Freedom In The Kant's Aesthetics

"Freedom" is a very important concept in the whole Kant's philosophy and aesthetics, even a central concept for understanding the whole Kant's aesthetic system. But for a long time, there have had few works or papers starting from the concept of "Freedom" to research Kant's aesthetic thought. The difficulty is that, although Kant has used this concept many times, its significations were not same, which were all based on the Kant's whole system of critical philosophy and the particular comprehension to the human being. As far as aesthetics is concerned, the concept of "Freedom" in the aesthetics is much complex and ambiguous for the particular position of Kant's aesthetics in his whole system of philosophy. So we could correctly grasp the significations of "Freedom" in Kant's aesthetics only when we base on his comprehension to human being with his philosophical background, effectively connect the philosophy with aesthetics, and combine his thought about human being with his comprehension to aesthetics. Thus, starting from Kant's thought about human being, this paper will clear the stipulation about freedom in Kant's system of philosophy, and, on this basis, discuss the distinct significations of "Freedom" in Kant's aesthetics, theoretic significance in the history of aesthetics, its dualist predicament and finally, try to find a road through the predicament according to Marx's aesthetic thought.The introduction explained the value of this topic, the way to the question of freedom, and the whole construction of this paper. That Kant first take freedom into Aesthetics, deeply integrated the freedom and aesthetic, linked the aesthetic and the being of human, and opened a new theoretic area, which has very important value in the comprehension about the whole Kant's aesthetics, the development of the history of west aesthetics, even the human being itself; The meaning of freedom is mostly complicated, so this paper according to phenomenological thought, in the help of Heidegger's study, tried to find a way to the question of freedom.The first chapter discussed the freedom in the Kant's philosophy. We started from the Kant's comprehension to human beings. Above all we should expound the age in which Kant lived. Being in the Enlightenment, deeply influenced by the thoughtof age, much affected by the thinkers of Enlightenment-Newton, Martin Luther, Hume, Rousseau etc, Kant began to concern the human being itself. In general, there are two characteristics in Kant's comprehension to human being: the one is stipulating human being from his limitation by critique of reason; the other is always stipulating human being from the higher substance of morality, i.e. freedom. Supplementing each other, the two facets reflect the direction of humanism of Kant's thought about human being.In the second chapter, we studied two important category in the Kant's aesthetics: the reflective judgment and the transcendental power of imagination. The reflective judgment has very important theoretic value in the Critique of Judgment, and determined the aesthetic intrinsically. It was through the reflective judgment, that aesthetic begin to link with certain absolute "freedom" , and obtained the self-regulated meaning of freedom; Through analyzing the initiative function of transcendental power of imagination in the first edition of Critique of Pure Reason, this paper elucidated the intrinsic connection of aesthetic and initiative horizon, and give aesthetic the orientation to ontic freedom.The third chapter mainly clarifies the distinct significations of freedom in Kant's system of philosophy. In epistemology, the one meaning of "Freedom" is subject providing laws to the empirical world, that is to say, the thought of "Human being legislating for Nature", which reflects the activity and creativity of human being. The other signification is the concept of causality of freedom, other than the concept of causality of Nature. As a ideal concept, this freedom is the last foundation of whole empirical world. In Kant's ethics, "Freedom" has positive signification and passive signification. The former is not relevant to morality directly, but relevant to human being's independent decision; the latter is the practical reason itself and introduce human being to the deep respect for the laws. In this view, Freedom is the obedience to the laws and reflects the inner foundation of human being itself.The third chapter mainly clarifies the distinct significations of freedom in Kant's aesthetics. At first, in the analysis of beauty, freedom is free play of imagination and understanding without any interference from interests, which has universality and necessity because of its transcendental basis in the heart of human being (common sense); In the analysis of sublime, freedom is human being arousing his Ideas of reason against the great quantity and strong of Nature, and awaking hissuper-perceptual mission which is relevant to the substantial existence of human being. Only in this meaning, does the famous proposition of "beauty is the symbol of morality " make sense; Freedom in the art mainly reflect the intention, technique and non-pressure of art and the originality and modality of genius.The fourth chapter has three points. At first the freedom in Kant's aesthetics is distinguished into three dimensions according to formal analysis: that is perceptual dimension transcendental dimension and transcendent dimension. The perceptual dimension stresses the perceptual characteristic of aesthetics on the basis of sentimental existence of human being. Transcendental dimension stresses the inner relation between aesthetics and morality with the transcendental and open characteristics on the basis of substantial existence of human being. Transcendent dimension clears the transcendent basis of aesthetics and guarantees the university and necessity of aesthetics on the basis of limiting existence of human being. Supplementing each other, this three dimensions constitute the particular connotation of freedom in Kant's aesthetics. Secondly, this paper discusses the theoretical significance of Kant's introducing freedom into this area in the history of aesthetics, that is, giving aesthetics the metaphysical direction, introducing the significance of freedom into aesthetics, providing aesthetics with rich connotation. At last, this paper points out the inner predicament of dualism, the critique and reflection of German classical aesthetics about it and try to find a road through the predicament according to Marx's aesthetic thought, which reflects the great significance of methodology of freedom in Kant's aesthetics.