about normal response, but rather as efforts on the part of those captivated by
beauty to articulate something about the nature of their experience. These
articulations typically are given less in phenomenological terms than they are
in either metaphysical or functional terms. Francis Hutcheson, for example,
identifies“uniformity amidst variety”as the feature in objects that“excite[s]
in us the ideas of beauty,”whether natural or artistic,^12 adding that objects
might also be“agreeable on other accounts, such asgrandeur,novelty,sanctity,
and some others.”^13 Hutcheson regards these as empirical claims about what
causes a distinct art-relevant sensation or aesthetic experience in him and,
presumably, like-minded others. But, again, this claim will not do, in the face
of wide disagreements about which objects occasion which experiences. What
makes Hutcheson’s claim seem specially metaphysical is its combination of
empirical inadequacy and vagueness. Almost any object seen or heard might
be thought by someone to possess uniformity amidst variety. Any single object
that has parts–from a dog to a teacup to a safety pin–might be thought
automatically to possess it. A similar objection applies to Clive Bell’s account of
art as that which possessessignificant form.^14 Almost anything might seem to
have it, and no empirical generalization about normal experience of pleasure
in significant form is available to resolve disagreements.
Kant on natural and artistic beauty
Instead, then, of following Hutcheson and Bell in their efforts to make
empirical claims about causes of aesthetic experience, we might instead
embrace the vagueness and metaphysical character of their descriptions of
art-relevant features in an object. The point of an account of uniformity
amidst variety or significant form or some other defining feature that causes
aesthetic pleasure would then not be empirical adequacy in the first instance
so much as the further articulation of thesignificanceof a certain kind of
pleasurable experience. In theCritique of the Power of Judgment, Kant moves
explicitly in this direction, in proposing“the form of the purposiveness of an
(^12) Francis Hutcheson,An Inquiry Concerning Beauty, Harmony, and Design, ed. Peter Kivy (The
Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1973), p. 40.
(^13) Ibid.
(^14) See Clive Bell,Art(1914), chapter 1,“The Aesthetic Hypothesis,”reprinted inPhilosophy of
Art, ed. Neill and Ridley, pp. 99–110, at pp. 100ff.
Beauty and form 57