In III. I recognition is again mentioned, but this time in a form still more akin to its treatment in the fourth stage. It is not recognition through categories, but, as a form in apperception, is the
“empirical consciousness of the identity of the reproductive representations with the appearances by which they were given.”[826]
In all other respects, however, the above six sections agree (along with I. § 14 C) in holding to a threefold division of mental powers: sensibility, imagination, and apperception. This third stage is thereby marked off sufficiently clearly from the second stage in which pure imagination is wanting, and from the fourth stage in which it is dissolved into a threefold a priori synthesis.
In both I. § 14 C and in III. I the classification which underlies the third stage is explicitly formulated. Their statements harmoniously combine to yield the following tabular statement:
1. The synopsis of the manifold—a priori through sense, i.e. in pure intuition.
2. The synthesis of this manifold—through pure transcendental imagination.
3. The unity of this synthesis—through pure original transcendental apperception.
At this point Vaihinger adds to the above section the earlier passage § 10 T.[827] It is even more definitely than III. γ and III. I transitional to the fourth stage. It must be classed within the third stage, as it holds to the above threefold classification. But it modifies that classification in two respects. First, in that it does not employ the term synopsis, but only speaks of pure intuition as required to yield us a manifold. The term synopsis, as used by Kant, is, however, decidedly misleading.[828] His invariable teaching is that all connection is due to synthesis. By synopsis, therefore, which he certainly does not employ as synonymous with synthesis, can be meant only apprehension of external side-by-sideness. It never signifies anything except apprehension of the lowest possible order. Kant’s omission of the term, therefore, tends to clearness of statement. Secondly, the classification is also modified by the substitution of understanding for the unity of apperception. Apperception is, however, so obscurely treated in all of the above sections, that this cannot be regarded as a vital alteration. What is new in this section, and seems to connect it in a curious and interesting manner with sections in the fourth stage, is its doctrine of
“a manifold of a priori sensibility.” “Space and time contain a manifold of pure a priori intuition.”[829]
That is, in this connection, an entirely new doctrine. In all the previous sections of the deduction (previous in the assumed order of original writing) the manifold supplied through intuition is taken as being empirical, and as consisting of sensations. Kant here also adds that the manifold, “whether given empirically or a priori,”[830] must be synthesised before it can be known.