Analysis Of The Free Play Of Imagination And Understanding From The Perspective Of Synthesis Of Apprehension

In the ninth chapter of critique of judgment,where Kant articulate the reason why in a judgement of taste the judging of the object precedes the feeling of pleasure,a concept was proposed,which is “the free play of imagination of understanding” as the answer to the former question.Although Kant didn't explain the concept in detail,however,it is very essential in the aesthetic theory of Kant,where the concept is tensely related with other important concepts,such as subjective universality,subjective purposiveness,pleasure or displeasure,etc.However,the significance and obscure of concept cause many debate on the aesthetic theory of Kant among researchers,for instance,how the judging of the aesthetical object precedes the feeling of pleasure,why the judgement of taste must be a singular,etc.In the view of this,the aim of this paper is to clarify the meaning of the concept,so to explicate the theory of judgement of taste thoroughly,so to get rid of the debate on aesthetic theory of Kant,answer the former questions,and then defend Kantian aesthetical theory.The innovation of this paper is explaining the connotation of the concept from the view of synthesis of apprehension of imagination.Imagination power plays an important role in Kantian philosophy.Considering the relation with epistemology,the pure synthetic and reproductive synthetic of imagination is indispensable to yield knowledge,and considering the relation with aesthetical creation,imagination is the aesthetically creative power,which is a necessary condition.In the cognitive judgment,synthesis of apprehension of imagination is the first act on manifold in aesthetical intuition,which bring category on aesthetical intuition and yield a whole representation by synthesizing them so that the representations can be subsumed under the corresponding concepts and then knowledge comes out.In the judgment of taste,imagination works in a similar way,however,the difference from the former is that there is formal freedom in synthesis of apprehension to aesthetical representation,which make judgment of taste possible andthat is,what I believe,the key to understand Kantian aesthetic theory.Therefore,I analyze the concept “the fee play of imagination and understanding” from the perspective of synthesis of apprehension of imagination,so that to clarify some controversy and misunderstanding of Kantian aesthetic theory and defend Kantian idea.