Kant and the Need for Orientational and Contextual Thinking: Applying Reflective Judgement to Aesthetics and to the Comprehension of Human Life

This essay explores the relation between worldly orientation and rational comprehension in Kant. Both require subjective grounds of differentiation that were eventually developed into a contextualizing principle for reflective judgement. This kind of judgement can proceed either inductively to find new universals or by analogy to symbolically link different objective spheres. I will argue that the basic orientational function of reflective judgement is to modally differentiate the formal horizonal contexts of field, territory, domain and habitat laid out in the Introduction to the Critique of the Power of Judgement. Assessing which context takes priority will be important in making aesthetic judgements and for applying practical reason to comprehend human affairs.

Reflective Judgement and Prudential Rationality: A Contribution to an Inclusive Practical Application of Law

Hannah Arendt has developed a theory of the importance of judgment of taste for political manners, founded on the Kantian aesthetic theory. Nowadays this theory is considered a current theoretical reference for establishing a political way to reconcile the demands of the radicalization of deliberative democracy with the need for political inclusion (Iris Marion Young, Seyla Benhabib). Albena Azmanova in her The Scandal of Reason: A Critical Theory of Political Judgment proposes an inclusive political rhetoric. The political theory founded on judgment is based on Kant’s philosophy; it was developed by Arendt and has greatly influenced the current debate, as an alternative theory in which the moral basis of law can be more sensitive to human contexts; a universalist theory more adequate for dealing with the tragic dimension of human life. The theory of political judgment uses the concepts of reflective judgment and ‘enlarged thought’ as its main concepts. As a starting point, a theory like this considers the singular judgments of justice that each person makes. The background, therefore, is not a rational foundation of principles, but the capacity of rational beings to make judgments. This post-metaphysical theory of law, based on a theory of judgment, is a critique of legal positivism, but presents itself as an alternative to the idealistic theory of law. But this theoretical project has received some criticism related to the adequacy of Arendt’s rereading of Kantian philosophy and her attempt to approximate Kant’s reflective judgment to the Aristotelian concept of phronêsis. Some critics, such as Bryan Garsten, believe that Kant’s rhetoric of public reason diminished and displaced the prudential faculty of judgment that Arendt is to be interested in reviving. Arendt’s attempt to find a theory of judgment in Kant’s aesthetic theory is not successful, in Garsten’s view. Our purpose is to show that a critical theory of judicial judgment is not only possible, but necessary; Arendt’s theory of judgment offers an important contribution to a critical theory of judicial judgment, particularly one devoted to the construction of a legal theory that prioritizes a politics of social inclusion. This theory proposes a critical approach to the project of the procedural conception of democracy, since it can mask social exclusion. An adequate understanding of judicial argumentation cannot forget that it happens in a rhetorical context: it is not only important what a discourse says, but how it says it. The radicalization of deliberative democracy supposes a revision of the ways judicial deliberation is thought: not by reference to universal or at least general principles, but taking into consideration what is ‘critically relevant’, with a view to remedying social injustice (following Azmanova).

Hegel on Reflection and Reflective Judgement

I examine the relation between logic and nature in terms of ‘reflection’, the word that Hegel uses at the end of the Encyclopaedia Logic to describe the self-sundering or externalization of the idea into nature. Although nominally the term ‘reflection’ seems to denote a uniquely mental process and is often used so by Hegel in his early critique of Reflexionsphilosophie, in his later writings it also has an irreducibly ontological significance. Hegel describes logic's opening-out to nature as a movement of ‘reflection’ [Widerschein] and he follows Kant in describing the shift from the finite to the infinite in the relation between nature and thought as one of reflective judgement. Although Hegel generally considers reflection to be uniquely concerned with finite cognition and the constitution of finite things, I argue that in his embrace of reflective judgement he sees a key role for reflection in the relation of logic, nature and spirit.

Dire la verità / To tell the truth

Dire o non dire la verità? Mentire a fin di bene? Dire subito tutta la verità, oppure farla trapelare progressivamente, tenendo conto della capacità che l’interlocutore ha di sopportarla? Questi dilemmi etici si pongono nei più svariati campi professionali e, prima ancora, nella nostra vita quotidiana. Le diverse tradizioni che hanno dato origine alla cultura occidentale, a cominciare dalla cultura greca e da quella giudaico-cristiana, hanno avuto atteggiamenti diversificati nei confronti della verità e della menzogna? E la modernità come si è posta di fronte a questo tema? Infine, come si è sviluppata la riflessione filosofica su questi temi? Come si sono posti autori quali Platone, Agostino, Machiavelli, Montaigne, Grozio, Kant, Constant, Feyerabend, MacIntyre, Sandel, di fronte a questo problema? Dopo aver preso in esame queste questioni il saggio prova a dare una risposta alla difficile problematica, facendo leva sulla nozione aristotelica di phronesis e su quella kantiana del giudizio riflettente, mettendone alla prova l’efficacia soprattutto nel campo della bioetica e della pratica clinica in medicina. ---------- Can we lie for a good purpose? Is it better to tell the whole truth immediately, or to leak it progressively, taking into account the interlocutor’s capacity to suffer? These ethical dilemmas are often raised in the most varied professional fields and first of all in our daily life. Do the different traditions that gave rise to western culture share similar attitudes towards truth and lies? What about Greek culture? What about Judeo-Christian culture? What about Modernity? How has philosophical reflection developed these topics? What did Plato, Augustine, Machiavelli, Grotius, Kant, Constant, Feyerabend, MacIntyre and Sandel think about these issues? After dealing with these difficult questions, this short essay tries to look for an answer in the Aristotelian concept of phronesis and in the Kantian notion of reflective judgement, testing these conceptual tools through bioethical and clinical medical cases.

The Encyclopedia Hands From Design Thinking to Design Making

This article deals with creativity in practice and reveals the complex web of knowledge and skills that are in the things we create. Immaterial values such as traditions, memories and intentions are made visible. Also dimensions from the philosophy of knowledge are revealed: reflective judgement, aesthetic sensitivity and accountability for doing good work. The epistemology of the article is based on the theory of hermeneutic experience and empirical examples are gathered from the author’s book Things in motion – the design process (2012).

7 Kant on the Public Sphere and Some Reflections on Hannah Arendt and the Contemporary Intercultural Discussion

Kant’s famous motto of enlightenment, “Sapere aude!”, is inseparably entwined with the demand for the “public use of reason”. There is no doubt that this also embraces the notion of a free and unrestricted exchange of ideas and indicates the potential beginning of a process in which “subjects” of the state and passive citizens are capable of developing into citizens of the world, and in which nation states are capable of developing into a kind of world community. This conception of the public sphere also receives further concrete articulation in Kant’s Critique of Judgement, as Hannah Arendt already clearly recognized. In particular, the doctrine of reflective judgement, which is developed in that work, also allows us to derive several critical insights from Kant’s conception of enlightenment and the public sphere which are highly relevant to the contemporary intercultural discussion regarding the issue of the “Public Sphere”.