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3.The introduction of the transcendental forms in the Critique of Pure Reason

In this third chapter, I will present the necessary premises for understanding the problem of schematism in the Critique of Pure Reason. The literature on Kant’s main work is innumerable. The neo-Kantian school saw Hermann Cohen and Paul Natorp as main exponents and commentators of the Critique, who put the accent on the subjective process of cognition rather than on the existence of things in themselves. In his Kants Theorie der Erfahrung (1871) Cohen puts aside the interpretation of the things in themselves as causes of the impressions and interprets Kant’s account as a theory on experience. Later on Heinrich Rickert in his Kant als Philosoph der modernen Kultur. Ein geschichtsphilosophischer Versuch (1924), Grundprobleme der Philosophie Methodologie, Ontologie, Anthropologie (1934) and Ernst Cassirer in his Kants Leben und Lehre (1918) stress the importance in Kant’s philosophy of the problem of objectivity and the conditions of experience. In 1896 Hans Vaihnger founded the Kant-Studien, which will be later followed by reviews such as Studi Kantiani (1990), Kantian Review (1997) and Con-Textos Kantianos (2014).

Among the commentators of the 20th Century, Willard Van Orman Quine opens up for discussion the distinction between analytical and synthetic judgements, while Peter Frederick Strawson combines his analytical standpoint and his interest in the transcendental philosophy in The Bounds of Senses (1966). Classical introductions and commentaries are those of Norman Smith A Commentary to Kant’s ‘Critique of Pure Reason’ (1918), Karl Vorländer’s Immanuel Kant, Der Mann und das Werk (1924) and Lewis White Beck’s Studies in the Philosophy of Kant (1965), Otfried Höffe’s Immanuel Kant (1983), Heiner F. Klemme’s Immanuel Kant (2004). Whilst Norbert Hinske’s Kant als Herausforderung an die Gegenwart (1980). Heinz Heimsoeth’s Transzendentale Dialektik. Ein Kommentar zu Kants Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 4 Teile (1966–71) and Herman Jan de Vleeschauwer’s La deduction transcendentale dans l’oeuvre de Kant (1934–37) are particularly concentrated on the Transcendental Deduction.

For my purposes a text of great importance is Henry Allison’s Kant’s Transcendental Idealism. An Interpretation and Defense (2004), which gives a ←57 | 58→brilliant overview of the reasons for the importance of schematism. Recently, the Kant-Lexikon edited in 2015 by Marcus Willaschek, Jürgen Stolzenberg, Georg Mohr and Stefano Bacin provides the largest and most accurate lexical reference on the author taking into account the most contemporary research.

I have made full use of this literature to elaborate the following chapter. In the first section, I will focus on the doctrine of sensibility and its forms, while in the second one on the Transcendental Analytic, in order to understand the need to include the schematism chapter in the project of the Critique, intended as an inquiry on the conditions of experience. This overview will provide an interpretation of Kant’s perspective as neither being idealistic (in a subjective sense) nor psychologistic.

3.1 The doctrine of sensibility

Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason is divided into Doctrine of Elements and Doctrine of Method: while the first doctrine concerns the two faculties of human cognition (sensibility and understanding); the second one focuses properly on the problem of method and aims at organising the conditions of cognition within a system.

The first chapter of the Doctrine of Elements constitutes the Transcendental Aesthetic, concerning sensibility, that is the faculty through which we are affected by things immediately, thus giving sensibility a sort of priority to the understanding (at least in the order of explanation of the process of cognition). A thing, in order to be thought, must be first of all be given: “[…] the conditions under which alone objects of human knowledge can be given must precede those under which they are thought.” (KrV A15/B29)⁶⁴

The indeterminate object of an empirical intuition, called by Kant ‘phenomenon’ or ‘Erscheinung’, is given not only by matter but also by form:

“I call that in the appearance which corresponds to sensation its matter; but that which allows the manifold of appearance to be intuited as ordered in certain relations, I call the form of appearance.” (KrV A20/B34)⁶⁵←58 | 59→

In order to find the forms of sensibility, Kant analyses the phenomenon, isolating everything that belongs to the function of the understanding and to matter, so that only pure elements of sensibility remain, namely, space and time, that are forms of the outer and the inner sense⁶⁶.

In these explanations, Kant seems to be repeating the views provided in his Dissertation. However, his perspective is now significantly different: he is not trying to provide an explanation of the constitution of the world (sensible and intelligible, as in the Dissertation) but rather of the possibility of claims of objective cognition. Given the presupposition that universal and necessary propositions (the well-known synthetic a priori judgements) do exist, he aims to explain their grounds, relying on the combination of different elements and functions.

On the one hand, there is the continuous presence of an element of novelty (the content “given” in sensibility), thus providing synthetic a priori judgements with fruitfulness (they are not merely analysis, definitions, but are actually able to increase the content of cognition); on the other hand, there is the form, the way in which this novelty occurs. In this view, the distinction between sensibility and understanding does not designate two forms of experience that are completely separated, because the experience is in itself united⁶⁷.

The division among faculties might be interpreted as a way to underline the peculiarity of human knowledge: there is an irreducible dualism between passivity and activity, particularity and contingency of the content, and general and universal concepts and laws. Referring to the pure elements as forms, Kant aims at underscoring how their value is not substantial but functional, as they do not consist of rules to be applied to a matter itself independent, but rather they are conditions of its very organisation. As Cohen (Cohen 1918) stresses, Kant’s pure forms can be conceived as logical conditions of experience, general methods that justify the order of the multiplicity of sensations. Moreover, two other differences from the Dissertation can be identified. Firstly, the priority given to the focus on space: although time is more general (everything is given in time but not in space), it is easier and more intuitive to represent time through space. Secondly, Kant introduces a separation between a metaphysical as well as a transcendental exposition: while the former is the clear representation of an a priori concept and aims to present and explain what space and time consist in by describing their metaphysical (non-empirical) content, the latter consists of the clarification of a ←59 | 60→principle as transcendental, that is to say a principle which is a condition of possibility of other a priori cognitions.

After illustrating the features of space and time in their Metaphysical Exposition, Kant first focuses on their Transcendental Expositions, aiming at underlying how space and time form the basis of the possibility of a priori knowledge. As he states, the basis of geometry can only be provided by pure intuition, in this case, by space: if the principle of geometry were empirical, geometry would not be universal and necessary, and if they were concepts, they would be predicable and so they would hold an extension. But if it were so, then such discursive and qualitative principles could not succeed in providing a justification for the axioms of geometry:

“That the straight line between two points is the shortest is a synthetic proposition. For my concept of the straight contains nothing of quantity, but only a quality. The concept of the shortest is therefore entirely additional to it, and cannot be extracted out of the concept of the straight line by any analysis. Help must here be gotten, by means of which alone the synthesis is possible.” (KrV B16)⁶⁸

In a similar way, if we focus on the theory of motion, only time insofar as it is not a concept, rather a pure intuition, can be regarded as its fundamental principle:

“Only in time can both contradictorily opposed determinations in one thing be encountered, namely successively. Our concept of time therefore explains the possibility of as much synthetic a priori cognition as is presented by the general theory of motion, which is no less fruitful.” (KrV B49)⁶⁹

Without succession no change would be possible: the passage from A to non A would be only a contradiction and the variety and multiplicity of experience could not be explained. For instance, a chrysalis turns into a butterfly only through time. Butterflies have a life cycle consisting of four stages: from egg to larva, through a chrysalis and finally to become a butterfly. Without the succession in time the progress from one stage to another could not be possible.←60 | 61→

Now, a question arises from these considerations:

“Now how can an outer intuition inhabit in the mind that precedes the objects themselves, and in which the concept of the latter can be determined a priori? Obviously not otherwise than insofar as it has its seat merely in the subject, as its formal constitution for being affected by objects and thereby acquiring immediate representation, i.e. intuition, of them; thus only as the form of outer sense in general.” (KrV B41)⁷⁰

Understanding what Kant means by ‘subject’ is undoubtedly problematic. Does he refer to a psychological subject? A theoretical one? In which sense?

Kant’s inquiry concerns the conditions of possibility of knowledge and not the psychological process. For this reason, the term ‘subjective’ might here be interpreted as not objective. Forms are not objects of experience but rather belong to the subject who has experiences: they do not belong to a subject absolutely regarded as autonomous and isolated, nor to an absolute object. As Cohen interprets the notion of the form (Cohen 1918, p. 205), on the one hand it is the form of the phaenomenon, that is, the object of experience; on the other hand it belongs to the subject transcendentally intended, as the field of the object’s possible manifestation. From this perspective form is a condition that can justify the regularity of human experience, in which the contents vary, but this variation is reduced to rules. These considerations explain why space and time are endowed with empirical reality as well as transcendental ideality: they are not conditions of the possibility of things in themselves, but of things given in the experience with respect to its limits and conditions. In other words: it makes sense to apply space and time to phenomena, to objects of experience (empirical reality); but there is no sense in applying them to things in themselves, which are not and cannot be given in experience (transcendental ideality⁷¹ of pure intuitions).

If one were to claim that space and time have transcendental reality, this would imply that intuition has the capacity to bring the contingent content of experience to the existence, consequently making the contingent side of the process of knowledge (the empirical content) necessary. On the other hand, it is possible to think of an intuition that is characterised by a transcendental reality: the intuition ←61 | 62→of an understanding that is a-human, an intellectus archetypus, in which thought and being are identified. But we cannot investigate whether this intuition can be real since it cannot be given in our experience, it is beyond the limits of our possible knowledge. Its possibility is only a logical one: given human intuition, it is possible to think of an intuition that is its opposite; it is possible to think the negation of human intuition (as A leads to the thought of not-A). In this sense the Transcendental Aesthetic is a negative doctrine of the noumenon, which is the thought of an object that is not and cannot be given in our experience:

“Now the doctrine of sensibility is at the same time the doctrine of the noumenon in the negative sense, i.e. of things that the understanding must think without this relation to our kind of intuition, thus not merely as appearances but as things in themselves, but about which, however, it also understands that in this abstraction it cannot consider making any sense of its categories, since they have significance only in relation to the unity of intuitions in space and time, and can even determine this unity a priori, through general concepts of combination only on account of the mere ideality of space and time.” (KrV B307–308)⁷²

So far, sensibility can only provide a necessary, although insufficient, indication of the constitution of the unity of the object: the forms of intuitions are not those in which the synthesis is completely constituted; it requires an additional contribution of the understanding for the possibility of the representation of objective unities (and not only of relations of successions or coexistence among impressions) to be justified. Without the act of thinking, objective cognition cannot be possible because there would be only a flow of separate impressions in which nothing could be distinguished as permanent, objective or unitary. The possibility of distinguishing between undetermined objects of intuition and determined objects of cognition lies in the activity of the understanding, which is responsible to provide the objectivity of the representations (Holzhey 1970, p. 219).←62 | 63→

3.2 The doctrine of the understanding

The purpose of the Transcendental Analytic is the development of a “logic of truth”, focusing on the faculty of the understanding in order to look for the principles of objectivity:

“The part of transcendental logic, therefore, that expounds the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding, and the principles without which no object can be thought at all, is transcendental analytic, and at the same time a logic of truth.” (KrV A62/B87)⁷³

The general logic deals with the formal criteria of truth, which are universal and necessary insofar as it abstracts from its content and deals only with the form of our thought (KrV A54/B78). A criterion which is not only universal and necessary but also sufficient is not possible: a criterion, in order to be universal and necessary has to be abstract to the particular content of experience (otherwise, it would not be universal), while to be sufficient, it would have to refer to the particular content of experience (the truth or falsity of any epistemic judgement is determined by its relation to its particular content and object). Therefore, no criteria can be at the same time both universal and sufficient (KrV A59/B83–84). Still, it is possible to have universal and necessary criteria of truth in a transcendental sense: the Transcendental Analytic can be regarded as a “logic of truth” (KrV A62/B87) insofar as it provides the conditions of the possibility of judgements to be either objectively true or false. The a priori principles of the understanding are these conditions of the possibility of objects of experience, and thus, any epistemic judgement has to respect the universal and necessary rules of transcendental logic.

In order to identify the principles of the understanding it is necessary to refer to a guiding thread (Leitfaden) which is found by Kant in the forms of thinking intended as formal modalities as the basis of the judgement, deprived of all content. Kant is proceeding in this way: if thinking means judging, i.e. the process through which a predicate is attributed to a subject, then there are as many modalities of thinking as there are of the judgement. Since Kant asserts that the Aristotelian general logic is complete and conclusive, it suffices to consider it for individuating the forms of thought. The same function of the understanding is the source of the analytic unity of the judgement as well as of the synthesis of ←63 | 64→representations, thus providing a sort of universal range of the limits in which an object can be given in the experience. In the “metaphysical deduction” of the categories (KrV B159), Kant derives twelve categories from the Aristotelian table of the twelve forms of judgements, namely: unity, plurality, totality (quantity); reality, negation, limitation (quality); of inherence and subsistence, causality and dependence, community (relation), possibility-impossibility, existence-nonexistence, necessity-contingency (modality)⁷⁴.

After exposing the categories Kant has to focus on their validity. The quid facti, that is the fact that such categories are these twelve, is not yet the quid juris: one thing is how many and which kinds of categories they are, another is the legitimacy of their validity⁷⁵. A transcendental justification is not necessary for pure intuitions, because they refer necessarily to sensible objects, given that such objects cannot be experienced without forms of sensibility. In contrast, the necessity of the reference of the categories to objects must be demonstrated: why can they not be mere forms of thinking, with no relation to objects? Why do they have an objective validity?

Showing this necessity is the aim of the famous Transcendental Deduction:

“I therefore call the explanation of the way in which concepts can relate to objects a priori their “transcendental deduction”, and distinguish this from the empirical deduction, which shows the how a concept is acquired through experience and reflection on it, and therefore concerns not the lawfulness but the fact from which the possession has arisen.” (KrV A85/B117)⁷⁶←64 | 65→

I will not delve into a detailed analysis of the Transcendental Deduction⁷⁷, but only provide a general overview of its main task, in order to stress its difference from the passages on schematism. The problem exposed in the Transcendental Deduction can be explained as the following: sensibility and its pure intuitions are not sufficient to justify experience and knowledge since they cannot provide a justification of the objective unity of epistemic judgements but only of succession and coexistence, although they are universal rules. Therefore, it is necessary to rely on a conceptual level able to provide such a unity that cannot be merely empirical, because otherwise, it would not constitute a level of legalities able to justify the unity of the experience and the necessity and universality of thought. Yet, the reference to the pure concepts, to categories regarded as functions of unification and conditions of the possibility of the unity of the objects of experience also is not sufficient. The conjunction of pure concepts of the understanding presupposes another unity:

“But in addition to the concept of the manifold and of its synthesis, the concept of combination also carries with it the concept of the unity of the manifold. Combination is the representation of the synthetic unity of the manifold.* The representation of this unity cannot, therefore, arise from the combination; rather, by being added to the representation of the manifold, it first makes the concept of combination possible. This unity, which precedes all concepts of combination a priori, is not the former category of unity (§ 10); for all categories are grounded on logical functions in judgements, but in these combination, thus the unity of given concepts, is already thought. The category therefore already presupposes combination. We must therefore seek this unity (as qualitative, § 12) someplace higher, namely in that which itself contains the ground of the unity of different concepts in judgements, and hence of the possibility of the understanding, even in its logical use.” (KrV B130–131)⁷⁸←65 | 66→

This unity is the ‘I think’, that must join up with each representation. If there were no such synthetic unity, it would not be possible to justify the unity in experience, which would only be a flow of impressions, deprived of objectivity. To underline the qualitative and not the quantitative aspect of the synthetic unity means to underline its peculiar function in opposition to that of quantitative unity, the mathematic category of unity. To affirm that the ‘I think’ is one, does not mean that there is only one unique ‘I think’, but that it is the unity in itself, a function, an x, that must be presupposed in justifying the unity of experience: if cognition did not have a unity at its basis, the regularity of experience could not be explained at all. Kant’s well-known example of the straight line might help in elucidating his account of cognition and demonstrating how it differs from an idealistic perspective: in order to think of a line, it is necessary to “draw it in thought” (KrV B154), connecting in a particular way some parts of space. In this way, a particular synthesis produces the object (the line traced) and its concept, but this is not a mere intellectual synthesis that takes place in the inside of the understanding as an intellectual intuition: the multiplicity of intuitions, on the contrary, must always be given. In other terms, the operation’s unity of the synthesis of the multiplicity is the unity of the consciousness of the multiplicity of the intuitions: without the synthesis of the understanding, the multiplicity would not be unified in a consciousness and no object would be given. Through this example of the straight line, it is possible to understand how far Kant is from an idealistic position: cognition needs not only the activity of the understanding and its forms but also the manifold of intuitions and the forms of intuitions. As the example shows, in order to think of a line, the subject has to “draw” it in space. That is to say, categories are not the only sufficient and necessary conditions of cognition; space and time are also needed.

Moreover, it is important also to remark that the ‘I think’ is not to be viewed from an empirical-psychological level but, instead, as a transcendental principle necessary for the justification of the possibility of experience. Kant’s statement of the necessity of each representation to be guided by the ‘I think’ does not imply that the condition of the objectivity must be a clear empirical consciousness, self-consciousness:

“Now it does not matter here whether this representation be clear (empirical consciousness) or obscure, even whether it be actual; but the possibility of the logical form of all cognition necessarily rests on the relationship to this apperception as a faculty.” (KrV A117)⁷⁹←66 | 67→

There is a huge difference between consciousness as self-knowledge and as a priori condition of the unity of the experience: the first, given and determined in the internal sense, is a representation; while the second, the ‘I think’: “it is the consciousness of the spontaneity of the thinking, but it does not reveal in itself an actual determined existence. This latter existence will follow from the diversity given through sensibility.” (de Vleeschauwer 1934–37, II, p. 228)⁸⁰.

Differently from the empirical ‘I’, the ‘I think’ does not facilitate the knowledge of the self, but knowledge of the fact that a self is given:

“In the transcendental synthesis of the manifold of representations in general, on the contrary, hence in the synthetical original unity of apperception, I am conscious of myself not as I appear to myself, nor as I am in myself, but only that I am.” (KrV B157)⁸¹

But this reference to the ‘I think’ can also lead to ambiguities: to be aware of being, at this level of inquiry, does not mean to be conscious of one’s own personal existence, but of the fact that there is an experience. In Kant’s view, the ‘I’ of the ‘I think’ does not refer to the personal identity, but it is merely a function, a necessary unity to justify the unity of the experience.

Now, what are, then, the conditions of the unity of experience? Which faculties are implied in the process of cognition? In Kant’s words, the conditions of possibility of experience can be summarised as follows:

“There are, however, three original sources (capacities or faculties of the soul), which contain the conditions of the possibility of all experience, and cannot themselves be derived from any other faculty of the mind, namely sense, imagination, and apperception. On these are grounded 1) the synopsis of the manifold a priori through sense; 2) the synthesis of this manifold through the imagination; finally 3) the unity of this synthesis through original apperception.” (KrV A94)⁸²←67 | 68→

It is not sufficient to claim that sensible impressions are given in sensibility according to space and time, but it is necessary to state that they are reproduced by the imagination (that allows the representation of an object although without a present intuition) and that they are all united in the understanding in order to make possible the experience of a unitary object and not of separated impressions, in which the consciousness would dissolve itself.

Although Kant distinguishes three different sources of consciousness, the synthesis’ process is unique⁸³:

“In such a way it is proved that the synthesis of apprehension, which is empirical, must necessarily be in agreement with the synthesis of apperception, which is intellectual and contained in the category entirely a priori. It is one and the same spontaneity, that, there under the name of imagination, and here under the name of understanding, brings combination into the manifold of intuition.” (KrV B162)⁸⁴

And in the section “On the ground of the distinction of all objects in general into phaenomena and noumena”:

“With us understanding and sensibility can determine an object only in combination. If we separate them, we have intuitions without concepts, or concepts without intuitions, but in either case representations that we cannot relate to any determinate object.” (KrV A258/B314)⁸⁵

In this way, according to Kant’s view, the synthetic a priori judgements find a first (although not completed) explanation through the Transcendental Deduction: the subjective conditions of the understanding have an objective value, because they are the basis of the possibility of the phenomena’s constitution; the a priori understanding anticipates the form of the possible experience in general, thus determining the field of possibility of an object of experience in general.←68 | 69→

But so far, the transcendental inquiry is not completed. Although Kant has explained that pure concepts are necessary conditions of objective experience, he does so only “from the side of the understanding” (KrV B162), that is to say, categories are not enough to provide a complete explanation of how experience is possible, which is one of the aims of the Critique (KrV B20). As Kant states:

“[…] categories contain the grounds of the possibility of experience in general from the side of the understanding. But more about how they make experience possible, and which principles of its possibility they yield in their application to appearances, will be taught in the following chapter on the transcendental use of the power of judgement.”(KrV B167)⁸⁶

Kant has to face a crucial question: can the forms of the understanding be applied to the matter of experience and can understanding and sensibility, despite their fundamental heterogeneity actually work together? Both of these faculties are provided with pure forms. The objective validity of the forms of sensibility does not need justification, because it is only through them that objects are given in experience. As Kant puts it:

“In the case of the concepts of space and time, we were able above to make comprehensible with little effort how these, as a priori cognitions, must nevertheless necessarily relate to objects, and made possible a synthetic cognition of them independent of all experience. For since an object can appear to us only by means of such pure forms of sensibility, i.e. be an object of empirical intuition, space and time are thus pure intuitions that contain a priori the conditions of the possibility of objects as appearances, and the synthesis in them has objective validity.” (KrV A89/B121)⁸⁷

Categories, on the contrary, need a justification of their objective validity and Kant provides it in the “Deduction of the Pure Concepts of the Understanding”. ←69 | 70→However, the possibility of cognition is not sufficiently explained. The two faculties and their forms must work together, but they are profoundly different: sensibility is merely a receptive faculty, while understanding is active; space and time do not need a transcendental deduction, while categories do because they are conditions of thinking, i.e. they could be regarded as mere subjective rules without necessary relation to objects (KrV A90–91/B123–124). As Kant states:

“Thus a difficulty is revealed here that we did not encounter in the field of sensibility, namely how subjective conditions of thinking should have objective validity, i.e. yield conditions of the possibility of all cognition of objects; for appearances can certainly be given in intuition without functions of the understanding. I take, e.g., the concept of cause, which signifies a particular kind of synthesis, in which given something A something entirely different B is posited according to a rule. It is not clear a priori why appearances should contain anything of this sort (one cannot adduce experiences for the proof, for the objective validity of this a priori concept must be able to be demonstrated), and it is therefore a priori doubtful whether such a concept is not perhaps entirely empty and finds no object anywhere among the appearances. For that objects of sensible intuition must accord with the formal conditions of sensibility that lie in the mind a priori is clear from the fact that otherwise they would not be objects for us; but that they must also accord with the conditions that the understanding requires for the synthetic unity of thinking is a conclusion that is not so easily seen.” (KrV A90/B122–123)⁸⁸

Kant here alludes to the independence of sensibility and understanding, saying that even if concepts were not valid, things will still continue to be given to us in the experience. Therefore, even after the Deduction, that is to say, even once it is demonstrated that categories are related to things of experience, it is left ←70 | 71→to demonstrate how two distinct and apparently independent functions such as sensibility and understanding can work together. The distinction between the two faculties is called by Kant ‘heterogeneity’:

“Now pure concepts of the understanding, however, in comparison with empirical (indeed in general sensible) intuitions, are entirely unhomogeneous, and can never be encounter in any intuition. Now how is the subsumption of the latter under the former, thus the application of the category to appearances possible, since no one would say that the category, e.g., causality, could also be intuited through the senses and is contained in the appearance? This question, so natural and important, is really the cause which makes a transcendental doctrine of the power of judgement necessary, in order, namely, to show the possibility of applying pure concepts of the understanding to appearances in general.” (KrV A137–138/B176–177)⁸⁹

Categories and appearances are inhomogeneous. How does Kant define homogeneity? ‘Homogeneity’ (Homogeneität) is used by Kant to refer to things sharing qualitative properties (KrV A657/B685; AA XIV, p. 366; AA XIV, p. 410). For instance, since ‘table’ and ‘quadrangle’ do not share the same properties, i.e. do not belong to the same kind, are inhomogeneous; the former belongs to the kind of the empirical objects, while the latter to that of the geometrical concepts. They do not share the same qualitative features and therefore they cannot be subsumed one under the other.

This is the opening problem of the schematism chapter, which focuses on a controversial problem and it is still open to new interpretations provided by critics belonging both to the philosophical as well as to the psychological fields.←71 | 72→

←72 | 73→

64 “[…] die Bedingungen, worunter allein die Gegenstände der menschlichen Erkenntnis gegeben werden, denjenigen vorgehen, unter welchen selbige gedacht werden.”

65 “In der Erscheinung nenne ich das, was der Empfindung korrespondiert, die Materie derselben, dasjenige aber, welches macht, daß das Mannigfaltige der Erscheinung in gewissen Verhältnissen geordnet werden kann, nenne ich die Form der Erscheinung.”

66 The separation between two senses reechoes the terminology of the Schulphilosophie, according to which all human senses can be reduced to these two (Klemme 2004, p. 29).

67 Kant indicates that there might be an unknown common root of the two sources of knowledge (KrV A16/B30).

68 “Dass die gerade Linie zwischen zweien Punkten die kürzeste sei, ist ein synthetischer Satz. Denn mein Begriff von Geraden enthält nichts von Größe, sondern nur eine Qualität, der Begriff des Kürzesten kommt also gänzlich hinzu, und kann durch keine Zergliederung aus dem Begriffe der geraden Linie gezogen reden. Anschauung muss also hier zu Hülfe genommen werden, vermittelst deren allein die Synthesis möglich ist.”

69 “Nur in der Zeit können beide kontradiktorisch-entgegengesetzte Bestimmungen in einem Dinge, nämlich nach einander, anzutreffen sein. Also erklart unser Zeitbegriff die Möglichkeit so vieler synthetischer Erkenntnis a priori, als die allgemeine Bewegungslehre, die nicht wenig fruchtbar ist, dargelegt.”

70 “Wie kann nun eine äußere Anschauung dem Gemüte beiwohnen, die vor den Objekten selbst vorhergeht und in welcher der Begriff der letzteren a priori bestimmt werden kann? Offenbar nicht anders, als so fern sie bloß im Subjekte, als die formale Beschaffenheit desselben von Objekten affiziert zu werden, und dadurch unmittelbare Vorstellung derselben, d. i. Anschauung zu bekommen, ihren Sitz hat, also nur als Form des äußeren Sinnes überhaupt.”

71 Here ‘transcendental’ has to be interpreted as the attempt to use concepts that go beyond the limits of possible experience (Kant-Lexikon, p. 2313).

72 “Die Lehre von der Sinnlichkeit ist nun zugleich die Lehre von den Noumenen im negativen Verstande, d. i. von Dingen, die der Verstand sich ohne diese Beziehung auf unsere Anschauungsart, mithin nicht bloß als Erscheinungen, sondern als Dinge an sich selbst denken muß, von denen er aber in dieser Absonderung zugleich begreift, daß er von seinen Kategorien in dieser Art sie zu erwägen keinen Gebrauch machen könne: weil, da diese nur in Beziehung auf die Einheit der Anschauungen in Raum und Zeit Bedeutung haben, sie eben diese Einheit auch nur wegen der bloßen Idealität des Raums und der Zeit durch allgemeine Verbindungsbegriffe a priori bestimmen können.”

73 “Der Theil der transscendentalen Logik also, der die Elemente der reinen Verstandeserkenntniß vorträgt, und die Principien, ohne welche überall kein Gegenstand gedacht werden kann, ist die transscendentale Analytik und zugleich eine Logik der Wahrheit.”

74 I shall not delve here into the question concerning the validity of the “metaphysical deduction”. I will only report one of the problems that arises, namely the distinction between concepts in a logical sense and categories (see Barone 1958). As Norman Kemp Smith underlines: “A generic or abstract concept expresses common qualities found in each of a number of complex contents. It is itself a content. A category, on the other hand, is always a function of unity whereby contents are interpreted. It is not a content, but a form for the organisation of content.” (Smith 1918, p. 178). A different point of view is the one of Luigi Scaravelli, who does not stress how Kant might have confused the two logics, but rather stresses how Kant suggests that the understanding is the function of unity which produces both the logical unities of logical judgements, and the ways in which the manifold given in sensibility is synthesised (Scaravelli 1968, p. 241).

75 On the distinction between quid facti and quid juris: see the Refl. 5636 (AA XVIII, p. 267), KrV A1, KrV A84–85/B116–117.

76 “Ich nenne daher die Erklärung der Art, wie sich Begriffe a priori auf Gegenstände beziehen können, die transzendentale Deduktion derselben, und unterscheide sie von der empirischen Deduktion, welche die Art anzeigt, wie ein Begriff durch Erfahrung und Reflexion über dieselbe erworben worden, und daher nicht die Rechtmäßigkeit, sondern das Factum betrifft, wodurch der Besitz entsprungen.”

77 Cf. de Vleeschauwer 1934–1937; Carl 1989.

78 “Aber der Begriff der Verbindung führt außer dem Begriffe des Mannigfaltigen und der Synthesis desselben noch den der Einheit desselben bei sich. Verbindung ist Vorstellung der synthetischen Einheit des Mannigfaltigen.*) Die Vorstellung dieser Einheit kann also nicht aus der Verbindung entstehen, sie macht vielmehr dadurch, daß sie zur Vorstellung des Mannigfaltigen hinzukommt, den Begriff der Verbindung allererst möglich. Diese Einheit, die a priori vor allen Begriffen der Verbindung vorhergeht, ist nicht etwa jene Kategorie der Einheit (§ 10); denn alle Kategorien gründen sich auf logische Functionen in Urtheilen, in diesen aber ist schon Verbindung, mithin Einheit gegebener Begriffe gedacht. Die Kategorie setzt also schon Verbindung voraus. Also müssen wir diese Einheit (als qualitative, § 12) noch höher suchen, nämlich in demjenigen, was selbst den Grund der Einheit verschiedener Begriffe in Urtheilen, mithin der Möglichkeit des Verstandes sogar in seinem logischen Gebrauche enthält.”

79 “Diese Vorstellung mag nun klar (empirisches Bewusstsein) oder dunkle sein, daran liegt hier nichts, ja nicht einmal an der Wirklichkeit desselben; sondern die Möglichkeit der logischen Form alles Erkenntnisses beruht notwendig auf dem Verhältnis zu dieser Apperzeption als einem Vermögen.”

80 “Est bien la conscience de la spontanéité de la pensée, mais il ne révèle, de lui-même, aucune existence réellement déterminée. Cette dernière existence suivra la nature de la diversité qui est donnée dans la sensibilité.”

81 “Dagegen bin ich mir meiner selbst in der transzendentalen Synthesis des Mannigfaltigen der Vorstellungen überhaupt, mithin in der synthetischen ursprünglichen Einheit der Apperzeption, bewusst, nicht wie ich mir erscheine, noch wie an mir selbst bin, sondern nur daß ich bin.”

82 “Es sind aber drei ursprüngliche Quellen, (Fähigkeiten oder Vermögen der Seele) die die Bedingungen der Möglichkeit aller Erfahrungen enthalten, und selbst aus teile andern Vermögen des Gemüts abgeleitet werden können, nämlich, SINN, EINBILDUNGSKRAFT und APPERZEPTION. Darauf gründet sich 1) die SYNOPSIS des Mannigfaltigen a priori durch den Sinn; 2) die SYNTHESIS dieses Mannigfaltigen durch die Einbildungskraft: endlich 3) die EINHEIT dieser Synthesis durch ursprüngliche Apperzeption.”

83 The way in which these different functions work together is highlighted through schematism (Hepfer 2006, pp. 111–112).

84 “Die Synthesis der Apprehension, welche empirisch ist, der Synthesis der Apperzeption, welche intellektuell und gänzlich a priori in der Kategorie enthalten ist, notwendig gemäß sein müsse. Es ist eine und dieselbe Spontaneität, welche dort, unter dem Namen der Einbildungskraft, hier des Verstandes, Verbindung in das Mannigfaltige der Anschauung hineinbringt.”

85 “Verstand und Sinnlichkeit können bei uns nur in Verbindung Gegenstände bestimmen. Wenn wir sie trennen, so haben wir Anschauungen ohne Begriffe, oder Begriffe ohne Anschauungen.”

86 “[…] nämlich die Kategorien von Seiten des Verstandes die Gründe der Möglichkeit aller Erfahrung überhaupt enthalten. Wie sie aber die Erfahrung möglich machen, und welche Grundsätze der Möglichkeit derselben sie in ihrer Anwendung auf Erscheinungen an die Hand geben, wird das folgende Hauptstück von dem transscendentalen Gebrauche der Urteilskraft das mehrere lehren.”

87 “Wir haben oben an den Begriffen des Raumes und der Zeit mit leichter Mühe begreiflich machen können, wie diese als Erkenntnisse a priori sich gleichwohl auf Gegenstände nothwendig beziehen müssen und eine synthetische Erkenntnis derselben unabhängig von aller Erfahrung möglich machten. Denn da nur vermittelst solcher reinen Formen der Sinnlichkeit uns ein Gegenstand erscheinen, d. i. ein Objekt der empirischen Anschauung sein kann, so sind Raum und Zeit reine Anschauungen, welche die Bedingung der Möglichkeit der Gegenstände als Erscheinungen a priori enthalten, und die Synthesis in denselben hat objective Gültigkeit.”

88 “Daher zeigt sich hier eine Schwierigkeit, die wir im Felde der Sinnlichkeit nicht antreffen, wie nämlich subjektive Bedingungen des Denkens sollten objective Gültigkeit haben, d. i. Bedingungen der Möglichkeit aller Erkenntnis der Gegenstände abgeben: denn ohne Funktionen des Verstandes können allerdings Erscheinungen in der Anschauung gegeben werden. Ich nehme z. B.den Begriff der Ursache, welcher eine besondere Art der Synthesis bedeutet, da auf etwas A was ganz Verschiedenes B nach einer Regel gesetzt wird. Es ist a priori nicht klar, warum Erscheinungen etwas dergleichen enthalten sollten (denn Erfahrungen kann man nicht zum Beweise anführen, weil die objektive Gültigkeit dieses Begriffs a priori muss dargetan werden können); und es ist daher a priori zweifelhaft, ob ein solcher Begriff nicht etwa gar leer sei und überall unter den Erscheinungen keinen Gegenstand antreffe. Denn daß Gegenstände der sinnlichen Anschauung den im Gemüth a priori liegenden formalen Bedingungen der Sinnlichkeit gemäß sein müssen, ist daraus klar, weil sie sonst nicht Gegenstände für uns sein würden; daß sie aber auch über den Bedingungen, derender Verstand zur synthetischen Einheit des Denkens bedarf, gemäß sein müssen, davon ist die Schlussfolge nicht so leicht einzusehen.”

89 “Nun sind aber reine Verstandesbegriffe in Vergleichung mit empirischen(ja überhaupt sinnlichen) Anschauungen ganz ungleichartig und können niemals in irgendeiner Anschauung angetroffen werden. Wie ist nun die Subsumtion der letzteren unter die erste, mithin die Anwendung der Kategorie auf Erscheinungen möglich, da doch niemand sagen wird: diese, z.B. die Kausalität, könne auch durch Sinne angeschaut werden und sei in der Erscheinung enthalten? Diese so natürliche und erhebliche Frage ist nun eigentlich die Ursache, welche eine transzendentale Doktrin der Urteilskraft notwendig macht, um nämlich die Möglichkeit zu zeigen, wie reine Verstandesbegriffe auf Erscheinungen überhaupt angewandt werden können.”