Expressions of Judgment

The Critique of Judgmentthe third and final work in Kants critical systemlaid the groundwork of modern aesthetics when it appeared in 1790. Eli Friedlanders reappraisal of this seminal accomplishment reformulates and elucidates Kants thought in order to reveal the inner unity of the Third Critique. Expressions of Judgment emphasizes the internal connection of judgment and meaning in Kants aesthetics, showing how the pleasure in judging is intimately related to our capacity to draw meaning from our encounter with beauty. Although the meaningfulness of aesthetic judgment is most evident in the response to art, the appreciation of natures beauty has an equal share in the significant experience of our world. Friedlanders attention to fundamental dualities underlying the Third Critiquesuch as that of art and natureunderscores how its themes are subordinated systematically to the central task Kant sets himself: that of devising a philosophical blueprint for the mediation between the realms of nature and freedom. This understanding of the mediating function of judgment guides Friedlander in articulating the dimensions of the field of the aesthetic that opens between art and nature, the subject and the object, knowledge and the will, as well as between the individual and the communal. Expressions of Judgment illuminates the distinctness as well as the continuity of this important late phase in Kants critical enterprise, providing insights for experienced scholars as well as new students of philosophy.