BODY AND PRACTICE IN KANT

SPATIAL SCHEMATISM 195
one she would perform in order to construct a triangle, for instance, on a
piece of paper. Thus, while she explores the triangle, it is at the same
time as if she constructs its shape. If I am right, Kant’s basic idea in the
schematism chapter, expressed through its second example, is that the
recognition of the triangle as a triangle takes place by making a
movement like the one just described, and, in making this movement,
recognizing it as the movement involved in the construction of triangles. 36
Later I will discuss whether the structure of this example also applies
to visual perception, but first let us see in what sense the movement just
described relates to what Kant says about the schema in the schematism
chapter. The first point I want to underline concerns image production.
The schema, Kant tells us, is a procedure for image production. The
movement just described, I would argue, may also be seen as
representing a practice resulting in the production of an image. Earlier I
suggested that when Kant uses the term ‘imagination’ it should be taken
to refer to our capacity to produce images in a wide sense. According to
this interpretation, a person drawing a circle in the air by making a
circular movement with her hand may be seen as constructing an image
even if no material image is produced. The act just described, when a
person lets her hands follow the contours of the triangle, one side after
the other, is imaginative or image-productive in the same sense.
Secondly, even if there is an aspect of this act that could be described
as ‘passive’ or ‘empirical’ in Kantian terminology, in the sense that the
person in question adjusts her movements to an already existing shape, so
that in ordinary language we would say that she copies the triangle rather
than creates it, nevertheless at the same time the act is also creative. It is
creative in the sense that it would never have taken place without the
active initiative of the agent. It represents an event in which the agent
does not just passively receive impressions from the world, but in which
36 Such a theory is implied, I think, by Berkeley, Descartes, Condillac, Rousseau
and others, when they argue that we arrive at knowledge of spatial properties of
objects by moving parts of our bodies, such as when we move our hands or eyes
when we observe an object. Included in this theory is the idea that the mind
during such an act receives information of the minutest changes in the muscles
operating our organs. Even a small movement by the pupil of the eye is registered
and the resulting information is used. As far as I know, however, neither of the
authors mentioned develops a theory of schematism from this like the one I take
to be implied by Kant’s schematism chapter. I think that Kant’s theory of
schematism may be seen as such a development.