An Essay on Hume’s Aesthetics

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Abstract

In his discussions about aesthetics, Hume seeks for a key to the controversial issue of passion. He thinks things are not fine-looking in themselves, rather the mind which considers the objects creates the beauty. Apparently, he raises a paradoxical claim. On the one hand, beauty is regarded something mental and completely subjective arisen from feelings, but on the other hand not only he suggests that we can judge about a work of art assessing its aesthetic value but also we can prefer one aesthetic judgment over another which implies an evidence of objective criteria on artistic evaluation. It is taken for granted by Hume that the intersubjectivity of aesthetic perception gives rise to achieving a collective agreement about it. Embracing the importance of aesthetic experience, nonetheless, Hume puts emphasis on the role of critics, those with some characteristics whose judgments may turn into the criterion for taste which is not of the affection category, but something real.
In this paper, the author attempts to survey Hume’s emphasis on the role of critics as the reference standards for different tastes of individuals.

 

Keywords

References

- دیوید هیوم، 1385، درباب معیار ذوق و تراژدی، ترجمه علی سلمانی، انتشارات فرهنگستان هنر، تهران.
2- Hume, D. 1987, A treatise of Human Nature, edited by L.A.Selby-Bigge, Oxford,.
3- Hume, D. "Of the Standard of Taste", Essays Moral, Political and Literary, ed. E. F. Miller Indianapolis: Liberty Classics.
4- Hume, D. 1988, Enquiries Concerning Human Understanding and Concerning the Principles of Morals, edited by L.A. Selby-Bigge, Oxford,.
5- Dabney, T. 2001, Hume's Aesthetic Theory, taste and sentiment,New York: Routledge.
6- Kivy, P. 2005, "Hume's Neighbor's Wife: An Essay on the Evaluation of Hume's Aesthetic". The Seventh Sense: A Study of Francis Hutcheson's Aesthetics and Its Influence In Eighteenth Century Britain,New York: Burt Franklin.
7- Shelley, J. 1994, "Hume's Double Standard of Taste", The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 52:4.
8- Ribeiro, B. 2007, "Hume's Standard of Taste and the DE GUSTIBUS Sceptic", British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol 47, No 1, January.
9- Perricone, C. 1995, "The Body and Hume's Standard of Taste", The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol 53, No 4.
10- Ross, S. 2008, "Human Critics: Real or Ideal?" British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol 48, No 1. 
11- Kaufman, D. 2003, "Critical Justification and Critical Laws", British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol 43, No.4.
12-Wieand, J. 2003, "Hume's Real Problem", The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 61:4.
13- Levinson, J. 2002, "Hume's Standard of Taste: The Real Problem", The Journal of aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol 60, No 3,.
14- Shiner, R. 1996, "Hume and the Causal Theory of Taste", The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol 54, No 3,.
15- Hanfling, O. 1995, Philosophical Aesthetics, an introduction, Blackwell.
16- Buddm, M. 2007, "The Intersubjective Validity of Aesthetic Judgments", British Journal of Aesthetics, Vol 47, No 4
Send comment about this article
CAPTCHA Image

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics