THE UNITY OF IDENTITY AND DIFFERENCE AS THE ...

of experience. These are changes in the object or in the world. Second, there are
transformations in our relation to the objects in the world. 206 Our experience of even a
minimally unified spatial framework depends upon our ability to distinguish between
these two kinds of transformations.
A relatively stable spatial framework requires relatively stable objects. We don’t
directly perceive or conceive space. Instead, we perceive and conceive spatial
frameworks in terms of relatively stable objects that we take as fixed points of reference.
Thus if we cannot pick out relatively stable objects, we cannot determine spatial
relations. If we fail to distinguish between transformations in the objects and
transformations in our relation to the objects, we will be unable to identify any stable
objects. As we move through the world, our relation to objects changes constantly.
Things appear bigger as we approach them. They appear smaller as we move away from
them. Moreover, they change their shape as move around them, as we view them from
different angles. Prior to the distinction between transformations in the object and
transformation in our relation to the object, there are no stable objects for the mind.
Prior to this distinction, the “object” changes every time we change our relation to it. Or,
conversely, the object is immutable, and only our relation to it changes. However, once
206 Kant presents this distinction in the Second Analogy. For instance, he says: “The apprehension
of the manifold of appearances is always successive. The representations of the parts succeed one another.
Whether they also succeed one another is a second point for reflection, which is not contained in the first”
(Critique of Pure Reason, A189/B235). In the form of a slogan, a change in awareness is not always an
awareness of change. Here Kant presents this distinction as a necessary condition for the determination of
an objective temporal sequence. However, as the example of the house makes clear, this distinction also
provides the basis for becoming aware of objective determinations in space. Speaking of the house, Kant
says: “the apprehension of the manifold in the appearances of a house that stands before me is successive.
Now the question is whether the manifold of this house itself is also successive, which certainly no one will
concede” (Critique of Pure Reason, A191/B236). In this case, the changes in awareness do not constitute
an awareness of change. This recognition provides the basis for determining the house as an object with a
stable existence in space.
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