Aesthetics Makes Things Happen: On the Role of Aesthetics to Cognitive and Moral Value

Maria José Alcarez León (Universidad de Murcia)

Aesthetic appearance has been usually conceived as being irrelevant to a work of art’s cognitive or moral value. A work’s truth content or moral significance seem to be connected to the work’s content and not with its aesthetic properties or aesthetic value. In this talk I would like to show that the aesthetic dimension of art (and, maybe of other artefacts, as well as actions) could have an impact upon the cognitive or moral value we often attach to it.