9 - The Transition from Nature to Freedom

Summary

In addition to the ‘architectonic’ sense in which the faculty of judgment allows a transition from understanding to practical reason, Kant argued for a logical (or teleological) and an aesthetic transition. In the latter, the pleasure of taste is assigned the role of promoting, moral feeling. Although this is a standard 18^th-century view, it takes on a deeper significance against the background of Kant’s moral philosophy after 1785. In later works, Kant is explicit that a being that possesses theoretical reason and the ability to set itself purposes could still be a merely natural being; a special (‘aesthetic’) receptivity for moral feeling must be added to those capacities in order to qualify such a being as one with practical reason. I suggest that Kant’s realization of this pivotal role played by moral feeling is the reason for his emphasis on the importance of any aesthetic preparation that can promote moral feeling.