A Structural Disanalogy between Aesthetic and Ethical Value Judgements

摘要

It is often suggested that aesthetic and ethical value judgements are similar in such a way that they nshould be analysed in analogous manners. In this paper, I argue that the two types of judgements nshare four important features concerning disagreement, motivation, categoricity, and argumentation. nThis, I maintain, helps to explain why many philosophers have thought that aesthetic and ethical nvalue judgements can be analysed in accordance with the same dispositional scheme which corre-nsponds to the analogy between secondary qualities and values. However, I argue that aesthetic and nethical value judgements differ as regards their fundamental structures. This scheme is mistaken as nregards ethical value judgements, but it is able to account for aesthetic value judgements. This nimplies that aesthetic value judgements are autonomous in relation to ethical value judements and nthat aestheticians, not moral philosophers, are the true heirs of this renowned analogy.