Book I: Analytic of Concepts
Chapter I
I. General Introduction
a. to analyze the whole of our a priori knowledge into the elements of pure cognition of the understanding (i.e., the transcendental analytic):
i. (1) the conceptions (of analysis) must be pure, not empirical; (2) they must not be derivative or complex, but fundamental; (3) that they belong to understanding, not intuition; (4) that we be able to exhaust a table of these conceptions of the pure understanding.
ii. The completeness of transcendental analytic (totality of a priori cognition) only given by the whole of an integrated table (of conceptions and relations).
II. Introduction to Analytic of Concepts: by “Analytic of Concepts” Kant understands the “dissection” (analysis) of the faculty of the understanding, in order to investigate the possibility of conceptions a priori (as origins or in pure relations), by “looking for them” in the understanding as their “birthplace,” and analyzing the pure [non-sensuous] use of the understanding.
a. The conceptions of the understanding arise pure and unmixed as an absolute unity, and may therefore be connected (related) according to an idea.
Transcendental Clue to the Discovery of All Pure Conceptions of the Understanding
III. Section I. – Of the Logical Use of the Understanding in General
a. The cognition of every (act of) understanding is a cognition of conceptions, not of intuitions. Proof: since the understanding is a non-sensuous faculty of cognition; and independent of sensibility we have no intuition; and besides conceptions there is no other faculty of cognition; then the understanding cognizes conceptions.
b. All conceptions depend upon functions (as intuitions depend upon affections)
i. Function: “the unity of the act of arranging diverse representations under one common representation.”
1. Conceptions based on spontaneity of thought; sensuous intuitions on receptivity of impressions.
2. The understanding cannot do anything with conceptions other than judge by means of them.
ii. Judgment: the mediate form of cognition of an object; the representation of a representation.
1. Explanation: no representation, except of intuition, relates immediately to an object, only another representation (as an intuition or conception).
2. In all judgments there is a concept which applies to, and is valid for, many other conceptions; and comprehends a series or complex [manifold] of representations, the last being immediately connected to an object by intuition.
3. All judgments are functions of unity in (of) our representations. Therefore, we can reduce all acts of understanding to judgments, such that understanding is the faculty of judgment
iii. All the functions of the understanding can be discovered when the functions of unity in judgments are exhausted.
1. Proof: (1) thought is cognition by means of conceptions; (2) conceptions, as predicates of possible judgments, relate to the representations of an indeterminate object; (3) all conceptions which contain representations under them are predicates to possible judgments
2. Note: Kant defines reality as explicitly linguistic, or at least of possible propositional form; that is, expressing logical relationships which are knowable. Certain conceptions could therefore be “higher” (or more polysemic) signifiers, under which unity a judgment (act of understanding) can occur.
IV. Section II. – Of the Logical Function of the Understanding in Judgments
a. Abstracted from all content of a judgment, so only the “intellectual form” exists, the function of thought in a judgment can be outlined as:
b. Notes on the Table of Judgments:
i. The modality (IV) in judgments contributes nothing to the content of a judgment, but concerns only the value of the copula in relationship to thought. Modal statements can be obviously false but necessary for cognition in general, especially in their application to practical reasoning. In Assertorical statements, we regard the affirmation or negation of the statement as true; in Apodictical ones, as necessary; and in Problematical ones, as merely possible.
ii. All relations of thought to judgments are: (1) of the predicate to subject (two concepts); (2) of the premise to its consequence (two judgments); (3) of parts to themselves or to a whole (relations of judgments).
V. Section III. – Of the Pure Conceptions of the Understanding, or Categories
a. Transcendental Logic has at its disposal the manifold content of a priori sensibility, given by transcendental aesthetic (which gives matter to pure conceptions of the understanding), without which transcendental logic would have no content.
i. Synthesis: the process of joining representations together and understanding what is manifold in them in one cognition. Synthesis is prior to knowledge and is not analysis.
1. The synthesis of a manifold (diversity) is antecedent to the production of (a) cognition; since synthesis is the elements of cognition united into a single content.
2. We are seldom conscious of the synthesis of representations
3. Pure Synthesis: the manifold of representations in synthesis given a priori (e.g., time and space). Gives us the pure concepts of the understanding (that which rests upon a basis of a priori synthetical unity).
ii. Analysis: the bringing together of different representations under one conception; but transcendental logic reduces to conceptions – not representations – the pure synthesis of representations. Requires:
1. A manifold (diversity) of pure intuition; the synthesis of this manifold; the conceptions which give unity to pure synthesis and consist only in the representation of this necessary synthetical unity, which is given by the understanding.
iii. The same function which unifies manifold representations in judgment also unifies the synthesis of manifold representations in intuition(s), which is called the pure conception of the understanding.
1. Pure conception of the understanding: applies a priori to objects of intuition (without regards their differences). By means of the synthetical unity of the manifold (representations) in intuition, a transcendental content is introduced into representations, which are pure concepts of the understanding, and apply a priori to objects. The Table of Categories, or Pure Conceptions of the Understanding, follows:
iv. The catalogue [table] of all the originally pure [not intermixed with sensation] concepts [active representations enabling thought] of the synthesis [action of unifying representations together] which the understanding contains [performs] a priori [transcendentally, as a method of gaining knowledge], constitute the pure understanding.
1. Only in the categories can the understanding render the manifold of intuition conceivable (i.e., to think an object of intuition).
2. The third term of each category arises from the contemplation of one of the two preceding forms with the other; but is not a derived, but a primitive, conception of pure understanding; nevertheless a specific act of the understanding required to produce it.
