller, en este artículo se opone a la calificación platónica y aristotélica una concepción distinta del arte, que sería una manufactura humana no sometida a la lógica de la apropiación, sino de su contraria. El hombre es un ser racional, pero Kant le otorgó tres dimensiones a esta idea: la razón es conocimiento, mas también compasión y contemplación. Un ser humano tiene intereses teóricos, intereses prácticos... y desintereses múltiples. El "temple estético" al que Schiller hace referencia apunta a esta facultad de no hacer nada, a este aflojamiento de las tensiones, ocupaciones y preocupaciones, al puro deleite (o pavor) de estar meramente en el mundo. La experiencia o la emoción estética aflora cuando no esperamos nada —ni bueno ni malo— de las cosas. Es paradójico que una dimensión de nuestra racionalidad sea la facultad de no esperar, de no buscar, de no modificar o sustituir, de no mover un dedo, de simple y llanamente no hacer nada: es la facultad de dejar llegar, de dejar aparecer (y desaparecer), de dejar ser a las cosas; es la facultad de desactivar —momentáneamente— nuestras otras facultades. Works of art are material objects that at the same time and in mysterious ways are spiritual objects (i. e. immaterial). Using Kant and Schiller, this article opposes the Platonic and Aristotelian qualification with a different conception of art, which would be a human manufacture not subject to the logic of appropriation, but of its opposite. Man is a rational being, but Kant gave this idea three dimensions: reason is knowledge, but also compassion and contemplation. A human being has theoretical interests, practical interests… and multiple interests. The “aesthetic temper" to which Schiller refers points to this faculty of doing nothing, to this loosening of tensions, occupations and worries, to the pure delight (or dread) of being merely in the world. Aesthetic experience or emotion comes to the surface when we expect nothing —neither good nor bad— from things. It is paradoxical that one dimension of our rationality is the faculty of not waiting, of not seeking, of not modifying or substituting, of not moving a finger, of simply doing nothing: it is the faculty of letting come, of letting appear (and disappear), of letting things be; it is the faculty of deactivating —momentarily— our other faculties.


2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-120
Author(s):  
Sasa Grbovic

This article is dedicated to the interpretation of the aesthetic thought of Nicolai Hartmann and Edmund Burke, that is, the interpretation of their different understandings of the sublime, and its relation to the beautiful. While Hartmann?s sublime is an aesthetic value that is subordinate to the beauty, Burke defines the sublime as a form of aesthetic experience that is on the same level as beautiful. Burke forms an understanding of the sublime based on his analysis of the aesthetic experience, which includes his understanding of passions, states of the soul and the analysis of the sensible qualities of the aesthetic objects, while Hartmann formally considers sublime as one kind of beautiful, and reaches his understanding of it based on his inquiry of the aesthetic object and his definition of beautiful.


2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
André G. Pinto

In this article I outline the idea of an empirical/experiential reconnection to the natural non-human world through the practice of deep listening. I believe that the aesthetic experience is central to a more ecological positioning of the human being on earth and that aesthetic experience should involve a ‘rewilding of the ear’. To discuss this concept, I build an argument from Edgard Varèse’s music as ‘organised sound’ and approach it from a perceptual point of view. This leads to the discussion of other concepts, such as David Dunn’s ‘grief of incommunicability’ (Dunn 1997) and Jean-François Augoyard and Henry Torgue’s ‘sharawadgi effect’ (Bick 2008). Further to this I discuss parallels between Truax’s continuum (Speech–Music–Soundscape) and Peirce’s semiotic system. Taking points from these theories, we can discuss the possibility of the re-tuning of our ears to the wider sound palette of the world. I consider George Monbiot’s concepts of ‘rewilding’ and ‘rewilding of the human life’ (Monbiot 2014), in order to create a parallel to our relationship with the soundscape.


Author(s):  
Matthew Mutter

There has been a small movement among recent critics and philosophers to rehabilitate the reputation of beauty, which suffered under the modernist fascination with ugliness, Romantic and postmodern prejudice in favor of the sublime, and political criticism of beauty as elitist, inefficacious, and complicit with injustice. This chapter seeks to reframe these debates by examining the link between beauty and religious ontologies. Weber, following Nietzsche, insisted that secular modernity had broken sympathetic relations between beauty and goodness, but in Woolf’s novels the beautiful cannot shed its theological aura: its promise of reconciliation, peace, and divine benevolence. Woolf’s famous conception of “the world as a work of art”—which has, nevertheless, no “creator”—remains entangled in the aesthetic theodicies she repudiates. Her novels struggle to conceptualize secular, mundane models of beauty while simultaneously clinging to intimations of a metaphysical and moral order implicit in aesthetic experience. Beauty is, in her writing, the last and most intractable stronghold of mystical feeling.


2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-86
Author(s):  
Colleen Fitzpatrick

Abstract This paper examines the dialogical relationship between painting and mindfulness. This premise is explored with reference to the aesthetics of Mikel Dufrenne. Dufrenne’s arguments make use of a number of features that characterise mindful practice and reflect mindfulness philosophy. Dufrenne’s phenomenology of aesthetic experience centres on being present, focused, non-judgemental and attentive to the aesthetic object in order to realise its signification. These concepts are also given primary importance in Buddhist philosophy of mindfulness. Dufrenne’s theory lends itself ideally to understanding aesthetic experience in relation to mindfulness as well as how these experiences complement one another. Although Dufrenne does not prioritise painting, the present paper will explore painting in particular due to its embodied, gestural nature, which utilises the notion of style, reflecting the artist’s mode of being-in- the-world. Dufrenne’s ideas allow both mindfulness and painting to be understood in more comprehensive terms than that of their meanings considered individually.


1997 ◽  
pp. 3-8
Author(s):  
Borys Lobovyk

An important problem of religious studies, the history of religion as a branch of knowledge is the periodization process of the development of religious phenomenon. It is precisely here, as in focus, that the question of the essence and meaning of the religious development of the human being of the world, the origin of beliefs and cult, the reasons for the changes in them, the place and role of religion in the social and spiritual process, etc., are converging.


Author(s):  
Н. Алтыкеева ◽  
Б. Ниясалиева

Аннотация. Макалада романдын мазмунунан орун алган пейзаждык сүрөттөөлөр талкууланат. Пейзаждык сүрөттөөлөр чыгарманын көркөмдүүлүгүн, эстетикалык баалуулугун арттыруу менен катар эле каармандардын образын тереңден ачып берүүдө, окуялардын өнүгүп-өсүшү жана алдыда боло турган окуялар тууралуу окурманга маалымат берүүдө кошумча каражат катары колдонулат. Жазуучу романда пейзаждык сүрөттөөлөрдү өтө кылдат колдонгону байкалат. Алсак, тоо адамдагы улуулук жана бийиктикти айгинелейт, толукшуган ай жан- дүйнөнүн бөксөрбөй толуп турушун көрсөтөт, ачык асмандын алай-дүлөй түшкөн көрүнүшкө айланышы - каармандын ички сезими, уйгу-туйгу ойлонуусу, жан дүйнөсүнүн бурганак болушун ачып көрсөтүүдө маанилүү болсо, чабалекейлердин тынымсыз учуп чабалакташы, жан алакетке түшүп чыйпылдашы – алдыда боло турган кырсыктуу окуя тууралуу кабар берсе, согуштун апааты жашыл шибердин, бак-дарактардын күлгө айланышы, чымчык-куштардын күздү күтпөй кайдадыр учуп кетип жатышы менен түшүндүрүлөт. Tүйүндүү сөздөр: пейзаж. роман, идея, легенда, эпилог, каарман, негизги окуялар. Аннотация. В статье дается пейзажное описание. Пейзажное описание используется в произведении как дополнительное средство эстетических ценностей и помогает раскрыть образы героев, и действия произведения. Писатель в романе тонко использует пейзажное описание. Например горы возвышенное и самое ценное в человеке, а полная луна – счастливое душевное состояние человека, а превращение безоблачного неба в бущующий вид – указывает, как неспокойно в душе главного героя, его беспокойные мысли, как бушует его внутренний мир, а ласточки неспокойно летающие, предвещают несчастье, птицы улетающие раньше времени, превращение зелёной травы, деревьев в пепел предвещают ужасы войны. Ключевые слова: пейзаж. роман, идея, легенда, эпилог, герой, главное событие Annotation. The article discusses the landscape description. The landscape description is used in the work as an additional tool for aesthetic values and helps to reveal the images of heroes, and in the development of the action of the work/ The writer in the novel subtly uses the landscape description. The mountains are the sublime and the most valuable in a person, and the full moon is a happy state of mind of a person, and the transformation of a cloudless sky into a raging view indicates how restless the soul of the protagonist is, his restless thoughts. How his inner world is raging, and the swallows are restlessly flying, foreshadow the misfortune, the birds flying away ahead of time, the transformation of green grass, trees in the forehead the horrors of war. This article describes the idea of the story "Do not kill" which is given instead of the epilogue in the novel "When the mountains fall" which was written by Ch.Aitmatov. It considers the role of a story that calls to live in peace and to end wars that are occurring in the world. Keywords: Landscapе, novel, idea, legend, epilogue, hero, main event.


2021 ◽  
pp. 003329412110021
Author(s):  
Sizhe Liu ◽  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Xianyou He ◽  
Xiaoxiang Tang ◽  
Shuxian Lai ◽  
...  

There is evidence that greater aesthetic experience can be linked to artworks when their corresponding meanings can be successfully inferred and understood. Modern cultural-expo architecture can be considered a form of artistic creation and design, and the corresponding design philosophy may be derived from representational objects or abstract social meanings. The present study investigates whether cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design is perceived as more beautiful and how architectural photographs and different types of descriptions of architectural appearance designs interact and produce higher aesthetic evaluations. The results showed an obvious aesthetic preference for cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design (Experiment 1). Moreover, we found that the aesthetic rating score of architectural photographs accompanied by an abstract description was significantly higher than that of those accompanied by a representational description only under the difficult-to-understand design condition (Experiment 2). The results indicated that people preferred cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design due to a greater understanding of the design, providing further evidence that abstract descriptions can provide supplementary information and explanation to enhance the sense of beauty of abstract cultural-expo architecture.


2020 ◽  
pp. 81-91
Author(s):  
N.V. Khalikova

The purpose of the article is to compare the definitions of a stylistic device with modern philological ideas about the text and the image of the author as the main subject of cognition of reality in a feature. The methods of structural poetics make it possible to separate the stylistic means and methods as functionally different units of the artistic speech and the language of the writer. There is a steady connection between the worldview of the writer, their “image of the author” and their style. Autological and metalogical stylistic means are equally important for creating both an artistic and a non-artistic image (journalistic, scientific, everyday). Artistic means and techniques perform fundamentally different functions. Artistic means of image expressiveness contribute to the aesthetization of speech. Stylistic techniques organize the processes of meaning generation, preservation and transmission of meanings. The text records and reproduces artistic thinking, typical for this very writer, a set of ideas about a human, landscape, interior, ways of action and other classes of images. The artistic style is the same as the style of thinking, a level speech style of reflecting the perception of reality. The style can be adopted, it can be imitated and, thus, one can understand how the author thinks, what their manner of the aesthetic transformation of reality, forms of perception, is. The stylistic forms of the same author are reproduced from work to work, regardless of the plot and ideological content. To explain how the technique works is to identify the ways of the artistic thinking about the world (images). The stylistic device is closely connected with the intellectual book culture of society.


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 889-895
Author(s):  
Frăguța Zaharia

The present European context challenges us to approach the issues of Romanian dignity, humanity and humanism. The purpose of this essay is to emphasize the interpretative and explanatory dimensions of Constantin Micu Stavila’s philosophical thinking focused on the meaning of life and the human destiny, no less on the significance of the Christian personalism that the Romanian-French philosopher has cultivated it. Some questions arise: What is the role of philosophy and religion in understanding the meaning of life? How do we have to consider the human being and by especially the characteristics defining the Human within the Romanian culture? Trying to provide an honest, coherent and enlightening response, the paper is organized into two parts: 1. The mission of Romanian philosophy – attempting to demonstrate that the Romanian culture is integrating itself in the world-wide one seeing that there is an intimate complementarity of philosophy and religion; and 2. Romanian cultural messianism – developing an interpretation of the Romanian folklore according to the topic of the paper.


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