The presented text is an attempt to sketch the basic contours of selected issues in the cognitive research of aesthetic experience. The core themes of the book are methodological problems of the unification of philosophical and cognitive-scientific approaches to beauty and aesthetic experience, and cognitive aesthetic of music perception.

The book is a second volume of the project, which is focused on a systematic examination of aesthetic experience by the unification of philosophical and cognitive-scientific approaches to beauty and aesthetic experience. This volume is focused on the analysis of selected aspects of aesthetic experience, especially on methodological problems and aspects of philosophical and scientific research, the question of the complementarity and compatibility of methods, and needs to interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research. Authors of the chapters are considering about diverse areas of perception of beauty, e.g.: pleasure by face perception; the synchronicity by music; the problems of musical chills; the psychosomatic unity of dance; or the problem of development of aesthetic appreciation.

Autorentext

Andrej Démuth is a professor of philosophy and the director of the Centre for Cognitive studies at the Trnava University. He studied philosophy and psychology, and is the author of many books and articles on cognition and the relationship between reflected and non-reflected knowledge. His research focuses on modern philosophy, epistemology and cognitive studies.

Inhalt

The examination of beauty and the problems of methodology - Aesthetic perception in the context of naturalism, art history and contemporary empirical aesthetics - A cognitive neuroscience approach to the explanation and reduction of the problem of musical meaning - Some methodological issues with the interface of neuroaesthetics and philosophy - Brain activity within (beautiful) face perception - What is music and what function does it serve in our lives? Three forms of synchronicity - Cognitive science and the neuroaesthetics of musical chills - Thinking in the flesh - Beauty, science and spirituality - Cognitive studies as an orchestra in search of a symphony of the cognitive aspects of aesthetic experience