Aesthetic Judgment, Embodied Rationality, and the Truth of Appearances: An Introduction to Roger Scruton’s Philosophical Anthropology

Abstract

This paper offers an interpretation of and introduction to the philosophical anthropology of Roger Scruton through an examination of the aesthetic dimension of human rationality. We argue that attending to our aesthetic experience as individuated subjects capable of intersubjective communion offers a helpful corrective to the deracinated and disembodied view of human rationality prevalent in much of our contemporary ethical and scientific discourse. Through a consideration of how embodied rationality is at work in four different forms of art – painting, music, dance, and architecture – our paper develops the rudiments of a more concrete philosophical anthropology, and on the basis of first principles advances a normative claim about the importance of art and beauty to human life.

Keywords

• aesthetics
• art
• beauty
• rationality
• subjectivity
• roger scruton