This paper is based on two questions about Baumgarten's aesthetics-how is it possible to go from perceptual cognition to beauty and how does perfection serve as a basis for judgement of appreciation. Firstly, this paper reanalyzes Baumgarten's definition of aesthetics, and concludes that the real research field of aesthetics is "free art" that can provide pleasure to people's emotions. "Free art" as the object of appreciation has its own kind of perfection. Secondly, this paper focuses on the consummation of perceptual cognitive ability of the appreciative subject, and restores the logical reasoning process from perceptual cognition to the possibility of beauty by analyzing three directions of consummation. Thirdly, combining with the historical evolution of the theory of perfection, this paper discusses the basis of perfection as the judgment of appreciation from two aspects of quality and quantity respectively. Finally, this paper combs the concept of clarity of extension proposed by Baumgarten, and makes some attempts to solve the universality problem in the judgment of appreciation.

Yazhou Wang, Tao Guo. How is it possible to go from perceptual cognition to beauty?-Perfection as the basis of judgment of appreciation. Frontiers in Art Research (2022) Vol. 4, Issue 16: 116-120. https://doi.org/10.25236/FAR.2022.041616.

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