PART II
THE TRANSCENDENTAL LOGIC
Introduction
I. Concerning Logic in General.—This Introduction[639] which falls into four divisions, is extremely diffuse, and contributes little that is of more than merely architectonic value. It is a repetition of the last section of the general Introduction, and of the introductory paragraphs of the Aesthetic, but takes no account of the definitions given in either of those two places. It does not, therefore, seem likely that it could have been written in immediate sequence upon the Aesthetic. It is probably later than the main body of the Analytic.[640] In any case it is externally tacked on to it; as Adickes has noted,[641] it is completely ignored in the opening section of the Analytic.[642]
In treating of intuition in the first sentence, Kant seems to have in view only empirical intuition.[643] Yet he at once proceeds to state that intuition may be pure as well as empirical.[644] Also, in asserting that “pure intuition contains only the form under which something is intuited,” Kant would seem to be adopting the view that it does not yield its own manifold, a conclusion which he does not, however, himself draw.
In defining sensibility,[645] Kant again ignores pure intuition. Sensuous intuition, it is stated, is the mode in which we are affected by objects.[646] Understanding, in turn, is defined only in its opposition to sensibility, in the ordinary meaning of that term. Understanding is the faculty which yields thought of the object to which sense-affection is due. It is “the power of thinking the object of sensuous intuition”; and acts, it is implied, in and through pure concepts which it supplies out of itself.
“Without sensibility objects would not be given to us [i.e. the impressions, in themselves merely subjective contents, through which alone independent objects can be revealed to us, would be wanting]; without understanding they would not be thought by us [i.e. they would be apprehended only in the form in which they are given, viz. as subjective modes of our sensibility].”
Kant has not yet developed the thesis which the central argument of the Analytic is directed to prove, namely, that save through the combination of intuition and conception no consciousness whatsoever is possible. In these paragraphs he still implies that though concepts without intuition are empty they are not meaningless, and that though intuitions without concepts are blind they are not empty.[647] Their union is necessary for genuine knowledge, but not for the existence of consciousness as such.
“It is just as necessary to make our concepts sensuous, i.e. to add to them their object in intuition, as to make our intuitions intelligible, i.e. to bring them under concepts.”
Kant’s final Critical teaching is very different from this. Concepts are not first given in their purity, nor is “their object” added in intuition. Only through concepts is apprehension of an object possible, and only in and through such apprehension do concepts come to consciousness. Nor are intuitions “made intelligible” by being “brought under concepts.” Only as thus conceptually interpreted can they exist for consciousness. The co-operation of concept and intuition is necessary for consciousness in any and every form, even the simplest and most indefinite. Consciousness of the subjective is possible only in and through consciousness of the objective, and vice versa. The dualistic separation of sensibility from understanding persists, however, even in Kant’s later utterances; and, as above stated,[648] to this sharp opposition are due both the strength and the weakness of Kant’s teaching. Intuition and conception must, he here insists, be carefully distinguished. Aesthetic is the “science of the rules of sensibility in general.” Logic is the “science of the rules of understanding in general.”
Kant’s classification of the various kinds of logic[649] may be exhibited as follows: