Pleasure of Art and Pleasure of Nature: A response to Matthen

I argue that by limiting the objects of genuine or purely aesthetic pleasure to the products of human artifice, Matthen wrongly excludes aesthetic pleasure in natural items. Cases of aesthetic reflection that yield the ‘facilitating pleasure’ he takes to be definitive of our experience of art regularly occur also in our aesthetic experience of nature. That is, many kinds of aesthetic appreciation of nature meet his criteria of ‘learned’ engagements that are ‘difficult’ and ‘costly’. Aesthetic appreciation of nature thus represents a kind of facilitating pleasure that enlarges our conception of ourselves and our connection to the world in ways that are at least as sophisticated as art appreciation.