child made the object or in the fact that it’s a poem about philosophy, rather
than through finding the object as-it-were intelligible without subsuming it
under a kind.
Elsewhere Kemal suggests that the deduction is not complete until con-
firmation can be secured that I am correctin some particular cases. Until I have
that confirmation I cannot demand the agreement of others. So far, this is
mistaken. What Kant means bydemand(fordern) is that Iam entitledto speak
as though others must agree with me–must have the same pleasure as I do–
assuming for the moment that I am right about my pleasure and its causes.
That I am entitled to do this would be entirely established by the deduction as
outlined, were it sound.Demandhere indicates an entitlement possessed in
virtue of the underlying similarity of the cognitive faculties of judging
subjects. It does not indicate any coercive power to make others agree with
this particular judgment. They must judge for themselves, freely, and if I am
right, then they must agree in feeling pleasure due to the harmonious free
play of the cognitive faculties, if they too estimate freely–or at least so the
deduction argues.
But this is not to say that confirmation–getting others to estimate freely and
then, after reflecting on their pleasure, tosaythat they agree–does not matter.
Here Kemal is ontosomething deepinKant, as he remarks that“the only way to
gain confirmation [that one’sreportofone’s experience of aesthetic pleasure is
correct], it seems, is by bringing other subjects to make the same judgment”^68
through their own free estimating. In fact, as Kemal notes, it is not even certain
that this will help. Other subjects may likewise experience pleasure (or not), but
misreport that they have estimated the object freely. They can be wrong just as
I can.Ifnoone canbe certain ofbeing right, how canwereassureoneanotherby
agreeing?^69
But perhaps this inability of all and any of us to be sure we are right does not
matter so much. When we develop the practice of estimating objects freely,
reflecting on our experience of them, and then reporting to other subjects the
resultsofourestimationandreflection,thensomethinginteresting and import-
ant happens.“Judgments of taste,”Kemal writes,“sustain an exploration of the
nature and form of the community of subjects. In seeking confirmation, we
must address subjects as subjects capable of such...judgments.”^70 That is,
we must address them freely. We must report what, on reflection, we have(^68) Ibid., p. 91. (^69) Seeibid., pp. 96–97. (^70) Ibid., pp. 98–99.
194 An Introduction to the Philosophy of Art