Document Type : Original Article

Authors

• Naeim Sadri ¹
• Mohammad Akvan ²
• Mohammadreza Sharifzadeh ³

¹ PhD Student of Philosophy, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

² Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

³ Professor of Art Research Department, Faculty of Art, Central Tehran Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

This article endeavors to elucidate the key concepts and views of Croce and Dewey within the framework of a comparative study of their philosophical systems, focusing specifically on aesthetics. The central hypothesis of this research is that the core idea of Dewey's philosophy, termed “immediate experience,” is a pragmatist interpretation of the closely related concept of “intuition” in Croce's aesthetics. Thus, both philosophers emphasize the role of aesthetics as a kind of a priori quality that ensures the unity and coherence of experience and knowledge. The defining difference lies in the fact that Croce, through the idea of “intuition-expression,” emphasizes the epistemological aspect of aesthetics, while Dewey conveys this same a priori quality in an ontological context (the process of the formation of experience). In other words, aesthetics, as an a priori quality, oversees the condition of unity and wholeness in the process of the formation of perception and guarantees the attainment of intuitive experience. In simpler terms, it is only by assuming a kind of aesthetic end (purposiveness without purpose) that the multifaceted and dynamic nature of perception is unified in an immediate and intuitive experience, and the possibility of “living” becomes feasible. A comparison of the views of Dewey and Croce, who belong to two contrasting intellectual traditions, reveals that the aforementioned hypothesis (i.e., the hypothesis that emphasizes the role of aesthetics as an a priori quality in the process of intuition and the formation of experience), regardless of whether its starting point is the realm of the objective (experience) or the realm of the subjective (intuition), leads to a unified conclusion, and its validity can be confidently asserted.

Keywords

• John Dewey
• Benedetto Croce
• Art
• Aesthetics
• Immediate Experience
• Intuition

Main Subjects

• Western Philosophy