ABSTRACT
Analytic aesthetics has been obsessed with mature, art historically well-informed, aesthetic judgment. Aesthetic judgments are propositions that attribute aesthetic properties to various entities. And the concept of aesthetic properties itself should be seen as derived from that of aesthetic judgment. According to Walton, aesthetic judgment depends on the category of art apply. His famous example is a thought experiment about a fictional society where the main form of art production is objects that all have the outline shape of Picasso's Guernica, but that differ in terms of their spatial dimensions. In order to shift the emphasis of aesthetic theory from aesthetic judgment to the temporal unfolding of aesthetic engagement, aestheticians need to understand why they are obsessed with aesthetic judgments to begin with. A less historical, but more substantial reason why the concept of aesthetic judgment has dominated aesthetics is that aesthetic judgments are communicable.
