Cycle 13 · 17 Dec 2024The essence of evil: innocence of nature, horror of naturalism!- 1:10:21Natural beauty appears when nature imitates a finality; it is a relation, not a substance, and it unfolds on surfaces.
Beauty
Worked through in 9 videos · 12 passages.
Summary
Dominique Pagani starts from the statement "it is beautiful", which amounts to saying "I like it": pleasure presupposes a desire that is satisfied, and the task is to find the desire specific to aesthetic pleasure, distinct from the desire to eat or from the use of a tool1. The aesthetic judgement is reflective: the beautiful object satisfies a desire with no known aim and thereby reveals an unconscious desire2. If this desire is common to humanity, there is a criterion of the beautiful, which he takes to be freedom3. Beauty is an image of freedom, but an abyss separates the image from the thing: it is a programme, not a reality in act. It plays on surfaces and appearance (Schein, schön), where the desire for freedom is reflected4. This is why the love that beauty triggers seems so important. Natural beauty appears when nature imitates a purposiveness; it is a relation, not a substance5. He also mentions Baudelaire's beauty that is always strange, the marble-like beauty of the Parnassians, and "art for art's sake", which he describes as a counter-revolutionary retreat after 1848.
- 1The philosopher's two enemies: the dogmatist and the sceptic16 Nov 2017 · 1:19
- 2From Plato to world revolution14 Jul 2022 · 56:18
- 3#2.6 Between crisis and war: philosophising?1 Aug 2017 · 1:52:24
- 4#9.13 How can sciences of history be real?29 Jan 2021 · 1:05:38
- 5The essence of evil: innocence of nature, horror of naturalism!17 Dec 2024 · 1:10:21
Summary produced automatically from 12 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.
Cycle 13 · 17 Dec 2024The essence of evil: innocence of nature, horror of naturalism!
Talks · 14 Jul 2022From Plato to world revolution- 56:18To say "it is beautiful" is to say that it pleases; the beautiful object satisfies a desire with no known aim and reveals an unconscious desire.
Series · 10 Mar 2021#16 Programme music, pure music- 56:57For Baudelaire, the beautiful is always strange; the instinct for beauty makes beauty a correspondence with heaven, glimpsed through poetry and music.
Cycle 9.2 · 5 Feb 2021#9.14 How can sciences of history be real?- 20:34Love seems most important because the beauty that triggers it resembles freedom, the most important thing of all.
Cycle 9.2 · 29 Jan 2021#9.13 How can sciences of history be real?
Cycle 7 · 27 Mar 2020#1 Harnessed to confinitude
Cycle 5.2 · 30 Jun 2019#5.8 Nature or landscape?- 1:03:11Beauty is an image of freedom, but an abyss separates the image from the thing: it is a program, not a reality in act.
Talks · 16 Nov 2017The philosopher's two enemies: the dogmatist and the sceptic- 1:19To say "it's beautiful" is to say "it pleases me." One must seek the desire that produces a specifically aesthetic pleasure, distinct from that of eating or of using a tool.
Cycle 2 · 1 Aug 2017#2.6 Between crisis and war: philosophising?- 1:50:34Between the dogmatist and the skeptic: to say "it's beautiful" implies a pleasure, hence a desire that is satisfied.
- 1:52:24Aesthetic judgment is reflective: the beautiful object reveals an unconscious desire. If there is a desire common to humanity, there is a criterion of beauty, which he takes to be freedom.