Abstract

Departing from the disconcerting fact that the only passage where Kant mentions court practice is in a chapter on art, the essay undertakes a reconstruction of Kant’s esthetics. As to beauty, the judgment of taste appears as a judgment on the ability to judge, and it is universally valid not because it is true, but because it is communicable. Kant’s notion of art turns out to be the autonomous discourse of taste as his notion of morality stands for autonomy of man and his notion of law for autonomy of civil society. However, Kant’s esthetical experience of the sublime as appearance of what neither mind nor senses grasp breaks up harmony and autonomy and unjudges judgment. At this point, the essay uncovers an intrinsically destabilizing force of Kant’s ‚reason‘, traces the consequences for the judicial judgment and gives a perspective to philosophy of law within a differentiated society.