The Difference Between Original, Metaphysical and Geometrical Representations of Space

Abstract

Tolley argues, first, for a sharper distinction between three kinds of representation of the space of outer appearances: (i) the original intuition of space, (ii) the metaphysical representation of this space via the a priori concept “expounded” in the Transcendental Aesthetic, and (iii) the representation of this space in geometry, via the construction of concepts of spaces in intuition. He then shows how more careful attention to this threefold distinction allows for a conservative, consistently nonconceptualist and non-intellectualist interpretation of the handful of suggestive remarks Kant makes in the Transcendental Deduction about the dependence of various representations of space on the understanding—against recent interpretations which argue that the Deduction’s remarks require that Kant revise the impression given in the Aesthetic (and elsewhere) that intuition in general, and the original intuition of space in particular, enjoys a priority to, and independence from, all acts and representations of the understanding.