Kant and Music

Here is a great quote that ties together Kant's odd view of music (compared to Hegel, who thinks it is extremely, extremely boring and abstract) and his theory of beauty. Beauty is what can be musical for Kant:

There are two kinds of beauty; free beauty or merely dependent beauty. The first presupposes no concept of what the object ought to be; the second does presuppose such a concept and the perfection of the object in accordance therewith. The first is called the (self-subsistent) beauty of this or that thing; the second, as dependent upon a concept (conditioned beauty), is ascribed to objects which come under the concept of a particular purpose. (this is the beauty that is not pure according to Kant--real beauty is pure, is only a matter of sensibility and not understanding at all, mj). Flowers are free natural beauties. Hardly any one but a botanist knows what sort of thing a flower ought to be; and even he, though recognizing in the flower the reproductive organ of the plant, pays no regard to this naural purpose if he is passing judgement on the power by Taste. There is then at the basis of this judgement no perfection of any kind, no internal purposiveness, to which the collection of the manifold (the varying sensuous input that the flower gives us, mj) is referred. Many birds (such as the parrot, the humming bird, the bird of paradise), and many sea shells are beauties in themselves, which do not belong to any object determined in respect of its purpose by concepts, but please freely and in themselves. So also delineations a la grecque, foliage for borders or wall-papers, mean nothing in them selves; they represent nothing (THIS IS KEY!, mj)--no Object under a definite concept--and are free beauties. We can refer to the same class what are called in music phantasies (i.e. pieces without any theme), and in fact all music without words.
-Critique of Judgement §16.

Erþe toc of erþe

Here is just an amazing Middle English poem I had to put up. Copied in c. 1307, dating assuredly from earlier, I'm writing on its resonance with Heidegger and repetition--I'll post that too once I'm done with it.

Erþe toc of erþe erþe wyþ woh,
Erþe oþer erþe to þe erþe droh,
Erþe leyde erþe in erþene þroh,
Þo heude erþe of erþe erþe ynoh.
-MS. Harleian

Translation:

Earth took of earth earth with woe,
Earth drew [other?] earth over [to?] the earth,
Earth laid earth in an earthen pit,
Then earth of earth had earth enough.

However, there are many other ways to interpret it, since the poem avoids being clear about its prepositions: "oþer" means both beyond or other as well as over, while "Þo" can mean then or at that time as well as though, however, etc. The use of "þroh" is odd too, and it can mean pretty much anything: it is a pit that is like a tomb but is a pit in the earth not distinct from the earth, like a trough, or a ditch.

Questioning after [nach] technology

Questioning nach der Technik, after technology, questioning once technology has come on the scene, after the history of technology's coming-on-the-scene, the historical questioning of technology, questioning the historicality of technology, the history of technology after it has been surmounted, the mourning of technology. All these are connected. If this is true, someone should read Heidegger's reflections on technology together with Freud. Or rather, Heidegger's idea of history as a enowning destining of Being together with Freud's diachronic structures of the mind, like the pleasure-principle, trauma, and mourning. The destining of being would parallel the destining of the cathexis, the Besetzung. Just looking at the following quote from Heidegger's "The Turning," should suggest something of the sort is possible:

...the essence of technology cannot be led into the change of its destining without the cooperation of the essence of man. Through this cooperation, however, technology will not be overcome by men. On the contrary, the essence of technology will be surmounted in a way that restores it to its yet concealed truth. This restoring surmounting is similar to what happens when, in the human realm, one gets over grief or pain. [my italics, mj]
-"The Turning" from The Question Concerning Technology, and Other Writings.