On the Cognitive Functioning of Aesthetic Emotions

This article seeks to show that we cannot accept an opposition between aesthetics and logic on the basis of the distinction between aesthetic emotion and cognition. This false distinction is founded on another ill-founded one between private states of mind and public languages. Echoing works by R. de Sousa, we can talk about the rationality of emotions. Following N. Goodman and I. Scheffler, we are conducted to the notion of cognitive emotions. If there are aesthetic emotions, they are likely cognitive. The notion of supervenience seems very adequate to show how aesthetic emotion, even aesthetic pleasure, can be related to cognitive experience.