ABSTRACT
It essential from the outset to be aware of the difference between aesthetics and philosophical aesthetics. The former has to do with the ways in which we respond aesthetically to natural objects and to works of art. Thus, an aesthetic response to nature might be expressed by saying that a sunset is beautiful or the Grand Canyon sublime. And an aesthetic response to a work of art might be expressed in similar ways, as when one finds, too, a lyric by Schubert or Joni Mitchell beautiful or Citizen Kane and King Lear sublime. Such responses, which have their roots in the way in which we, from early infancy, respond both to the sensory textures of the world, its colours, fragrances and sounds, and to such humanly constructed things as simple rhythms, nursery rhymes, fairy stories and cradle songs, are the material of aesthetics.
