Aesthetic Judgment and the Moral Image of the World: Studies in Kant

by Dieter Henrich

This is a collection of four essays on aesthetic, ethical, and political issues by Dieter Henrich, the preeminent Kant scholar in Germany today. Although his interests have ranged widely, he is perhaps best known for rekindling interest in the great classical German tradition from Kant to Hegel. The first essay summarizes Henrich's research into the development of the Kant's moral philosophy, focusing on the architecture of the third Critique . Of special interest in this essay is Henrich's intriguing and wholly new account of the relations between Kant and Rousseau. In the second essay, Henrich analyzes the interrelations between Kant's aesthetics and his cognitive theories. His third essay argues that the justification of the claim that human rights are universally valid requires reference to a moral image of the world. To employ Kant's notion of a moral image of the world without ignoring the insights and experience of this century requires drastic changes in the content of such an image. Finally, in Henrich's ambitious concluding essay, the author compares the development of the political process of the French Revolution and the course of classical German philosophy, raise the general question of the relation between political processes and theorizing, and argues that both the project of political liberty set in motion by the French Revolution, and the projects of classical German philosophy remain incomplete.

Genres: Philosophy

112 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1992

About the author

Geboren am 5. Januar 1927 in Marburg, studierte Dieter Henrich von 1946 bis 1950 in Marburg, Frankfurt und Heidelberg (u.a. bei Hans-Georg Gadamer) Philosophie. 1950 Dissertation: Die Grundlagen der Wissenschaftslehre Max Webers.
Nach der Habilitation 1955/56 Lehrtätigkeiten als ordentlicher Professor in Berlin (ab 1960) und Heidelberg (ab 1965), Gastprofessuren in den USA ( Harvard, Columbia, University of Michigan, Yale); 1981 Berufung an die Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in München, Ordinarius für Philosophie bis zur Emeritierung 1994. Seit 1997 Honorarprofessor an der Berliner Humboldt-Universität.
Auszeichnungen:
1995 Friedrich-Hölderlin-Preis
2003 Hegel-Preis der Stadt Stuttgart
2004 Internationaler Kant-Preis der ZEIT-Stiftung
2006 Deutscher Sprachpreis
2008 Leopold-Lucas-Preis der Universität Tübingen

(Source: Suhrkamp Verlag)

Reviews

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a nice little book in with Henrich explains Kant's aesthetic theory within the context of the first and second critiques. The lynchpin connecting judgment to ethics and reason occurs in the free play between imagination and the understanding in its lawfulness. Henrich provides a strong justification for Kant's arguments which is grounded in Kant's intellectual development and refinement of aesthetics as it can be understood within the context of his critical project as a whole. The second essay is the best of the four for providing insight into Kant's work. The third essay is a much more generalized application of Kant's theory of freedom applied to the historical development of human rights from enlightenment to present. Set up as a dialectic between nihilism and imperialism, Henrich offers an alternative grounded in the critical project and freedom. If there is a criticism of this small text, it is that it is too short. Each of the essays is sufficiently rich that I would have preferred a more extended work focused on how the moral image as he introduces it in essay one can be understood in the history of enlightenment political and philosophical development that he addresses in essays three and four.

[Dan DalMonte · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a brief book and it leaves a lot of questions unanswered. But, the issues addressed are quite intriguing. We learn that Kant was centrally concerned with preserving the moral principles of Rousseau having to do with the liberty and dignity of man, and how these principles have to be preserved against a dialectic of sophistry and materialism that constantly threaten them. The moral image of the world has to be protected from the conditions of the unity of experience which would otherwise threaten them, in a rational way that does not merely establish the moral image as a ungrounded perspective. In the second essay on aesthetics, Henrich explains how the freedom of the imagination, in the formation of empirical concepts through reflecting judgment that begins with particulars, accords with the lawfulness of the understanding, and in his presentation (darstellung) beauty is generated. Especially interesting is Henrich's call to reconceptualize our grounding for rights as they have moved from the egocentrism of the Enlightenment to a logical progression to nihlism.

[Socrates · Rating 5 out of 5]

p52-53太优雅了，p53-54审美体验和经验知识的共振太符合我。p62开论很原创的worldview, self-image, norm之间的关系，又恰合他在第一篇阐述康德伦理的框架，鉴于思想成熟、连贯、原创，四星升五星；亨利希重视道德主体的现象学分析，强调权利观念同世界图景的不可分割，来解释人权在全球文化语境下面临的挑战，也驳斥了洛克和潘恩将权利观念植于剥离语境的普遍理性（p67)，我都非常激动。第四篇最奇，亨利希延续world image框架去探讨法国大革命和德国古典哲学的对应关系，已在社会理论层次，他从容征引韦伯或文艺复兴，不禁令我好奇，究竟是亨利希的个性，还是德国风格，威廉斯强调历史和社会学在伦理学的作用，在分析哲学内激起千层浪，是否是分道而行而殊途同归的表现一种。