Talk:Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime

message: This book contains Kant's personal, subjective generalizations. He arrived at his opinions by reading foreign authors and by having limited acquaintance with foreigners in Königsberg. This was typical of Kant's method, in which he depended on experience as little as possible and tried to fit general conclusions into presupposed forms. He is concerned with reports of an observing subject's judgments regarding the feelings of the beautiful and sublime. Lestrade 16:58, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Method 

message: Kant's interest in the subjective is evidenced in the very first sentence of the book. "The various feelings of enjoyment or of displeasure rest not so much upon the nature of the external things that arouse them as upon each person's own disposition to be moved by these to pleasure or pain." This prepares the reader for Kant's description of the activities of the mind. The external world that is known through the mind is of less concern to Kant.Lestrade 18:50, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Subjectivity 

message: Kant's claim that true virtue accompanies the sublime feeling of humanity's beauty and dignity is in marked contrast to a few other thinkers. Hobbes saw humanity as a bellum omnium contra omnes (war of everyone against everyone else). Humans, to his experienced eye, were naturally solitary, poor, nasty, and brutish creatures. Similarly, Schopenhauer asserted that man is a wolf to man.Lestrade 19:00, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sublime Feeling of True Virtue 

message: A quarter of a century before his Categorical Imperative, Kant praised true virtue as being the result of establishing one's feelings of the beautiful and sublime as a principle. The principle is that humans have beauty and dignity. Anyone who could regulate their behavior in accordance with that principle has achieved true virtue, according to Kant. Because this affection and esteem of humans is universal, it would also include the virtuous person himself. In case anyone might interpret this as being selfish or egotistical, Kant explains that the virtuous person would love and value himself "only so far as he is one of all those over whom his broadened and noble feeling is spread." Otherwise, the virtuous person would not love and prize himself. It is a logical, rational affection and esteem, the result of the individual being conceived as a part  of a whole. Lestrade 17:52, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Acting according to a principle 

message: Kant's observations are in opposition to today's society. His description of women and their dominant feelings leaves no room for Margaret Thatchers, Susan Sontags, Ruth Bader Ginsburgs, Hillary Clintons, Sandra Day O'Connors, Angela Merkels, Condoleezza Rices, and Indira Gandhis. It must have seemed to him to be a confirmation of his judgments when he learned that Queen Christina of Sweden had abdicated and went to Paris to enjoy the frivolities that were available there.Lestrade 19:21, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: The Sexes 

message: Kant observed that persons of very refined tastes sometimes do not marry because no one can match their ideal. "...[S]uch an inclination usually misses the great goal of nature. As it demands or expects more than nature usually offers ...." I am reminded of Christina Rossetti, the poetess, and her decision to renounce marriage and devote herself to her ideal spouse, Christ. Kant observed that a person of this disposition "...becomes oversubtle, because actually it is attracted to none. It is occupied only with an object that the enamored inclination creates in thought, and ornaments with all the noble and beautiful qualities that nature seldom unites in one human being...." (Section Three)Lestrade 18:32, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Ideal Mate 

message: In March, 2012, the article was claimed to be "written like a personal reflection or essay rather than an encyclopedic description of the subject." It was also claimed that the "article may contain original research." Can anyone specifically indicate where, in the article, it is written like a personal reflection or essay and where it seems to contain original research? If the person who made these claims has actually read the book, it should be easy for that person to provide instances of the alleged transgressions. If the claimer has not read the book, then I expect no response to my request.Lestrade (talk) 12:50, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Kant's book has the word "Observations" in the title because it contains Kant's observations or subjective, personal reflections and Kant's original research. The Wikipedia article merely lists Kant's personal observations. The Wikipedia article does not contain the Wikipedia author's personal reflections and original research. Anyone who has read Kant's book would know this. The topic of mere personal reflections is of the highest importance because Kant, in his subsequent critiques, thoroughly investigated the difference between the subjective and the objective, that is, the ideal and the real. You might even say that Kant's major concern was with the difference between what is inside a knower's brain and what can be known to exist outside of that brain. This book of personal observations regarding individual, nonobjective judgments of artistic taste was his last subjective publication. All of his following books were attempts at being completely objective.Lestrade (talk) 15:37, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Write a better article if you think that the present one is so bad. If you read the book, you will see that the present article gives an exact abstract or epitome. Lestrade (talk) 02:34, 17 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Multiple Issues