Philosophical writings

Mendelssohn, Moses; Dahlstrom, Daniel O.

doi:10.1017/cbo9781139164078.005

Cited by 3 publications

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“…Batteux also had an impact on the thought of Moses Mendelssohn. We find his influence in passages, such as the one in which Mendelssohn writes that, “Let this much … be granted, that the imitation of nature is the only reason why the fine arts are pleasing to us” (1997, 171). Batteux's influence in Germany extended to thinking about music.…”

Section: Fine Art and The Imitation Of Naturementioning

confidence: 99%

Kant's Musical Antiformalism

Young

2020

The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

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According to the orthodox view of Kant's philosophy of music, Kant is the founder of musical formalism, the view that music is pure, contentless form, and appreciated as such. On this orthodox view, Kant is an innovator in philosophy of music, though his views are confused and sometimes contradictory. Sometimes, we are told, Kant indicates that music is a fine art and sometimes that it is merely an agreeable art. None of the orthodox position is correct. Kant's views on music are familiar, even a little old fashioned for their time. His views are consistent. He believes that some music is fine art and that the fine arts are imitative arts. Imitative arts have content, and Kant believes that at least some music has content. Our views on Kant's philosophy of music ought to be thoroughly revised.

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Section: Fine Art and The Imitation Of Naturementioning

confidence: 99%

Kant's Musical Antiformalism

Young

2020

The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism

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“…The answer lies with the reference to “good” and “evil.” Mendelssohn's views on these concepts are grounded in his anthropology, which ascribes to the human being the “vocation” of pursuing “perfection” or “flourishing”—a condition, ultimately unattainable, in which an individual has properly cultivated and rendered harmonious the faculties of her soul and body . On this view, an action is good insofar as it promotes the pursuit of perfection and evil insofar as it impedes this task ( On Evidence in Metaphysical Sciences , in Mendelssohn , 296–99; JubA 2:316–20). For example, while economic pursuits can be good if treated as opportunities to refine our faculties, such pursuits become evil if they distract us from properly developing our bodies and intellects.…”

Section: Mendelssohnmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…By contrast, the insight that has no marked influence on the capacity to desire is called an instance of ineffective or speculative knowledge. (Mendelssohn , 158–59; JubA 1:412–13; translation slightly altered)…”

Section: Mendelssohnmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Law, Ethics, and the Needs of History: Mendelssohn, Krochmal, and Moral Philosophy

Sacks¹

2016

Journal of Religious Ethics

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Although the role of ethics in modern Jewish thought has been widely explored, major works by foundational philosophers remain largely absent from such discussions. This essay contributes to the recovery of these voices, focusing on the Hebrew writings of Moses Mendelssohn (1729–1786) and Nachman Krochmal (1785–1840). I argue that these texts reveal the existence of a shared ethical project animating these founding philosophical voices of Jewish modernity, and that reconstructing their claims contributes to broader conversations about the relationship between ethics and law. Mendelssohn and Krochmal present Jewish law as addressing needs emerging from the history of moral philosophy—from the modern histories of Platonic and Aristotelian ethics. Moreover, my reading highlights these thinkers’ ongoing relevance, suggesting that their work illuminates the role of law in ethical cultivation.

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“…Thus, Meier proposes the following rule, 'All arbitrary signs must imitate natural signs to as great a degree as possible if they are to be truly beautiful' 34 and Lessing famously contends in his 'Letter to Nicolai', 'Poetry must endeavour absolutely to elevate its arbitrary signs into natural ones.' 35 The problem, however, is that there are so few examples of natural signs; those often seized upon include onomatopoeia (see above), emotional cries 36 , dramatic performances 37 and metaphors 38 . The scarcity of examples meant that to convert arbitrary signs into natural ones (and so to convert symbolic cognition into intuition) poets must, the aestheticians prescribe, cultivate metaphors, onomatopoeia, cries and drama as intensely as possible.…”

Section: Mendelssohn's Distinction Between Arbitrary and Natural Signmentioning

confidence: 99%

Purely Practical Reason

Whistler¹

2014

Epoché

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When Kant separated off the Critique of Practical Reason from the Critique of Pure Reason, he did not solely isolate ethics from the rest of philosophy, he also drained theoretical philosophy of any practical element, anything involving reason's capacity to change and improve reality (including, I will argue, itself). What theoretical philosophy lost with the splitting of the first and second Critiques was any claim to normativity, to rules and so to an epistemic 'ought'. I contend, however, that in eighteenth-century German philosophy Kant is the exception, not the norm. Both before him (in the Leibniz-Wolffian tradition) and after him (in Schiller and Maimon's work), epistemology is understood as thoroughly normative. Here reason is neither merely pure, nor merely practical, not even pure practicalit forms, instead, 'purely practical reason' which applies normative rules in every domain. In this paper, therefore, I argue for the centrality of normative ruleswhat I dub, philosophy's ameliorative vocationto both pre-and post-Kantian German epistemology. Philosophers such as Wolff, Mendelssohn, Schiller and Maimon understood themselves as changing the world, not merely understanding it: praxis, not contemplation, was their ideal (even in epistemology). This was an ameliorative philosophy that sets rules for the improvement of both itself and other forms of thought. My argument proceeds in three steps. First, I focus on one element of the Leibniz-Wolffian projectits attempt to eliminate symbolic cognitionin order to substantiate my thesis. There is a pressing need for research on Leibniz-Wolffian thought: the more ingrained a philosophical prejudice, the more urgently it calls for reappraisal, and there is no prejudice in the history of philosophy stronger than that against the Leibniz-Wolffian tradition of German rationalism. A dearth of studies, of translations and of basic conceptual familiarity with this period strongly suggests a need to attend to it. 1 It is, of course, Kant's three critiques which provide the justification for contemporary ignorance: we are too quick to accept that the transcendental turn inaugurated a radical sea-change in philosophical thought and so consigned eighteenth-century rationalism to oblivion. However, central to my argumentand this is its second stepis that the Leibniz-Wolffian conception of the theoretical philosopher as a prescriber of rules does not become obsolete with the onset of transcendental thought; it lives onin transfigured formin strands of post-Kantian philosophy. Schiller and Maimon, for example, still conceive of philosophy as an ameliorative enterprise. Even though the ameliorative self-understanding of the philosopher was particularly prominent in the Leibniz-Wolffian tradition, it lived on after the transcendental turn. In this respect at least, Kant's Copernican revolution did not bring about an immediate paradigm shift; for his successors, this aspect of the Leibniz-Wolffian tradition was neither obsolete nor antiquated. Finally, the third step of my argumen...

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Philosophical writings

Cited by 3 publications

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Kant's Musical Antiformalism

Kant's Musical Antiformalism

Law, Ethics, and the Needs of History: Mendelssohn, Krochmal, and Moral Philosophy

Purely Practical Reason

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