Space and Time as a Priori Forms of Human Intuition in Kant’s Epistemology

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This work offers a concise exposition and critical appraisal of Kant's notion of space and time as a priori forms of human sensibility or intuition. He dwells on these issues in his Critique of Pure Reason, under the Transcendental Aesthetics section. Owing to the fact that Kant published two editions of the Critique of Pure Reason, both editions are being referenced. Letters A and B are used to denote the first and second edition respectively. Kant identifies the a priori forms of sensibility: space and time, which the mind contributes, to make experience possible. The reason is that an event cannot be experienced at all, unless it is recognized as being in ‘space’ and occurring in ‘time.’ Thus, the possibility of human experience is anchored on the spatiotemporal framework of empirical reality, which embraces both the experiences and their objects. Kant's most original contribution to philosophy is his "Copernican Revolution," in which he argues that it is the ‘representation’ that makes the object possible, and not the ‘object’ that makes the representation possible. With this he presents the human mind as an active originator of experience rather than just a passive recipient of perception. His opinion was that the rational structure of the mind reflected the rational structure of the world, even of ‘things-in-themselves.’ In other words, the operating system of the processor, by modern analogy, matched the operating system of reality. It follows from the way in which appearances are given to us that those things given in space and time must be unified in accordance with the categories, and since the ‘objects of experience’ are given to us in space and time, it follows that they must be unified in accordance with the categories. All representations are subject to the transcendental unity of apperception. Space and time, as forms of human sensible intuition, structure the manifold of appearance, since such a manifold can only occur in accordance with this form. But, space and time are represented by us not only as forms of sensible intuition, but also as intuitions themselves, and therefore as possessing a unity of the manifold of empirical intuition within them. This unity precedes all concepts, and it presupposes a synthesis which does not belong to the senses but through which all concepts of space and time first become possible. So the unity of space and time is explained in terms of the synthetic activity of the understanding. Space and time stand under the synthetic unity of apperception, and in so far as they are represented as unities they are themselves the product of the effect the understanding has upon sensibility, and are thus subject to the categories of human understanding.