DIE UNDINGE

 

(It's a pity that one of my favorite subjects: the Kantian Undinge, currently subsists in this mostly unoriginal (largely derivative from Bertrand Russell) shape, but such is the fact, and hopefully at a more propitious time this indignity will be properly remedied. Meanwhile, I am posting this informative material now for the sake of the continuity of the subject matter, considering that the need to include Kant’s Space and Time in any Kant series trumps the argument to the contrary.)

 

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“Die Undinge,” “The Un-Things.” This perfectly Halloweenish title refers to Kant’s designation of space and time. I wish the content of this entry were likewise Halloweenish, but, come to think of it, it is, if the reader looks at it the right way.

Kant’s theory of space and time is presented here largely using Bertrand Russell’s narrative. At this point, this is clearly a stock entry, which is subsequently to be developed into my personal take on this subject. (I suggest that when sufficiently simplified in retelling, this subject is not as hard to grasp as it may seem, and I am looking forward to presenting my original summary and commentary at the first opportunity.)

According to Kant, the outer world causes only the matter of sensation, whereas our own mental apparatus orders this matter in space and time, supplying the concepts by means of which we understand experience. Things in themselves, which are the causes of our sensations, are unknowable; they are not in space or time and they are not substances, nor can they be described by any of those other general concepts, which Kant calls categories. Space and time, “Die Undinge, The Un-Things,”--- are subjective, part of our apparatus of perception. But, because of this, we can be sure that whatever we experience will exhibit the characteristics dealt with by geometry and the science of time. Thus if you always wore blue spectacles, you could be sure of seeing everything blue (this is not Kant’s illustration). Similarly, since you always wear spatial glasses in your mind, you are sure of always seeing everything in space: thus, geometry is a priori, in the sense that it must be true of everything experienced, but we have no reason to suppose that anything analogous is true of things in themselves, which we do not experience.

This is a tremendous psychological insight on Kant’s part. Time and space, in his treatment, can be called our “prejudices,” and looking at some other prejudices of ours (which constitute a massive majority in our perception of everything around us, and much within us: even the so-called open mind cannot escape from its own share of prejudices!) we can understand two things: one, that many of our firmly held views are, in fact, nothing better than prejudices; and two, that considering how strongly we believe that space and time are objective realities, it is quite understandable why some of our prejudices have such a tight hold on us.

Space and time, Kant says, are not concepts; they are forms of Anschauung. (This German word is usually translated as intuition, but such translation is not at all satisfactory!) There are two forms of Anschauung: one for the outer sense, space, the other for the inner sense, time.

To prove that space and time are a priori forms, Kant has two classes of arguments, one metaphysical, the other epistemological, or, as he calls it, transcendental. As regards space, the metaphysical arguments are four in number:

1. Space is not an empirical concept, abstracted from outer experiences, as space is presupposed in referring sensations to something external, and external experience is only possible through presentations of space.

2. Space is a necessary presentation a priori which underlies all external perceptions; for we cannot imagine that there should be no space, although we can imagine that there should be nothing in space.

3. Space is not a discursive or general concept of the relation of things in general: there is only one space, of which what we call spaces are parts, not instances.

4. Space is represented as an infinite given magnitude, which holds within itself all the parts of space. This relation is different from that of a concept to its instances, and therefore space is an Anschauung, and not a concept.

The transcendental argument about space is derived from geometry. Kant holds that Euclidian geometry is known a priori, although it is synthetic, that is, not deducible from logic alone. Geometrical proofs, he says, depend upon the figures; we can see, for instance, that, given two intersecting lines at right angles to each other, only one straight line at right angles to both can be drawn through their point of intersection. Such knowledge, he thinks, is not derived from experience. But the only way in which my intuition anticipates what will be found in the object is if it contains only the form of my sensibility antedating in my subjective all the actual impressions. The objects of sense must obey geometry, because geometry is concerned with our ways of perceiving, and therefore we cannot perceive otherwise. This explains why geometry, although synthetic, is a priori and apodeictic.

The arguments with regard to time are essentially the same, except that arithmetic replaces geometry with the contention that counting takes time.

Coming now to criticizing Kant’s theory, the four metaphysical arguments can be dismissed as too arcane and subjective, while the transcendental argument does not hold water, as we now know what Kant did not know, that there are actually two types of geometry, one pure, which deduces consequences from axioms, without inquiring if the axioms are true (this one is a priori, but not synthetic); and the other derived from physics, in which the axioms are derived from measurements, and are different from Euclid’s (this one is synthetic, but it is not a priori). Generally speaking, we can talk about two kinds of space: one subjective, and the other one objective, where Kant’s theories do not hold water at all. With regard to time, there is no sense, in which perceptual time can be subjective, and his theory of time falls apart right away.

At the same time, however, Kant’s invalid arguments have historically generated a host of valid ones, and in this sense he can be justly credited as the progenitor of all those modern arguments that have promoted and enriched science, regardless of whether his own arguments had been true or not.