Tuesday, October 15, 2019
Transcendental Deduction Essay Example for Free
Transcendental Deduction Essay Kant’s Transcendental Deduction of the categories of the analytic concepts presents an analysis of the mental activities as well as the analysis of knowledge and self. Kant discussed these mental activities using two sets of terms such as manifold representations and intuition as well as understanding and sensibility (p.76).            Representation to him means the various concepts pulling together into unity and can be given in an intuition that is merely sensible. For Kant, intuition means a perception or knowledge (a priore) or insight.  Kant associated knowledge to intuition and also to perception (p.82). He said, â€Å"The pure concepts of understanding even when they are applied to a priori intuition provide knowledge only to the extent that these are priori intuition, and through them, the concept of understanding is applied also. He further noted that â€Å"empirical intuition serves only for the possibility of empirical knowledge. Sensible on the other hand, means either having or demonstrating sound reason and judgment or able to be perceived through the senses. Synthesis is the result of combination, a process of combining different ideas, influences or objects into a new whole. In view of transcendental deduction of Kant, the combination of concepts is act of â€Å"active department†of understanding which disguised it from the passive department which he called sensibility. He concludes this statement that â€Å"all combining is an action of the understanding whether or not we are conscious of it†(p.75). Kant further discussed the understanding self using another set of terminology.            The â€Å"I think†which refers to that something was represented that could not be thought at all; He introduced three bits of terminology in order for us to grasp of the self-awareness (p76), that is expressed in the representation â€Å"I think.† These three bits about self-awareness according to Kant are: (1) the pure self-awareness which presupposed by all thought and intuition; (2) the basic self-awareness which is the self-consciousness that produces the representation of the â€Å"I think;†(3) Transcendental which is the unity of self-awareness. Clarifying the Aim of Transcendental Deduction of the Categories of the Analytical Concepts            Kant’s aim of transcendental deduction is to seek to generalize what he has said about self-awareness to all conceptual thinking. The author pointed out that what Kant must have meant is that, â€Å"a property combines with other properties†or that a â€Å"representation of a property combines with the representation.† This according to him, Kant infers about analysis is being possible if there has previously been synthesis. In the discussion of analytic concept, Kant used such terms as I, I think, I can, I couldn’t do it. He said that each of this representation is accompanied with consciousness that when combined with different representation can on finally say â€Å"I can†that means he is now aware of the intended action or he calls it â€Å"self-awareness. In his discussion of synthesis, he said that it is an act of the mind. Here, what he meant is act of mentally combining distinct intentional representations. Important Argumentative Elements             The first argumentative element about transcendental deduction is that, our concept about an object is associated with self awareness. The mind must have representations of that concept to make it pure concept. In my own interpretation, this representation could be experiences that connect representation of concept, since self has one identity. Therefore, all other perception must be belonging to one consciousness or attributing to one identity in which the central grip is the self-employed knowledge. In this sense, we can conclude that the self identifies object based on consciousness and awareness. Usually, the experiences help shape the self’s concept of things. Kant emphasize that there must be a unity of consciousness and self-awareness which underlies the relations of representations to an object, which makes their objective validity and consequently their status as an item of knowledge (p.78). What he meant by this is that the unity of self consciousness and the synthetic unity of self awareness are the bases for all uses of the understanding and it has nothing to do with any sensible intuition. Kant also emphasized that â€Å"understanding must related through more understanding to objects of intuition (p.83). In other words, concepts that are not sensible cannot be transformed to reality and cannot be understood. An act of the understanding results from self-awareness that leads to thinking something that is necessary condition not only for our identity as experiencing minds, but also for anything that is to be an object of sensible intuition (p.83). These forms of thought of thoughts must come to have objective reality. In my idea, Kant is discussing these matters for us to understand how our thoughts are formed and come into reality. The object is self-awareness and self-consciousness of our actions, thoughts, and words. On of the argumentative elements in Kant’s discussion of deduction of pure concepts of understanding that I find is his statement about the multiplicity of intuition which he labeled synthesis. He said that it reminds us that we cannot represent to ourselves anything as combined in the object unless we ourselves have previously combined it. I find this statement somehow contradicting in a sense that synthesis is natural work of the mind which we may not be conscious how it is working. He said synthesis is â€Å"mind self activity†(p.75), and can only be carried out by mind itself. In this case, it appears that we have no control of this activity. If what he meant is that we can be aware of all these intuition pure concept and synthesis. Then, we can guide our thoughts towards right expression of reality. If this is the case, the expression of self-awareness and self-consciousness would have high effect. But since this is a mental act, it can only be carried out by the mind itself which we are not conscious. There I would say that it certainly cannot represent to us anything. Kant presented another interesting discussion of the pure concept and forms of thoughts. He said that â€Å"pure concept of understanding is related through mere understanding to objects of intuition of any kinds as long as it is sensible†(p.103). Here, Kant relates pure concept of understanding with intuition of any kinds as long as it is sensible regardless of the nature of those objects whether they are corrupt or bad character. He pointed out that because of this application; the intuition become a form of thoughts convey us information about determinate object. What quite interesting in this is that, he said that pure concept of understanding is related to intuition which is sensible. The pure concept to intuition is mere forms of thoughts with no determinate object related to intuition which is sensible. Thus, the discussion centers on how our mental faculties are working in so far as to have self-awareness which must be the basis of all these. Kant pointed out that there is in us a certain basic form of a priori sensible intuition that depends on our passive faculty representation. What he meant is that we have intuition of space and time which is also the pure intuition. But this intuition according to Kant is either pure intuition or empirical intuition. The pure intuition is about space and time while empirical those sensations that immediately represent to us as real in space and time. Kant noted that â€Å"thing in space and time are given as perception†(p.82). Conclusion            Kant’s discussion of transcendental deductions was quite very difficult to understand. But in so far as my understanding is concerned, Kant presented a detailed discussion of how our mental faculties are working towards a formation of thoughts about the self from what he calls manifold representation. He said that we have basically a priori knowledge yet it needs to be combined to the manifold representations which he calls this combination as synthesis or synthetic unity. This according to Kant leads to self awareness or self consciousness.            Kant also discussed pure concept of knowledge which according to him is related to understanding objects of intuition. Here he discussed that before a concept becomes a thought it has to be identified with intuition of any kinds as long as it is sensible. In other words, a concept that is identified with sensibility can be concrete and can be grasped.            But what is important in this discussion is the aim of this presentation. Kant was able to clarify to us how our mental faculties are working towards the making of mere thoughts and concepts to become words and pure concepts of knowledge to express consciousness and awareness.            I would say that knowing all these, must help us to be more careful of our self-expression as well as of our attitude in dealing with others. The transcendental deductions has helped us know our selves, therefore it must help us too in expressing our own selves in the everyday events and circumstances of our lives.
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