On the Deeply Moving and the Merely Touching

Bibliographic Data

ID9467492
AuthorsEric Cullhed (0000-0003-4043-0294, Uppsala University, corresponding author)
Year2022
Volume64
Issue1
Pages17-32
Publication date2022-12-12
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe British Journal of Aesthetics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0007-0904 • E-ISSN: 1468-2842
PublisherOxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1093/aesthj/ayac072
OpenAlexW4386835110
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited24

Critics often link yet distinguish between ‘moving’ and ‘touching’ characters, scenes and artworks. It has been argued that being moved is a specific emotion, that its formal object is the thin goodness of exemplified final, important and impersonal thick values, and that being touched is an attenuated form of that phenomenon. First, I dispute that the values that move us must be impersonal, since we can be moved by the personal goodness of being loved, free or healthy. Second, I argue that being touched should be considered a distinct emotion type. To support this claim, I refer to apparent differences between the formal objects that the two affective phenomena relate to as well as to dissimilarities in cognitive sophistication and phenomenology. I suggest that we are touched by that which invites love. Vulnerable, innocently suffering and affectionate beings are touching insofar as they need and will be responsive to love

Aesthetics · Epistemology · Linguistics · Object (grammar · Phenomenology (philosophy · Phenomenon · Sophistication · Aesthetic Perception and Analysis · Emotions and Moral Behavior · Philosophy · Psychology · Visual Culture and Art Theory