Kant's Theory of Knowledge Part 10

and 'trees' are unified respectively by the judgements 'This body is a plant' and 'This body is a tree'; for 'this body' is in the one case related to other 'plants' and in the other case to other 'trees'. And though the unity produced is different in each case, the kind of unity is the same; for plants and trees are, as members of a kind, unities of a special kind distinct from unities of another kind, such as the parts of a spatial or numerical whole. (2) There are as many kinds of unity as there are universals. Every group of particulars forms a unity of a special kind through relation to the corresponding universal. (3) There are as many kinds of unity as there are highest universals or _summa genera_. These _summa genera_ are the most general sources of unity through which individuals are related in groups, directly or indirectly. The kinds of unity are therefore in principle the Aristotelian categories, i. e. the highest forms of being under which all individuals fall.

Nevertheless, it is easy to see that the second and third answers should be rejected in favour of the first. For though, according to Kant, a judgement unifies particulars by bringing them under a universal, the special universal involved in a given judgement belongs not to the judgement as such, but to the particulars unified. What belongs to the judgement as such is simply the fact that the particulars are brought under a universal. In other words, the judgement as such determines the kind of unity but not the particular unity. The judgements 'Gold is a metal' and 'Trees are green', considered merely as judgements and not as the particular judgements which they are, involve the same kind of unity, viz. that of particulars as particulars of a universal; for the distinction between 'metal' and 'green' is a distinction not of kinds of unity but of unities. Moreover, to antic.i.p.ate the discussion of Kant's final conclusion, the moral is that Kant's account of judgement should have led him to recognize that judgement involves the reality, not of any special universals or--in Kant's language--conceptions, but of universality or conception as such. In other words, on his view of judgement the activity of the understanding implies simply that there _are_ universals or conceptions; it does not imply the existence of special conceptions which essentially belong to the understanding, e. g. that of 'cause' or 'plurality'.[17]

[17] To this failure in Kant's argument is due the difficulty in following his transition from 'function' to 'functions' of judgements. The judgement, as Kant describes it, always does one and the same thing; it unifies particulars by bringing them under a universal. This activity does not admit of differentiation.

If we now turn to the list of the activities of thought in judgement, borrowed from Formal Logic, we shall see that it is not in any way connected with Kant's account of judgement.[18] For if the kinds of judgement distinguished by Formal Logic are to be regarded as different ways of unifying, the plurality unified must be allowed to be not a special kind of group of particulars, but the two conceptions which const.i.tute the terms of the judgement[19]; and the unity produced must be allowed to be in no case a special form of the unity of particulars related through the corresponding universal. Thus the particular judgement 'Some coroners are doctors' must be said to unify the conceptions of 'coroner' and of 'doctor', and presumably by means of the conception of 'plurality'. Again, the hypothetical judgement 'If it rains, the ground will be wet' must be said to unify the judgements 'It rains' and 'The ground will be wet', and presumably by means of the conception of 'reason and consequence'. In neither case can the act of unification be considered a special form of the act of recognizing particulars as particulars of the corresponding universal.

The fact is that the distinctions drawn by Formal Logic are based on a view of judgement which is different from, and even incompatible with, Kant's, and they arise from the attempt to solve a different problem.

The problem before Kant in describing judgement is to distinguish the understanding from the sensibility, i. e. thought from perception.

Hence he regards judgement as the act of unifying a manifold given in perception, directly, or indirectly by means of a conception. But this is not the problem with which Formal Logic is occupied. Formal Logic a.s.sumes judgement to be an act which relates material given to it in the shape of 'conceptions' or 'judgements' by a.n.a.lysis of this material, and seeks to discover the various modes of relation thereby effected. The work of judgement, however, cannot consist _both_ in relating particulars through a conception _and_ in relating two conceptions or judgements.

[18] Moreover, the forms of judgement clearly lack the systematic character which Kant claims for them. Even if it be allowed that the subdivisions within the four main heads of quant.i.ty, quality, relation, and modality are based upon single principles of division, it cannot be said that the four heads themselves originate from a common principle.

[19] In the case of the third division, the plurality unified will be two prior judgements.

It may be urged that this criticism only affects Kant's argument, but not his conclusion. Possibly, it may be said, the list of types of judgement borrowed from Formal Logic really expresses the essential differentiations of judgement, and, in that case, Kant's only mistake is that he bases them upon a false or at least inappropriate account of judgement.[20] Moreover, since this list furnishes Kant with the 'clue' to the categories, provided that it expresses the essential differentiations of judgement, the particular account of judgement upon which it is based is a matter of indifference.

[20] It may be noted that the account cannot be merely inappropriate to the general problem, if it be _incompatible_ with that a.s.sumed by Formal Logic.

This contention leads us to consider the last stage of Kant's argument, in which he deduces the categories in detail from his list of the forms of judgement. For it is clear that unless the forms of judgement severally involve the categories, it will not matter whether these forms are or are not the essential differentiations of judgement.

Kant's mode of connecting the categories in detail with the forms of judgement discovered by Formal Logic is at least as surprising as his mode of connecting the latter with the nature of judgement in general.

Since the twelve distinctions within the form of judgement are to serve as a clue to the conceptions which belong to the understanding, we naturally expect that each distinction will be found directly to involve a special conception or category, and that therefore, to discover the categories, we need only look for the special conception involved in each form of judgement.[21] Again, since the plurality unified in a judgement of each form is the two conceptions or judgements which form the matter of the judgement, we should expect the conception involved in each form of judgement to be merely the type of relations.h.i.+p established between these conceptions or judgements. This expectation is confirmed by a cursory glance at the table of categories.[22]

I. _Of Quant.i.ty._ Unity Plurality Totality.

II. _Of Quality._ Reality Negation Limitation.

III. _Of Relation._ Inherence and Subsistence (_Substantia et Accidens_) Causality and Dependence (_Cause and Effect_) Community (_Reciprocity between the agent and patient._)

IV. _Of Modality._ Possibility--Impossibility Existence--Non-existence Necessity--Contingence.

If we compare the first division of these categories with the first division of judgements we naturally think that Kant conceived singular, particular, and universal judgements to unify their terms by means of the conceptions of 'one', of 'some', and of 'all'

respectively; and we form corresponding, though less confident, expectations in the case of the other divisions.

[21] This expectation is confirmed by Kant's view that judgement introduces unity into a plurality by means of a conception. This view leads us to expect that different forms of judgement--if there be any--will be distinguished by the different conceptions through which they unify the plurality; for it will naturally be the different conceptions involved which are responsible for the different kinds of unity effected.

[22] B. 106, M. 64.

Kant, however, makes no attempt to show that each form of judgement distinguished by Formal Logic involves a special conception. In fact, his view is that the activities of thought studied by Formal Logic do not originate or use any special conceptions at all. For his actual deduction of the categories[23] is occupied in showing that although thought, when exercised under the conditions under which it is studied by Formal Logic, does not originate and use conceptions of its own, it is able under certain other conditions to originate and use such conceptions, i. e. categories.[24] Hence if we attend only to the professed procedure of the deduction, we are compelled to admit that the deduction not only excludes any use of the 'clue' to the categories, supposed to be furnished by Formal Logic, but even fails to deduce them at all. For it does not even nominally attempt to discover the categories in detail, but reverts to the prior task of showing merely that there are categories. Doubtless Kant thinks that the forms of judgement formulated by Formal Logic in some way _suggest_ the conceptions which become operative in thought under these other conditions. Nevertheless, it is impossible to see how these forms of judgement can suggest these conceptions, unless they actually presuppose them.

It is clear, however, that the professed link[25] between the forms of judgement and the categories does not represent the actual process by which Kant reached his list of categories; for he could never have reached any list of categories by an argument which was merely directed to show that there are categories. Moreover, an inspection of the list shows that he actually reached it partly by noticing the conceptions which the forms of judgement seemed to presuppose, and partly by bearing in mind the general conceptions underlying physics which it was his ultimate aim to vindicate. Since this is the case, and since the categories can only be connected with the forms of judgement by showing that they are presupposed in them, the proper question to be considered from the point of view of the metaphysical deduction is simply whether the forms of judgement really presuppose the categories.[26]

[23] B. 102-5, M. 62-3.

[24] Cf. p. 166.

[25] B. 102-5, M. 62-3.

[26] As we shall see later, the real importance of the pa.s.sage in which Kant professes to effect the transition from the forms of judgement to the categories (B. 102-5, M. 62-3) lies in its introduction of a new and important line of thought, on which the transcendental deduction turns.

Consideration of it is therefore deferred to the next chapter.

If, however, we examine the forms of judgement distinguished by Formal Logic, we find that they do not presuppose the categories. To see this, it is only necessary to examine the four main divisions of judgement _seriatim_.

The first division of judgements is said to be a division in respect of quant.i.ty into singular, particular, and universal. So stated, the division is numerical. It is a division of judgements according as they make an a.s.sertion about one, more than one, or all the members of a kind. Each species may be said to presuppose (1) the conception of quant.i.ty, and (2) a conception peculiar to itself: the first presupposing the conception of one member of a kind, the second that of more than one but less than all members of a kind, the third that of all members of a kind. Moreover, a judgement of each kind may perhaps be said to relate the predicate conception to the subject conception by means of one of these three conceptions.

The fundamental division, however, into which universal and singular judgements enter is not numerical at all, and ignores particular judgements altogether. It is that between such judgements as 'Three-sided figures, as such, are three-angled' and 'This man is tall'. The essential distinction is that in the universal judgement the predicate term is apprehended to belong to the subject through our insight that it is necessitated by the nature of the subject term, while in the singular judgement our apprehension that the predicate term belongs to the subject is based upon the perception or experience of the coexistence of predicate and subject terms in a common subject.

In other words, it is the distinction between an _a priori_ judgement and a judgement of perception.[27] The merely numerically universal judgement, and the merely numerically particular judgement[28] are simply aggregates of singular judgements, and therefore are indistinguishable in principle from the singular judgement. If then we ask what conceptions are really presupposed by the kinds of judgement which Kant seeks to distinguish in the first division, we can only reply that the universal judgement presupposes the conception of a connected or systematic whole of attributes, and that the singular judgement presupposes the conception of the coexistence of two attributes in a common subject. Neither kind of judgement presupposes the conception of quant.i.ty or the conceptions of unity, plurality, and totality.

[27] I owe this view of the distinction to Professor Cook Wilson's lectures on logic.

[28] 'Some coroners are doctors' of course in some contexts means, 'it is possible for a coroner to be a doctor,' and is therefore not numerical; but understood in this sense it is merely a weakened form of the universal judgement in which the connexion apprehended between subject and predicate terms is incomplete.

The second division of judgements is said to be a division in respect of quality into affirmative, negative, and infinite, i. e. into species which may be ill.u.s.trated by the judgements, 'A college is a place of education,' 'A college is not a hotel,' and 'A college is a not-hotel'. The conceptions involved are said to be those of reality, of negation, and of limitation respectively. The conception of limitation may be ignored, since the infinite judgement said to presuppose it is a fiction. On the other hand, the conceptions of reality and negation, even if their existence be conceded, cannot be allowed to be the conceptions presupposed. For when we affirm or deny, we affirm or deny of something not mere being, but being of a particular kind. The conceptions presupposed are rather those of ident.i.ty and difference. It is only because differences fall within an ident.i.ty that we can affirm, and it is only because within an ident.i.ty there are differences that we can deny.

The third division of judgements is said to be in respect of relation into categorical, hypothetical, and disjunctive judgements. Here, again, the conclusion which Kant desires is clearly impossible. The categorical judgement may be said to presuppose the conception of subject and attribute, but not that of substance and accident. The hypothetical judgement may be conceded to presuppose the conception of reason and consequence, but it certainly does not presuppose the conception of cause and effect.[29] Lastly, while the disjunctive judgement may be said to presuppose the conception of mutually exclusive species of a genus, it certainly does not presuppose the conception of reciprocal action between physical things.

[29] No doubt, as the schematism of the categories shows, Kant does not think that the hypothetical judgement _directly_ involves the conception of cause and effect, i. e.

of the relation of necessary succession between the various states of physical things. The point is, however, that the hypothetical judgement does not involve it at all.

The fourth division of judgement is said to be in respect of modality into a.s.sertoric, problematic, and apodeictic, the conceptions involved being respectively those of possibility and impossibility, of actuality and non-actuality, and of necessity and contingence. Now, from the point of view of Kant's argument, these conceptions, like those which he holds to be involved in the other divisions of judgement, must be considered to relate to reality and not to our att.i.tude towards it. Considered in this way, they resolve themselves into the conceptions of--

(1) the impossible (impossibility); (2) the possible but not actual (possibility, nonexistence); (3) the actual but not necessary (existence, contingence); (4) the necessary (necessity).

But since it must, in the end, be conceded that all fact is necessary, it is impossible to admit the reality of the conception of the possible but not actual, and of the actual but not necessary. There remain, therefore, only the conceptions of the necessary and of the impossible. In fact, however, the distinctions between the a.s.sertoric, the problematic, and the apodeictical judgement relate to our att.i.tude to reality and not to reality, and therefore involve no different conceptions relating to reality. It must, therefore, be admitted that the 'metaphysical' deduction of the categories breaks down doubly. Judgement, as Kant describes it, does not involve the forms of judgement borrowed from Formal Logic as its essential differentiations; and these forms of judgement do not involve the categories.

CHAPTER VIII

THE TRANSCENDENTAL DEDUCTION OF THE CATEGORIES

The aim of the _Transcendental Deduction_ is to show that the categories, though _a priori_ as originating in the understanding, are valid, i. e. applicable to individual things. It is the part of the _Critique_ which has attracted most attention and which is the most difficult to follow. The difficulty of interpretation is increased rather than diminished by the complete rewriting of this portion in the second edition. For the second version, though it does not imply a change of view, is undoubtedly even more obscure than the first.

It indeed makes one new contribution to the subject by adding an important link in the argument,[1] but the importance of the link is nullified by the fact that it is not really the link which it professes to be. The method of treatment adopted here will be to consider only the minimum of pa.s.sages necessary to elucidate Kant's meaning and to make use primarily of the first edition.

[1] Cf. p. 206-10.

It is necessary, however, first to consider the pa.s.sage in the _Metaphysical Deduction_ which nominally connects the list of categories with the list of forms of judgement.[2] For its real function is to introduce a new and third account of knowledge, which forms the keynote of the _Transcendental Deduction_.[3]

[2] B. 102-5, M. 62-3. Cf. pp. 155-6.

[3] The first two accounts are (1) that of judgement given B.

92-4, M. 56-8, and (2) that of judgement implicit in the view that the forms of judgement distinguished by Formal Logic are functions of unity. In A. 126, Mah. 215, Kant seems to imply--though untruly--that this new account coincides with the other two, which he does not distinguish.

In this pa.s.sage, the meaning of which it is difficult to state satisfactorily, Kant's thought appears to be as follows: 'The activity of thought studied by Formal Logic relates by way of judgement conceptions previously obtained by an a.n.a.lysis of perceptions. For instance, it relates the conceptions of body and of divisibility, obtained by a.n.a.lysis of perceptions of bodies, in the judgement 'Bodies are divisible'. It effects this, however, merely by a.n.a.lysis of the conception 'body'. Consequently, the resulting knowledge or judgement, though _a priori_, is only a.n.a.lytic, and the conceptions involved originate not from thought but from the manifold previously a.n.a.lysed. But besides the conceptions obtained by a.n.a.lysis of a given manifold, there are others which belong to thought or the understanding as such, and in virtue of which thought originates synthetic _a priori_ knowledge, this activity of thought being that studied by Transcendental Logic. Two questions therefore arise.

Firstly, how do these conceptions obtain a matter to which they can apply and without which they would be without content or empty? And, secondly, how does thought in virtue of these conceptions originate synthetic _a priori_ knowledge? The first question is easily answered, for the manifolds of s.p.a.ce and time, i. e. individual s.p.a.ces and individual times, afford matter of the kind needed to give these conceptions content. As perceptions (i. e. as objects of perception), they are that to which a conception can apply, and as pure or _a priori_ perceptions, they are that to which those conceptions can apply which are pure or _a priori_, as belonging to the understanding.

The second question can be answered by considering the process by which this pure manifold of s.p.a.ce and time enters into knowledge. All synthetic knowledge, whether empirical or _a priori_, requires the realization of three conditions. In the first place, there must be a manifold given in perception. In the second place, this manifold must be 'gone through, taken up, and combined'. In other words, if synthesis be defined as 'the act of joining different representations to one another and of including their multiplicity in one knowledge', the manifold must be subjected to an act of synthesis. This is effected by the imagination. In the third place, this synthesis produced by the imagination must be brought to a conception, i. e.

brought under a conception which will const.i.tute the synthesis a unity. This is the work of the understanding. The realization of _a priori_ knowledge, therefore, will require the realization of the three conditions in a manner appropriate to its _a priori_ character.