Bolzano on Beauty

PaisleyLivingston
This paper sets forth Bolzanos little-known 1843 account of beauty. Bolzano accepted the thesis that
beauty is what rewards contemplation with pleasure. The originality of his proposal lies in his claim that
the source of this pleasure is a special kind of cognitive process, namely, the formation of an adequate
concept of the objects attributes through the successful exercise of the observers proficiency at obscure and
confused cognition. To appreciate this proposal we must understand how Bolzano explicated a number of
concepts (especially clarity, confusion, and intuition) in his Wissenschaftslehre. Iargue that Bolzano
was ahead of his time and anticipated some of the results of recent empirical psychological research on the
relations between beauty, affect, and processing fluency. Bolzanos remarks on ugliness and on relations
between pure and mixed beauty are also of contemporary interest. The upshot is that Bolzanos account of
beauty is neither as derivative nor dark as some of his commentators have claimed.
First published in 1843 and rarely mentioned thereafter, Bernard Bolzanos ideas about
beauty deserve to be better known.1 Bolzano accepted the thesis that the beautiful is what
rewards contemplation with pleasure, but he had his own ideas about the source of this
pleasure.2 Our enjoyment of beauty, he proposes, stems from the successful exercise of
an ability to devise a concept that covers the attributes of a sufficiently complex object.
Our knowledge of the regularity in the objects attributes must not be acquired too easily,
but nor does it require systematic recourse to the effort of distinct thought. In brief, we
apprehend and enjoy beauty in a mixture of clear, obscure, distinct, and confused cognitions,
in senses of these terms that Bolzano was at pains to specify.
In Section 1 of this paper, Ipresent Bolzanos explication of beauty and ugliness to readers
unfamiliar with his text.3 In Section 2, Irespond to commentators who have characterized
Bolzanos proposal as a dark and derivative doctrine. With regard to the latter charge,
1

Bolzano remains unmentioned in all recent English-language histories and reference works devoted to aesthetics.
Avaluable overview is provided in Maria E.Reicher, Austrian Aesthetics, in Mark Textor (ed.), The Austrian
Contribution to Analytic Philosophy (London: Routledge, 2006), 293323. An unfortunate and highly misleading
early reference to Bolzano was made by William Knight, professor of philosophy at St Andrews and the author of
a compendious historical survey, who wrote: Another of the minor Kantians, Bernhard [sic] Bolzano of Prague
(17811848), wrote a treatise on The Idea of the Beautiful in 1843, and one on The Division of the Fine Arts in 1847.
These works, however, have no special value (The Philosophy of the Beautiful: Being Outlines of the History of Aesthetics
(New York: Charles Scribner, 1891), 6465).
Hugo Bergmann reports that Emil Utitz identifies Aquinas as Bolzanos implicit source here (Das philosophische
Werk Bernard Bolzanos (Halle an der Saale: Max Niemeyer, 1909), 115; Emil Utitz, Bernard Bolzanos sthetik,
Deutsche Arbeit 8 (1908), 8994). This could be right, but it is extremely likely that Bolzano was also familiar
with Hippias Major 298a, as he mentions this work in passing in 27 of the essay on beauty.
Bernard Bolzano, Abhandlungen zur sthetik. Erste Lieferung. ber den Begriff des Schnen: Eine Philosophische
Abhandlung (Prague: Borrosch und Andr, 1843); the same text was published in the Abhandlungen der Kniglichen
Bhmischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, 5th series, Vol. 3, 1843. Modern editions include Untersuchungen zur

British Journal of Aesthetics Vol. 54 | Number 3 | July 2014 | pp. 269284 DOI:10.1093/aesthj/ayu037
British Society of Aesthetics 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Society of Aesthetics.
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270 | PaisleyLivingston

Iargue that while it is correct to observe that Bolzano was influenced by various philosophers (and especially by Leibniz, Wolff, Baumgarten, and Kant), it should also be recognized
that he criticized many of their views and proposed his own elucidations of the concepts he
employed in his explication of beauty. To understand Bolzanos views on beauty, we must
consult some of the passages in his 1837 Wissenschaftslehre where he takes up a number of relevant concepts, including clarity, distinctness, ideas, judgement, intuition, and consciousness.4 The upshot is that Bolzanos proposal is far less derivative than it has appeared to some
of his commentators. Ialso argue that it is by no means as obscure as has been claimed. To
that end, in Section 3, Icompare Bolzanos thoughts about beauty to the findings of some
contemporary psychological research. It turns out that the results published by some empirical psychologists converge on salient aspects of Bolzanos thinking. Bolzano was ahead of his
time, Iclaim, with regard to his criticisms of prior accounts, his own innovative proposal,
and some of the problems he identified but did not solve. As Iexplain in Section 4, one of
these problems was that of exploring the relations between what Bolzano calls pure and
mixed beauty, and Bolzanos remarks on this topic merit our attention aswell.

1. Bolzanos Explication ofBeauty

Covering familiar ground, Bolzano first sets out to distinguish between the beautiful and
the good. Some but not all morally good things are beautiful, and although some beautiful
things are morally good, others are not. Similarly, the beautiful is not conceptually equivalent to what has allure or charm (der Reiz), but is a species thereof. The taste of an apple,
however pleasant or alluring, cannot be beautiful. Given that the beautiful is a source of
pleasure or delight (das Wohlgefallen, die Verngen), the key question is under what conditions this species of pleasure obtains. Bolzano proposes that the pleasure in an objects
beauty arises through the contemplation (die Betrachtung) of the object, and not from any
other form of influence or interaction.5 The object must be appropriately (gehrig) contemplated and comprehended (aufgefasst) (2, 13). Bolzano does not, unfortunately, offer
a more detailed account of these cognitive requirements.6

Grundlegung der sthetik, ed. Dietfried Gerhardus (Frankfurt am Main: Athenum, 1972), 1118; and Bernard
Bolzano, Gesamtausgabe, I.18: Mathematisch-physikalische und philosophische Schriften 18421843, ed. Gottfried
Gabriel, Matthias Gatzemeier and Friedrich Kambartel (Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog, 1989),
87217. Unless otherwise stated, paragraph numbers followed by page numbers are from the 1843 Borrosch und
Andr edition, which is readily available on Google Books.
Bernard Bolzano, Wissenschaftslehre: Versuch einer ausfhrlichen und grsstentheils neuen Darstellung der Logik mit steter
Rcksicht auf deren bisherigen Bearbeiter, 4 Vols (Sulzbach: Seidelschen, 1837). In what follows Igive page numbers
in this edition, available in a somewhat lacunary scan on Google Books. For partial translations and paraphrase of
selected sections, see Theory of Science, ed. and trans. Rolf George (Oxford: Blackwell, 1972).
Although in some contexts Betrachtung can be translated as observation, Bolzano holds that not everything
beautiful is observable in the sense of perceptible. So in some cases the more inclusive term contemplation is a
more appropriate translation (e.g. in 13, 32).
It may be helpful to note that cognition in what follows translates Erkenntnis, which for Bolzano entails truth
(Wissenschaftslehre, 26, 117). He uses Wissen for a species of knowledge in which we have an unassailable
conviction (Wissenschaftslehre, 321, 288).

Bolzano on beauty | 271

With these preliminaries in place, Bolzano considers a counterexample.When Robinson

Crusoe finds a useful tool, he contemplates it with great pleasure, but this is not an experience of beauty. Bolzano proposes that in order to rule such cases out, we must specify
conditions pertaining to (i) the nature and special qualities of the contemplation, such
as its contents, and/or (ii) the nature and basis of the pleasure. In this regard, Bolzano
explicitly rejects Kants manner of explicating and applying the idea that a judgement of
beauty must be without interest. Bolzano proposes that we should replace Kants and
various other philosophers notions of disinterestedness with a condition to the effect that
neither the pleasure in the object nor the content of the experience hinges primarily on
an exclusive relation to the contemplator. The observers attention, he specifies, cannot be
exclusively directed towards a relation between the object and the observers individuality
(individuo) (14, 31). Nor can such an exclusive relation be the basis of the pleasure taken
in the object, as would be the case, say, in a shoppers delight in his acquisition of some new
possession. Similarly, if what Crusoe is contemplating is his possession of the tool and the
utility it will have for him and him alone, he would not be experiencing the tools beauty,
even if his cognition of this object satisfied Bolzanos other conditions.
Bolzano observes that many philosophers, including Kant, have held that a judgement
of beauty makes a claim to a general or even universal validity, and while Bolzano agrees
that some such condition is warranted, he thinks a more precise analysis is needed. Bolzano
says that it would be wrong to deny the differences between people with regard to their
ability to judge and enjoy beauty. This ability depends upon the natural development and
exercise of various skills, especially our powers of recognition or knowing (das Erkennen)
(6, 18). Bolzano adds that while few thinkers have doubted that beings with far more
perfect powers than ours could also know beauty, some, such as Schiller, have believed that
the contemplation of beauty could not be a source of pleasure for angelic beings, and this
is a point that Bolzano seems prepared to endorse.7
Bolzano conjectures that the very fact that the nature of beauty has so long eluded
analysis gives us a valuable clue: perhaps our recognition of beauty, which is normally
accomplished with speed and ease, does not arise from cognition that is clear and distinct.
Our contemplation of beautiful objects is like other observations in that we search for a
concept, an idea or a rule, from which the attributes (Beschaffenheiten) of the thing before
us can be derived. Memory, imagination, understanding, reason, and judgement work
together in this process, but Bolzano cannot accept Kants evocation of a free play of
faculties in the formation of a judgement of beauty. Nor does he understand how a cognitive activity could be purposeful without actually being oriented towards a purpose.8
7

Bolzano did, however, contend that in the afterlife we will continue to enjoy beauty, even though our cognitive
powers will be greatly improved and we will accordingly have far more clear and distinct ideas and judgements
(Athanasia; oder, Grnde fr die Unsterblichkeit der Seele: Ein Buch fr jeden Gebildeten, der hierber zur Beruhigung
gelangen will, 2nd edn rev. (Sulzbach: Seidelschen, 1838), 150, 171).
These are not the only criticisms of Kants aesthetics made by Bolzano. For an able survey, see Peter McCormick,
Bolzano and the Dark Doctrine: An Essay on Aesthetics, in Barry Smith (ed.), Structure and Gestalt: Philosophy and
Literature in Austria-Hungary and Her Successor States (Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 1981), 69113.

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Brentano proposes instead that on the basis of what is perceived in the object or thought
about it, our minds formulate guesses or anticipations about other possible attributes of
the object. In an easy and swift cognition we settle on a concept that covers other attributes we subsequently perceive in the object. We enjoy this discovery of a pattern without
having a clear and distinct representation of how it has been achieved.
Bolzano grounds this explanation in a more general account of the sources of pleasure.
Whenever the activation of our powers is neither too easy nor too hard, we experience
pleasure. Whatever is taken as a means to those events whereby our powers are increased
can be a source of pleasure, as can events apprehended by us as signs of such enjoyable
increases of our capacities. Merely to exercise ones powers, and thereby to become aware
of them, can be an improvement if it contributes to the correct employment of the ability
in question.
Carrying these assumptions over to the case of beauty, Bolzano reckons that the source
of our pleasure is not the thought of some particular advantage that might be had from
the object. Instead, the source of the pleasure is the beneficial activation of our powers
facilitated by our engagement with the object. As beauty is not enjoyed by creatures with
significantly lower or higher powers than our own, the source of our pleasure must be
determined through the relation in which the beautiful object stands to our cognitive powers [Erkenntniskrften] (10, 24; Bolzanos emphasis). Those objects that stimulate in us the
pleasures of beauty are ones the attributes of which manifest regularities that are neither
too easy nor too difficult for us to process, that is, those the contemplation of which triggers the right sort of activation and employment of our cognitive powers.
Once he has identified in this general way the source of the pleasure we take in the
contemplation of beautiful objects, Bolzano provides additional remarks about the process
involved in the corresponding employment of our powers. In Bolzanos paradigm case, we
find ourselves in a situation where we are not troubled by any urgent needs. We perceive
or think about some object that draws our attention, and we consider this object more
closely. We recognize a significant number of attributes, some of which we cannot readily
derive from the others. Usually without making any conscious decision to do so, we set
ourselves the task of finding a concept that will cover all of these attributes. Our imagination becomes active and generates thoughts of other possible attributes of the object. We
reason about those attributes and form judgements as to which of them are most likely to
belong to the object. We thereby form a concept of the object, which we test by means
of further observations and thoughts. We discover that some of the attributes that we had
guessed at, or that could be derived from those guessed at, actually belong to the object,
which provides us with a kind of proof that our conception was correct. This successful
deployment of our cognitive powers gives us pleasure.
To the objection that this analysis resembles far too closely the process in which we
might solve mathematical problems, Bolzano responds that there are important differences to be noted (and one of his criticisms of Herbarts account of beauty is that it
fails precisely in this regard; 52, 76). In mathematics and in speculative thinking more
generally, we should attempt to bring together our thoughts as clearly and distinctly as
possible. We tread carefully as we seek to move from one concept, proposition, or conclusion to the next. (In a long footnote to this remark, Bolzano rails eloquently against

Bolzano on beauty | 273

Hegelian violations of this basic norm of enquiry; 10, 2526.) It is different in the case
of beauty, where we move as swiftly as possible from one thought to another. Here our
skill (Geschicklichkeit) is engaged and improved by means of thoughts that are dark or
obscure in a sense discussed below. What is more, the pleasures are different in these
two sorts of cases. The ability to think correctly by means of obscure ideas is more generally useful in practical life, so it is not surprising that the exercise of this ability is more
ardently enjoyed. The pleasure we take in beauty is at bottom a pleasure in our own
contemplation itself, a pleasure, however, which we necessarily transfer to its object,
since without the mediation of this object we would not have had the occasion to engage
and improve our cognitive powers (10, 26). We only feel the proficiency (die Fertigkeit) of
our powers, Bolzano adds, without having any awareness of its components, and usually
without having a clear idea or judgement ofit.
Drawing these threads together, Bolzano offers a definition of beauty that is repeated
with minor variations at several points in histext:
The beautiful must be an object the contemplation of which can give pleasure to all
human beings whose cognitive faculties are properly developed. The reason why such
observers experience this pleasure is that when they have contemplated some of the
beautiful objects attributes, they form a concept of the object that allows them already
to guess at other attributes to be found through further observation and contemplation. The formation of this concept is neither too easy nor requires the effort of distinct thought, and the observers thereby have at least an obscure apprehension of the
proficiency [Fertigkeit] of their cognitive powers. (18, 37; cf. 11, 27, 14, 30, 31)9
Before he moves on to a discussion of some of the implications of this explication of
beauty, Bolzano briefly discusses a few examples. The first is the logarithmic spiral. As
we contemplate a drawing of this kind of spiral, we look for a regularity, have a clear but
confused apprehension of the pattern, and find it pleasing. It does not follow that we are in
a position to identify the mathematical formula governing this figure, nor that all beautiful
figures of this sort must partake of some underlying form of beauty. Bolzano does not, by
the way, contend that the spira mirabilis has a beauty superior to that of the Archimedean
spiral and other figures.
A second example is the fable of the wolf and the lamb, which Bolzano had earlier
discussed in a passage in the Wissenschaftslehre, where he introduces some thoughts about
works of fiction and poetic imagery.10 Those who devise a Dichtung or poiema, Bolzano there
notes, do not have the intention of getting us to believe that the represented events refer to
actual, particular objects or events in the real world. Instead the goal is to inspire resolutions and feelings. In the essay on beauty, Bolzano says that what makes this fable beautiful
is the way the parts of the story fit together to serve the point the author wants to convey.
Without having to bring our thoughts about these parts into our awareness, we grasp
the pattern and are delighted by this proof of our intellectual proficiency (Denkfertigkeit):
herein lies the ground of our finding the work beautiful (11,28).
9
10

I have done violence to Bolzanos torturous syntax here. For help in this, Ithank Andreas Matthias.
Wissenschaftslehre, 284, 66.

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Bolzano gives a brief analysis of ugliness and signals an ambiguity that would appear
to have no analogue in the case of beauty. In one sense, ugliness refers to attributes that
cause displeasure in a way that runs directly contrary to the way beautiful objects can
give pleasure. When we experience some of the objects attributes, we try to discover in
it other, corresponding features, but in the case of ugliness our hope is disappointed when
we encounter something that defeats our attempt to frame a conception of the objects
regularity. The process whereby these expectations and disappointments occur does not
require what Bolzano calls the effort of distinct thinking (die Mhe des deutlichen Denkens)
(18, 37). Bolzanos examples of ugliness include a failed or false rhyme in a poem and
a break in symmetry in a building. This is not, however, the only kind of ugliness to be
identified. Some things are ugly, Bolzano proposes, in the sense of being immediately
repugnant or hateful.
Bolzano argues that his explication of beauty has several implications that speak in
its favour. First of all, it helps explain why it has proven so difficult to provide explicit
grounds for particular judgements of beauty, since these judgements involve obscure and
confused cognitions. Bolzano does not, however, endorse de gustibus; nor does he speak of
beauty as a je ne sais quoi, by definition indescribable or even inexplicable. Stating himself
to be in agreement with Moses Mendelssohn in this regard, Bolzano writes that instead of
referring to a darkly known unity (dunkel erkannte Einheit), it would be more accurate to
speak of a darkly knowable (erkennbare) unity, the point being that the parts and relations
that make up a beautiful object are not necessarily inaccessible. Nor are they detectable
only through the operation of a specialized faculty or sense (29, 49). Yet Bolzano is very
critical of previous attempts to identify a particular type of order or organization (such as
unity in diversity, harmony, proportion, or symmetry) as the essence of beauty. None of
these overly broad terms picks out the sole type of order capable of supporting the special
type of cognition giving rise to the enjoyment of beauty.
Bolzano contends that a second advantage of his proposal is that it provides additional
support for the traditional idea that the only senses that contribute directly and independently to our experience of beauty are sight and hearing (16, 3435). Here he appeals to
his own version of the familiar claim that the other senses cannot provide combinations
and successions manifesting an order or pattern of the sort required for beautywhere in
Bolzanos account, this is a matter of the pattern being susceptible to the sort of cognitive
process referred to in his definition.
Thirdly, Bolzano claims that his explication best explains why in some cases we take
the most pleasure in the beauty of an object when we have not experienced it before.
What matters is the complexity of the object and the relative ease or difficulty with which
someone can grasp its pattern. There are cases where on a first encounter it is neither
too easy nor too hard to do so. In other cases, where the pattern is more complex and
harder to grasp, repeated experiences may be required if the objects beauty is to be
appreciated. Bolzano also contends that his account explains why people who have different degrees of education, training, or experience diverge in their enjoyments of different
kinds of beauty. Some people prefer beautys simpler and more accessible forms, while
others derive greater enjoyment when the objects regularity is more complex and so less
obvious.

Bolzano on beauty | 275

Bolzano anticipates and responds to several objections to his proposal. Afirst objection
has it that even a simple colour or sound can be beautiful, and that in such cases there is
no complex apprehension of a regularity amongst the objects qualities. One way of dealing with this familiar Plotinian objection would be to classify such cases as instances of
what is pleasant to the senses but not beautiful. Yet Bolzano argues instead that even an
experience of a single unbroken tone or uniform field of colour has unrecognized, confusedly represented constituents. For there to be an enjoyment of the beauty of a single
coloured surface or a single enduring sound, there must be complex underlying sensorial
and mental processes, which Bolzano evokes, following Kant on Euler, with reference
to the vibrations of the aether or air and its actions on our nerves, none of which is the
object of a clear and distinct cognition when the object is enjoyed (19, 3839). As he puts
it in the Wissenschaftslehre, the individual ideas pass by too quickly for us to intuit them
individually.11
Yet if the obscurity and confusedness of such seemingly simple perceptions is admitted, it might be objected that Bolzanos previous exclusion of the pleasure granted by the
exercise of the lower senses from the domain of beauty must be reconsidered. Why
should the delights of the three lower senses not be recognized as beautiful delights? Is
there no exercise here of the proficiency of obscure cognition? Bolzanos response to this
question is that the cognitive processes involved differ significantly. Although the sense of
touch can in some cases detect a pleasing pattern of some complexity, this could not be an
experience of beauty because it would require too much of an effort of distinct analysis to
yield pleasure in the right sort of way (16, 3435). In other cases, the sensorial delights
brought by taste, touch, and smell would fail to satisfy the not too easy condition on the
cognitive process involved. That the exercise of these sensory modalities has more complex and sophisticated rewards is not something Bolzano denies, yet he contends that in
such caseshis example being someones knowledgeable appreciation of food or wine
we reason from a perceived taste to its ingredients or origins. This is different from the
appreciation of sounds or colours in which we arrive at a successful concept on the basis of
a clear but confused cognition of the attributes and relations of the object itself.
A second anticipated criticism is that Bolzanos account makes the appreciation of
works of art too easy, since beauty must be recognized without the effort required to
come up with a lucid and detailed analysis of the objects components and their relations.
Is not scholarly knowledge a prerequisite to the understanding and appreciation of some
works? In response to this question, Bolzano can invoke his broad claim that the object of
beauty must be contemplated appropriately and with understanding. He can coherently
allow, then, that in some cases difficult study is indeed required before a pleasant experience of the objects beauty can be had. He also insists that the guesswork and reasoning
involved in experiences of beauty are distinct from the pursuit of strictly necessary relations characteristic of mathematical reasoning.
To the objection that he reduces beauty to regularity, and that there are both irregular beauties as well as regularities devoid of beauty, Bolzano responds that indeed many
regularities cannot inspire the kind of cognitive process referred to in his explication of
11

Ibid., 286, 90.

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beauty, and so are not beautiful. The beauties thought to be wholly irregular are only so
in relation to certain expectations about what kinds of regularities there are, but not to
all actual regularities. And to those who might complain that beautiful art is the product,
not of rule-following, but of freely acting genius, Bolzano replies that whether an object is
actually beautiful is not determined by this aspect of its emergence or production. If it is
objected that it follows from his account that a perfectly predictable play or musical composition is a beautiful one, and that all surprises must be ugly, he replies that the objection
is met by his condition that it must be neither too easy nor too difficult to come up with
a confused conception of the objects regularity. Atotally predictable composition would
not allow us to exercise our cognitive powers in a rewarding way and so would be boring,
not pleasant.
Half of Bolzanos essay on beauty is devoted to a highly detailed critical review of the
literature on the topic. Ishall refer to this fascinating material only very selectively in
what follows.

2. A Dark, Derivative Doctrine?

In a paper on Bolzanos account of beauty, Peter McCormick writes: The problem of
course is understanding just what it is to which Bolzano is referring in his metaphorical
talk of dark apprehensions.12 Unable to solve this problem, McCormick concludes bleakly
that Bolzanos doctrine of the dark judgment is itself a dark doctrine.13 Disagreeing
explicitly with this verdict, Achim Vesper states that Bolzanos ideas about aesthetic perception derive from Leibniz and his followers, especially Wolff and Baumgarten:
Bolzano patently borrows from the traditional distinction between clear and distinct
ideas. For Wolff, the specificity of distinct ideas is precisely that we are conscious of
what they imply: in the same manner, Bolzano speaks of ideas without distinct consciousness when the consciousness of the ideas is not joined to a consciousness of what
they imply. It follows that a subject who perceives aesthetically, while being conscious
of his or her ideas, does not at the same time know what they imply in detail.14
As Ishall argue at greater length below, Vesper is right to hold that McCormicks dark
conclusion is unwarranted. Yet in response to Vesper Iwould say that Bolzano neither formulates nor seeks to defend a general account of aesthetic perception. More importantly,
perhaps, Bolzano did not passively accept what Vesper calls the traditional distinction,
if only because he found that philosophers using the words klar, dunkel, deutlich, undeutlich, and verworren (as well as the related terms in Latin and other languages) disagreed
with each other quite significantly over their meanings. Bolzano remarks, for example,
that in the determination of the concepts of clarity [Klarheit] and darkness [Dunkelheit]
12
13
14

McCormick, Bolzano and the Dark Doctrine, 103.

Ibid., 106.
Achim Vesper, Contempler, distinguer: Bolzano sur la conceptualit de la perception esthtique, in Charlotte
Morel (ed.), Esthtique et logique (Villeneuve dAscq: Presses Universitaires du Septentrion, 2012), 5170, at
5657, my translation. Vesper draws an interesting connection to Johann Georg Sulzer on 57 n.16.

Bolzano on beauty | 277

philosophers diverge sharply.15 In the essay on beauty he says that the conceptual clarifications provided by the members of the Leibniz-Wolff school (and he refers explicitly to
Baumgarten, Delbrck, and Maass) were limited by their failure to understand the difference between the Bestandtheilen (components) and Merkmale (marks or attributes) of a
concept (26, 4546); this complaint crops up againbelow.
In his lengthy critical notes on the literature, Bolzano passes judgement on the ways
other philosophers have sought to define terms and clarify concepts. On the crucial topic
of what constitutes the clarity of subjective ideas and judgements, he remarks that whatever weaknesses Descartes explanation of clarity may have had, he was right to say that
clear subjective ideas and judgements are those to which the mind directs its attention
and that are intuited (angeschaut).16 Bolzano then cites and rejects Lockes identification of
full and evident perception as the criterion of the clarity of an idea, on the grounds that
Lockes remarks are ambiguous and overlook the possibility of someone having a clear but
non-perceptual idea, such as a thought of virtue.
Bolzano also cites two of Leibnizs statements on the topic: a cognition is clear if Ihave
it in such a way that Ican re-identify the thing represented, and an idea is clear when it
suffices to recognize and distinguish the thing; without this the idea is obscure.17 Bolzano
adds that Leibnizs definition is essentially retained by Wolf [sic] and several other philosophers.18 Ambiguity is again Bolzanos main complaint. He lays out different senses of
the object of an idea and tries to determine whether any of them fits Leibnizs remarks.
If the thesis is that an idea is clear only if it suffices to pick out some single actual thing,
Bolzano objects that not every clear idea has an actual object: one can have a very clear
idea of a man with a golden tongue. We could also have a clear idea of a distant object
without being able to distinguish it from others or recognize it later on. Bolzano comments: When we refer to the clarity of an idea we are now accustomed to thinking of
a certain relation between that idea and our consciousness; but whether a given idea A
suffices to pick out the object to which we relate it does not depend on how this idea is
represented in our consciousness, but on its relation to that object.19
Bolzano attributes to Kant the thesis that ideas are clear when they are conscious
(bewusst) and dark when they are not. To support such a thesis, he adds, it would be
necessary to have a more precise determination of what is understood by consciousness.
Bolzano then explores the proposition that to be conscious of an idea is to form a belief
or judgement that one has it. He considers and rejects the thesis that consciousness is a
15 Wissenschaftslehre, 280, 30.
16 Ibid.
17 Ibid., 280, 31. The first citation, given in Latin in Bolzanos text, is from the second paragraph of Meditationes
de cognitione, veritate et ideis, in Die philosophischen Schriften von Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, ed. C.J. Gerhardt (Berlin:
Weidmausche, 1880), Vol. 4, 422; the second citation, given in French in Bolzanos text, can be found in the
Nouveaux essais sur lentendement, Book 2, chapter 29, paragraph 2, page 256, in uvres de Leibniz, ed. A.Jacques (Paris:
Charpentier, 1846), 265. For an informative discussion of Leibnizs views on topics in aesthetics, see Frederick
C.Beiser, Diotimas Children: German Aesthetic Rationalism from Leibniz to Lessing (Oxford: OUP, 2009). See also Christia
Mercer, Leibnizs Metaphysics: Its Origins and Development (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).
18 Wissenschaftslehre, 280, 31.
19 Ibid., 280, 32.

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matter of being disposed to form a higher-order judgement about ones own ideas. He
takes up the possibility that the clarity of an idea depends on the way we actually represent
it to ourselves, where this representation is achieved by a higher-order idea that refers
exclusively to its object. Such a representation is not the same thing as having a compound
concept or a description of the idea, such as the idea Ihad precisely at midnight on New
Years Eve in 2012, since one could have such a thought without being aware of what that
idea was. Bolzano then reaches the following conclusion: An idea is clear if we represent
it to ourselves by intuiting [anschauen] it. When this is not the case, Iwill call it obsure
[dunkel].20 Bolzano subsequently distinguishes between clear and obscure judgements along
precisely the same lines,21 where by judgement he means what is common to assertion,
belief, holding true, and opining.22
What, then, did Bolzano mean by Anschauung, and why might he have thought this
notion could be used to elucidate cognitive clarity? Like Kant, Bolzano may have been
influenced by some of the ways in which medieval philosophers used the term intuitio
to refer to introspective and singular cognition.23 He did not, however, use the term
Anschauung just the way Kant did.24 So on this topic we would do well to turn to the relevant sections of the Wissenschaftslehre, including the section entitled What the Author
Understands by Intuitions.25
Even a brief and selective presentation of Bolzanos relevant contentions on this topic
must begin by mentioning his distinction between subjective and objective ideas. Asubjective idea is what we would today call a token mental event whereby someone occurrently
has a certain idea (and for Bolzano, ideas or Vorstellungen are constituents of propositions).
Objective ideas (or ideas in themselves), on the other hand, are the possible contents or
immediate matter of subjective ideas; objective ideas may or may not have been thought
by someone, and may or may not represent actual items. Bolzano applies this subjective/
objective distinction to propositions, concepts, and intuitions.
In the abridged survey in Bolzanos Wissenschaftslehre und Religionswissenschaft, Bolzanos
discussion of intuition is prefaced by the statement that it is undeniable that we have the
ability to form ideas of our own ideas, for otherwise we would not be able to speak about
them and say we have them.26 The account of intuition that he sets forth here as well as in
20
21
22
23
24
25

26

Ibid., 280, 29.

Ibid., 295, 116.
Ibid., 34, 154.
John Marenbon, Medieval Philosophy: An Historical and Philosophical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2007),
285287.
This point is established in great detail in Timothy Rosenkoetter, Kant and Bolzano on the Singularity of
Intuitions, Grazer Philosophische Studien 85 (2012), 89129.
Wissenschaftslehre, 72. Sandra Lapointe discusses Bolzanos account of intuitions in her Bolzanos Theoretical
Philosophy: An Introduction (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), 31. Valuable background is provided in Mark
Textor, Bolzanos Anti-Kantianism: From APriori Cognitions to Conceptual Truths, in Michael Beaney (ed.),
The Oxford Handbook of the History of Analytic Philosophy (Oxford: OUP, 2013), 227249.
Bolzanos Wissenschaftslehre und Religionswissenschaft in einer beurtheilenden Uebersicht (Sulzbach: Seidelschen, 1841),
72. Although Bolzano is referred to in the third person throughout this anonymously published work, it is
generally agreed that it was written by Bolzano himself.

Bolzano on beauty | 279

the Wissenschaftslehre runs as follows. Something causes a modification of the mindfor

example, Iopen the package and smell the aroma of freshly ground coffee. My attention
is drawn to this mental change, and the next and immediate effect of this attention is that
a subjective idea of this change arises. This indexical idea refers exclusively to the mental
event that is its proximate cause, namely, this immediate, attentional modification of ones
mind. The ideas extension is singular because it picks out this and only this individual
and non-repeatable mental event. The subjective intuition is a simple idea as well, since its
content is just this immediate change. Given Bolzanos subjective/objective distinction,
we can say that the subjective intuition is caused by a mental modification represented by
the objective intuition that is the content of the subjective intuition.
An intuition of ones immediate idea can be accompanied by other ideas or judgements. Bolzano writes of mixed ideas in which non-intuitive ideasfor Bolzano, conceptsare compounded with intuitions. Some of these mixed ideas can be classified as
intuitions due to the importance of their intuitive constituent(s). In Bolzanos examples,
This, which is a colour is an intuitive mixed idea, while The truths contained in this
book is a conceptual mixed idea. Bolzano also introduces a distinction between inner
and external intuitions, where the difference hinges on whether the change and object of
the idea is itself another idea or judgement, or instead some external object that effected
the change.27
Given this explication of intuition, we can say that for Bolzano an idea or other mental event lacks clarity, and so is obscure or dark, because there is no intuition, that is,
no higher-order, indexical simple and singular idea, that represents it. Clarity, following
Bolzanos explication, is not a matter of degree: either we have a subjective intuition of
some token mental event of ours or we do not. Vividness, force, perfection, and distinctness are different sorts of possible attributes of mental events, conducive but not
equivalent to clarity. In the essay on beauty there is additional textual evidence indicating
that Bolzano thought of obscure cognition as thinking that lacks a higher-order intuitive
representation. When we enjoy beauty because of the successful exercise of our cognitive
powers, we have no second-order cognition of our cognitive proficiency or of the process
whereby its exercise gives us pleasure.
What about the putative link between clarity and consciousness? Remarks that crop up
here and there in the Wissenschaftslehre indicate an inclination on Bolzanos part to favour
what we would today call an actualist higher-order thought view of consciousness.28
Yet Bolzano probably did not think he could provide the successful, reductive explication of consciousness needed to support a strong thesis about a conceptual link between

27
28

Wissenschaftslehre, 286, 85.

Bolzanos remarks in this vein include the comment that animals may not be able to judge that they have made
a judgement, and thus not have any distinct consciousness (35, 161, italics); and in doing this [compounding
a concept] the mind does not form the judgement that it does it, but performs these operations without
being clearly conscious of them (302, 139140, my italics). This is puzzling: if consciousness is a matter of the
clarity given by intuitions (higher-order indexical thoughts), and never a matter of degree, in what sense could
consciousness be obscure?

280 | PaisleyLivingston

consciousness and clarity. He may have prudently refrained from proposing such an explication of consciousness.
I turn now to the contrast between distinct and confused ideas or judgements. That
on this issue Bolzano was influenced by Leibniz and others should not be questioned, yet
it is important to point out that Bolzano did not merely echo Leibnizs, Wolffs, or any
one elses opinion on the matter. He complains, for example, that Leibniz confounds the
components of which an idea is composed with the various properties of the object represented by this idea, where only the former are relevant to the definition of the idea and
to its classification as distinct or confused.29 Bolzano charges Baumgarten with attempting a mistaken explanation of distinctness in terms of clarity alone. More specifically,
the objection is that the distinctness of a complex subjective idea does not follow merely
from a clear representation of the ideas of which it is composed, but also requires that the
subject know that the compound idea is composed of these parts. Bolzanos point here is
that knowledge (Wissen) of component ideas as such, and of their relations to each other
within the complex idea as a whole, is different from just having discrete intuitions of the
componentideas.
Setting aside Bolzanos criticisms of other views on the matter, we can briefly characterize his preferred manner of drawing the relevant distinctions as follows. He claims
that if an idea is simple and the person who has this idea knows it to be so, it is distinct.
If it is simple, but the person who has the idea somehow does not know this, it is indistinct (undeutlich). If someone has an idea and knows it to be complex, and also knows
what its parts are, then it is distinct (at least to the first degree, since there can be known
or unknown parts within known parts, and so degrees of distinctness, as Leibniz contended). If the subject knows that an idea is complex, but does not know what the parts
of this idea are, then it is confused (verworren). If someone does not know that an idea is
complex (either because it is wrongly taken to be simple, or the person has no thought
on the matter), then this idea is confused. Both sorts of confusion are relevant to the
apprehension of beauty as Bolzano understandsit.
To sum up, it should be acknowledged that Bolzano explicitly sought to provide precise
conceptual explications for a discourse based on such contrasts as light vs dark, transparent vs opaque, and clear vs unclear. Although he did not attempt a reductive analysis of
consciousness, he did explicate the metaphorical use of clarity by turning to an analysis
of what he called Anschauung, which he in turn explicated in terms of a second-order
singular thought caused by the event that is its object.30 Bolzanos explications of these
notions do, of course, leave some difficult questions unanswered. Yet it was not just a
metaphorical shot in the dark on Bolzanos part to refer to many of our responses to
beautiful objects as obscure or dark, because what he literally meant was that we do not
have second-order indexical singular thoughts about each of the mental events that occur
29
30

Wissenschaftslehre, 281, 43; cf. 64.

Unless we refrain from translating Bolzanos Anschauung as intuition, it is potentially misleading to explicate
Bolzanos reference to dark ideas or judgements as a kind of intuitive cognition, as does Maria E.Reicher in
her Austrian Aesthetics, in Mark Textor (ed.), The Austrian Contribution to Analytic Philosophy (London: Routledge,
2006), 293323, at 300. For Bolzano, the intuitive is clear, while dark thoughts are those lacking intuition.

Bolzano on beauty | 281

as we observe and judge these objects. More specifically, there is the tendency on the part
of observers of beauty not to recognize that the source of their pleasure in beauty is not
just the features of the object, but the exercise of cognitive powers of which they are usually only dimly aware. It was not just a dark doctrine to propose that even when we intuit
(in his sense) some of our feelings and thoughts about a beautiful objects qualities, it does
not follow that we know the components of these thoughts and feelings, or that we know
all of the parts of these components.

3.BolzanoToday
It turns out that some recent empirical work in psychology meshes nicely with salient
aspects of Bolzanos speculations about beauty, and in this section Ishall briefly evoke a
few of these connections.
Bolzano, Ihave observed, stressed the prevalence and practical value of dark, indistinct, and confused cognitive processes. With reference to decades of empirical investigations into implicit learning and tacit knowledge, Arthur S.Reber provocatively proposes
that the burden of proof should be shifted onto the shoulders of those who wish to claim
that a particular cognitive process is conscious or reflective rather than unreflective and
unconscious. The evidence, he contends, amply supports the conclusion that any sensible
theory of mind is going to have to have in it a rich cognitive unconscious processing system
or systems.31 Consider in this regard what contemporary psychoacoustics has to teach us
about the nature and audition of even the simplest harmonic chords. As Juan G.Roeder
puts the basic point, music is made up of complex tones, each one of which consists of a
superposition of pure tones blended together in a certain relationship so as to appear to
our brain as unanalysed wholes.32 The psychoacoustic research corroborates Bolzanos
suggestion that our response is confused in the sense that it is not a matter of a stepwise
higher-order recognition of the concurrent and successive parts of our processing of the
complex stimuli to which we respond.
Contemporary psychologists do not speak of the effort of distinct cognition, nor
do they wield the idiom of clear but confused ideas about an objects attributes.33
Psychologists Rolf Reber, Norbert Schwarz, and Piotr Winkielman do, however, refer
to a subjects implicit learning of stimulus regularities, where such learning involves
unconscious processing converging on the recognition of a pattern. Their results support
the thesis that what they call processing fluency correlates significantly with positive

31
32
33

Arthur S.Reber, Implicit Learning and Tacit Knowledge: An Essay on the Cognitive Unconscious (Oxford: OUP, 1993), 21.
Juan G.Roederer, The Physics and Psychophysics of Music: An Introduction, 4th edn (New York: Springer, 2008), 113.
Rolf Reber, Norbert Schwarz and Piotr Winkielman, Processing Fluency and Aesthetic Pleasure: Is Beauty
in the Perceivers Processing Experience?, Personality and Social Psychology Review 8 (2004), 364382; see also
Piotr Winkielman etal., The Hedonic Marking of Processing Fluency: Implications for Evaluative Judgment,
in Jochen Musch and Karl Christoph Klauer (eds), The Psychology of Evaluation: Affective Processes in Cognition and
Emotion (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2003), 189221.

282 | PaisleyLivingston

aesthetic response, and even with preferences indicative of a more specific judgement
of beauty.
What psychologists understand by processing fluency is the ease, speed, and accuracy with which the relevant physical and semantic features of a stimulus are identified.
Fluency, in the specified sense, is correlated with positive affect, and this experienced
affect, and not a direct experience of the processing fluency, is the basis of the judgement
of beauty. In Bolzanian terms, this is a matter of saying that the enjoyment felt by the
subject has its source in the ease and success of the pattern recognition, not in any clear
idea of the underlying proficiency. The evidence for this fluency-affect link is provided
in subjects statements of preference and other reports, but also by such psychophysical
measures as facial electromyography.34
As Bolzano would have it, the affective response is interpreted by the subject as a
reaction to the features of the target object, not as the effect of the fluency with which
the stimulus was processed. The affective reward yielded by processing fluency mediates between the judgement of the objects merit and the various factors that indirectly
influence the subjects preferences, such as regularities in the stimulus (symmetry, good
form, prototypicality), previous experience, and implicit learning (defined as a nonreflective apprehension of a rule or pattern). Beauty, these psychologists propose, is neither an objective property nor whatever pleases the senses; it is instead grounded in
the processing experiences of the perceiver that emerge from the interaction of stimulus
properties and perceivers cognitive and affective process.35
The psychologists whose research Ihave mentioned above acknowledge that moderating variables can vitiate the simple thesis that the more fluently the perceiver can process
an object, the more positive is his or her aesthetic response.36 In the case of Bolzanos proposal, the simple thesis was already blocked by his condition on the use of the observers
cognitive proficiency, his assumption being that beauty is not enjoyed when the recognition of the pattern comes too easily. The psychologists observe that whether the subject
expects it to be easy to process something can make a difference in that surprising fluency
can yield more enjoyment than expected fluency, just as extensive prior knowledge of
the source can diminish the effect. Bolzano made no observations relevant to the latter
variable, but he did, as we have seen above, underscore the influence of surprise in our
cognition of beauty. Systematic differences with regard to the subjects degree of expertise in the domain in question have also been investigated with regard to their influence
on the correlation between rewards and fluency. As might be expected, art experts may
enjoy a work of art partly due to the ease with which it was grasped by them, but they may
also rank it less highly in terms of its beauty, artistic excellence, or some other aesthetic
desideratum. Bolzano has room for the variable of expertise in his account and adverts
to differences in the appreciation of beauty that are explicable precisely along these lines.
34

Piotr Winkielman and John T.Cacioppo, Mind at Ease Puts a Smile on the Face: Psychophysiological Evidence
that Processing Facilitation Leads to Positive Affect, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 81 (2001),
9891000.
35 Reber, Schwarz and Winkielman, Processing Fluency and Aesthetic Pleasure, 365.
36 Ibid.

Bolzano on beauty | 283

4. Pure and MixedBeauty

Bolzano does not explicitly develop a distinction between pure beauty and some other
kind of beauty, but in his critical comments on prior proposals in the literature, he castigates others for having overlooked this matter.37 The enjoyment of pure beauty, he tells us,
is different from prevalent experiences in which the pleasure yielded by beauty interacts
significantly with pleasures from other sources, such as sensory arousal, the prospect of
instrumental pay-offs, or our admiration of what is morally good. These sorts of advantages may heighten the pleasure we take in some object, but they do not belong on the
scales that measure an objects pure beauty. Bolzano judges, for example, that the beauty of
music is not to be reckoned in terms of the particular charm of an instrument or voice.38
These considerations lead Bolzano to write more generally of the mixed beauties of musical
and literary works. He comments as well that the beauty of the human face is a very mixed
beauty, since it involves not only symmetry or regularity of the features, but the expression of physical and spiritual health, good judgement, and moral virtue.
These points have implications for Bolzanos views about the relative role of confused
and distinct cognition in an adequate evaluation of an objects beauty. Consider a relatively
simple example. Auditors are asked to listen to a melody played in two versions: first the
melody is played on an instrument that has a strikingly unpleasant timbre, and then it is
played on a piano. Hearing the first version causes the auditors to grimace. According to
Bolzano, the object of their response is not the pure beauty of the melody, but the timbre
of the instrument, which has a kind of ugliness distinct from the sort of ugliness that
would stand in direct contrast to pure beauty as Bolzano understands it. Suppose now that
when they hear the second version, the subjects recognize that the melody is quite lovely
and enjoy hearing it. It would seem, then, that their negative response to the first version
involved a confused cognition in which the different components (i.e. the attributes of
the melody and the timbre of the instrument) were not distinctly recognized. If so, this
was a case where a confused cognition precluded an accurate judgement of the melodys
pure beauty. Expert auditors should be capable of having a distinct cognition in which
the beauty of the melody is recognized, if not enjoyed, on a hearing of the first version.
Similarly, some observers may be capable of appreciating the beauty of a representational
work the subject matter of which includes unattractive elements. Bolzano allows, for
example, that a beautiful whole could contain components that are ugly. He suggests
that a repellent face (e.g. that of the villain) that appears in the right place in a dramatic
representation could be relatively beautiful in that it contributes to the overall beauty of
the play as awhole.
Bolzano does not go on from here to attempt to identify principles governing the interaction of the various factors involved in a mixed apprehension of beauty or ugliness, just as
he refrains from trying to say what place pure beauty has in the overall merit of a work of
37
38

This complaint is levelled against associationist theories of beauty (Locke, Home, and Sayers) in 32, 5253, and
against Umbreit in 57, 90, who is said to be clueless about this nthig distinction.
Bolzano follows Kant in this regard; cf. the assertion that the tone of musical instruments belongs only to the
agreeable in 7 of the Kritik der Urteilskraft.

284 | PaisleyLivingston

art. In an anticipation of what we might today call a contextualist position, he indicates

that he thinks the relations between these sorts of different factors are too complex and
tangled for any straightforward principles to be set forward. It does not follow, however,
that Bolzano should be classified as a forerunner of an aestheticist or immoralist position.
Bolzano observed that people wrongly deprive themselves of many pleasures in life by failing to think about how to make things more beautiful. Yet to this endorsement of the art
of living beautifully was added a reservation about carrying an interest in beauty too far.39
In some cases our concern for beauty must be subordinated to other factors. If it conflicts
with our overarching goal of enhancing the general happiness of all sentient beings, our
otherwise legitimate interest in beauty must be sacrificed.40,41
PaisleyLivingston
Lingnan University
pl@ln.edu.hk

39

40
41

Bernard Bolzano, ber die Eintheilung der schnen Knste: Eine sthetische Abhandlung (Prague: Gottlieb Haase,
1849), 1, 4; 5, 89. In this regard Bolzano approvingly cites several texts by Wilhelm Bronn, including his
Kalobiotik, oder die Kunst schn zu leben: wissenschaftlich aufgefasst (Leipzig: R.Bnder, 1839).
For background on Bolzanos ethics, see Bernard Bolzano, Selected Writings on Ethics and Politics, ed. and trans.
Paul Rusnock and Rolf George (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2007).
I am grateful to Rafael De Clercq, Andrea Sauchelli, and two anonymous readers for helpful comments on a draft
of this paper. I also thank Stuart Brock, Stephen Davies, Sondra Bacharach and other participants for helpful
comments and questions after talks I gave at Hong Kong University, Victoria University of Wellington, and the
Universities of Auckland and Otago.

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