BODY AND PRACTICE IN KANT

SPATIAL EXPERIENCE AND THE BODY IN THE CRITIQUE 165
elaborates further on his theory of the syntheses of the imagination. Here
the notion of a threefold synthesis is introduced:
If therefore I ascribe a synopsis to sense, because it contains a
manifold in its intuition, a synthesis must always correspond to this,
and receptivity can make cognitions possible only if combined with
spontaneity. This is now the ground of a threefold synthesis, which is
necessarily found in all cognition: that, namely, of the apprehension
of the representations, as modifications of the mind in intuition; of the
reproduction of them in the imagination; and of their recognition in
the concept. Now these direct us toward three subjective sources of
cognition, which make possible even the understanding and, through
the latter, all experience as an empirical product of understanding. (A
97) 11
This passage is loaded with information. The threefold synthesis, we are
told, is a necessary condition of all cognition. What does this mean? I will
try to answer this question, with the emphasis still on the A-edition of the
text.
5.6 Apprehension
Apprehension is the first of the three syntheses mentioned at A 97. At A
99 it is defined as a process creating a unity of the manifold of intuition.
In order to do this, we have to go through and put together this
manifold, Kant explains, and this is apprehension.
Now in order for unity of intuition to come from this manifold (as,
say, in the representation of space) it is necessary first to run through
and then to take together this manifoldness, which action I call the
synthesis of apprehension. (A 99)
Kant’s way of describing apprehension is interesting, not only in that it
exemplifies how important the activity of the mind is in cognition. It also
expands the theory of the a priori forms of intuition that was presented in
the Transcendental aesthetic. There the a priori forms of intuition were
described as a priori and ascribed to the mind with only vague references
to activity. Now time and space are clearly associated with activity and at
11
In this passage Kant also uses the term ‘synopsis’. This is one of the more
obscure notions of the Critique. It is mentioned explicitly only twice in the whole
Critique and only in the first edition, and I will not discuss it here. For a brief
discussion of the term, cf. e.g. Brook (1994), 125.