The Critique of Judgement [69]
in aesthetic judgements, i.e., not those in which (as in theoretical judgements) it has merely to subsume under objective concepts of understanding, and in which it comes under a law, but rather those in which it is itself, subjectively, object as well as law. We may also put the problem in this way: How a judgement possible which, going merely upon the individual's own feeling of pleasure in an object independent of the concept of it, estimates this as a pleasure attached to the representation of the same object in every other individual, and does so a priori, i.e., without being allowed to wait and see if other people will be of the same mind? It is easy to see that judgements of taste are synthetic, for they go beyond the concept and even the intuition of the object, and join as predicate to that intuition something which is not even a cognition at all, namely, the feeling of pleasure (or displeasure). But, although the predicate (the personal pleasure that is connected with the representation) is empirical, still we need not go further than what is involved in the expressions of their claim to see that, so far as concerns the agreement required of everyone, they are a priori judgements, or mean to pass for such. This problem of the Critique of judgement, therefore, is part of the general problem of transcendental philosophy: How are synthetic a priori judgements possible?
SS 37. What exactly it is that is asserted a priori of an object in a judgement of taste.
The immediate synthesis of the representation of an object with pleasure can only be a matter of internal perception, and, were nothing more than this sought to be indicated, would only yield a mere empirical judgement. For with no representation can I a priori connect a determinate feeling (of pleasure or displeasure) except where I rely upon the basis of an a priori principle in reason determining the will. The truth is that the pleasure (in the moral feeling) is the consequence of the determination of the will by the principle. It cannot, therefore, be compared with the pleasure in taste. For it requires a determinate concept of a law: whereas the pleasure in taste has to be connected immediately with the sample estimate prior to any concept. For the same reason, also, all judgements of taste are singular judgements, for they unite their predicate of delight, not to a concept, but to a given singular empirical representation. Hence, in a judgement of taste, what is represented a priori as a universal rule for the judgement and as valid for everyone, is not the pleasure but the universal validity of this pleasure perceived, as it is, to be combined in the mind with the mere estimate of an object. A judgement to the effect that it is with pleasure that I perceive and estimate some object is an empirical judgement. But if it asserts that I think the object beautiful, i.e., that I may attribute that delight to everyone as necessary, it is then an a priori judgement.
SS 38. Deduction of judgements of taste.
Admitting that in a pure judgement of taste the delight in the object is connected with the mere estimate of its form, then what we feel to be associated in the mind with the representation of the object is nothing else than its subjective finality for judgement. Since, now, in respect of the formal rules of estimating, apart from all matter (whether sensation or concept), judgement can only be directed to the subjective conditions of its employment in general (which is not restricted to the particular mode of sense nor to a particular concept of the understanding), and so can only be directed to that subjective factor which we may presuppose in all men (as requisite for a possible experience generally), it follows that the accordance of a representation with these conditions of the judgement must admit of being assumed valid a priori for every one. In other words, we are warranted in exacting from every one the pleasure or subjective finality of the representation in respect of the relation of the cognitive
SS 37. What exactly it is that is asserted a priori of an object in a judgement of taste.
The immediate synthesis of the representation of an object with pleasure can only be a matter of internal perception, and, were nothing more than this sought to be indicated, would only yield a mere empirical judgement. For with no representation can I a priori connect a determinate feeling (of pleasure or displeasure) except where I rely upon the basis of an a priori principle in reason determining the will. The truth is that the pleasure (in the moral feeling) is the consequence of the determination of the will by the principle. It cannot, therefore, be compared with the pleasure in taste. For it requires a determinate concept of a law: whereas the pleasure in taste has to be connected immediately with the sample estimate prior to any concept. For the same reason, also, all judgements of taste are singular judgements, for they unite their predicate of delight, not to a concept, but to a given singular empirical representation. Hence, in a judgement of taste, what is represented a priori as a universal rule for the judgement and as valid for everyone, is not the pleasure but the universal validity of this pleasure perceived, as it is, to be combined in the mind with the mere estimate of an object. A judgement to the effect that it is with pleasure that I perceive and estimate some object is an empirical judgement. But if it asserts that I think the object beautiful, i.e., that I may attribute that delight to everyone as necessary, it is then an a priori judgement.
SS 38. Deduction of judgements of taste.
Admitting that in a pure judgement of taste the delight in the object is connected with the mere estimate of its form, then what we feel to be associated in the mind with the representation of the object is nothing else than its subjective finality for judgement. Since, now, in respect of the formal rules of estimating, apart from all matter (whether sensation or concept), judgement can only be directed to the subjective conditions of its employment in general (which is not restricted to the particular mode of sense nor to a particular concept of the understanding), and so can only be directed to that subjective factor which we may presuppose in all men (as requisite for a possible experience generally), it follows that the accordance of a representation with these conditions of the judgement must admit of being assumed valid a priori for every one. In other words, we are warranted in exacting from every one the pleasure or subjective finality of the representation in respect of the relation of the cognitive