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HORIZON 12 (1) 2023 : II. Discussions : N. Artemenko: 216-234
ФЕНОМЕНОЛОГИЧЕСКИЕ ИССЛЕДОВАНИЯ • STUDIES IN PHENOMENOLOGY • STUDIEN ZUR PHÄNOMENOLOGIE • ÉTUDES PHÉNOMÉNOLOGIQUES
II. ДИСКУССИИ
https://doi.org/10.21638/2226-5260-2023-12-1-216-234
PRO-CREATIVE FUNCTION OF
PRODUCTIVE IMAGINATION IN KANT'S FIRST CRITIQUE
DISCUSSION REMARK ON THE BOOK OF SAULIUS GENIUSAS
"PHENOMENOLOGY OF PRODUCTIVE IMAGINATION: EMBODIMENT, LANGUAGE, SUBJECTIVITY"
Ibidem-Verlag, Stuttgart, 2021. ISBN-13: 978-3-8382-1552-5* NATALIA ARTEMENKO
PhD in Philosophy, Assistant Professor.
St. Petersburg State University, Institute of Philosophy.
199034 St. Petersburg, Russia.
Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University.
236016 Kaliningrad, Russia.
E-mail: n.a.artemenko@gmail.com
The aim of our "discussion remark" is not to present a critical review on the book written by S. Geni-usas, a brilliant study notable by its extreme painstakingness, historical sensitivity and terminological accuracy, but rather to delve deeply into the origins of phenomenological understanding of productive imagination, i.e., to turn "back to Kant", given in Saulius Geniusas' book (the first chapter) for introductory reason. We proceed from S. Geniusas remark that productive imagination establishes a relation between different abilities, reconciles the antagonism between them and, in this respect, exercises a pro-creative function. We reveal that it is this pro-creative element of productive imagination that brings it closer to time (as indicated by Viktor Molchanov, a prominent Russian phenomenologist, in
* This article was prepared within the framework of the Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University project "Critical Thinking as a Subject of Criticism in the History of Russian and European Thought" under the Priority 2030 program.
© NATALIA ARTEMENKO, 2023
his study of 1988) and serves as the basis for gaining new knowledge. Imagination acts as a limit for reflection, however, it gets revealed only through reflecting, and, thus, it proves to be connected with a fundamental layer of consciousness, which appears both as an object and as a means of describing reflection, i.e., as time. The convergence, or rather, identification, of time with imagination lies in the very fact that both of them exercise an objective function: time — as a possibility for semantic definition of objectivity, imagination — as a basis for a possibility of any knowledge. Moreover, imagination turns out to be a source of a paradox and, ultimately, the only thing that explains self-cognition.
Keywords: productive imagination, Kant, function of time, temporal syntheses, knowledge, subjective deduction, pro-creative function.
ТВОРЧЕСКАЯ ФУНКЦИЯ ПРОДУКТИВНОГО ВООБРАЖЕНИЯ В «КРИТИКЕ ЧИСТОГО РАЗУМА» И. КАНТА
ДИСКУССИОННАЯ РЕПЛИКА НА КНИГУ SAULIUS GENIUSAS
"PHENOMENOLOGY OF PRODUCTIVE IMAGINATION: EMBODIMENT, LANGUAGE, SUBJECTIVITY"
Ibidem-Verlag, Stuttgart, 2021. ISBN-13: 978-3-8382-1552-5* НАТАЛЬЯ АРТБМЕНКО
Кандидат философских наук, доцент.
Санкт-Петербургский государственный университет, Институт философии.
199034 Санкт-Петербург, Россия.
Балтийский федеральный университет им. И. Канта.
236016 Калининград, Россия.
E-mail: n.a.artemenko@gmail.com
Целью нашей «дискуссионной реплики» не является представить критическую рецензию на книгу С. Генюшаса — блестящее исследование, проведенное с чрезвычайной кропотливостью, исторической чуткостью и терминологической точностью, а, скорее, более основательно погрузиться в истоки феноменологического понимания продуктивного воображения, т. е. ввернуться «назад к Канту», который в книге Саулюса Генюшаса (первая глава) представлен в ознакомительных целях. Мы отталкиваемся от замечания С. Генюшаса, что продуктивное воображение устанавливает связь между различными способностями, примиряет антагонизм между ними, и в этом отношении выступает с творческой функцией. Мы показываем, что именно эта творческая составляющая продуктивного воображения сближает его со временем (на что указывал в своем исследовании 1988 г. известный русский феноменолог Виктор Молчанов) и служит основанием для получения нового знания. Воображение выступает пределом рефлексии, однако
Данная статья подготовлена в рамках проекта Балтийского федерального университета им. И. Канта «Критическое мышление как предмет критики в истории русской и европейской мысли» по программе Приоритет-2030.
выявляется только в рефлексии, а потому оказывается связанным с фундаментальным слоем сознания, который предстает одновременно как предметом, так и средством описания рефлексии — временем. Сближение, а точнее — отождествление — времени и воображения состоит в том, что они выполняют предметную функцию: время — как возможность смысловой оформ-ленности предметности, воображение — как основание возможности всякого знания. Кроме того, воображение оказывается источником парадокса и, в конечном итоге, единственным, что объясняет самопознание.
Ключевые слова: продуктивное воображение, Кант, функция времени, темпоральные синтезы, знание, субъективная дедукция, творческая функция.
Over the years of teaching, I often had to deliver courses devoted to enunciating Kant's "Critique of Pure Reason." However, S. Geniusas' book prompted us to systematize our ideas concerning the most complex, according to our reckoning, subject broached by Kant, the one that refers to the problem of productive imagination. S. Geniusas notes in his book that his research is focused on considering the problem of productive imagination from a phenomenological point of view,
with the aim of showing how this figure of imagination has been conceptualized in the phenomenological tradition. One can only be surprised that, to this day, there are no book-length studies that have exclusively focused on the phenomenological analyses of productive imagination. The fundamental goal of this study is to show why such an investigation is needed and why, in its absence, our understanding of the phenomenology of imagination remains severely limited. My goal is to show that such an investigation can in significant ways enrich our understanding of subjectivity. (Geniusas, 2021, 16)
It was the given observation that actually prompted us to this "discussion remark," aimed not at presenting a critical review the book written by S. Geniusas, a brilliant study notable by its extreme painstakingness, historical sensitivity and terminological accuracy, the very study that we all actually lacked, but rather at delving deeply into the origins of phenomenological understanding of productive imagination, i.e., turning "back to Kant," given in S. Geniusas' book (the first chapter) for introductory reason, as the author says himself:
I should stress that this chapter is meant to serve introductory goals. In other words, the reason why I address Kantian and post-Kantian conceptions of productive imagination is for the sake of clarifying the historical precursors of phenomenology. The purpose of this introductory chapter is to demonstrate that phenomenological analyses of productive imagination do not emerge in a historical vacuum. Such phenomenological analysis has, instead, grown out of a long history of philosophical struggle and proposed solutions, and should, therefore, be understood from within this historical framework. (Geniusas, 2021, 26)
We will also set to work and try to expand in more detail the following remark made by S. Geniusas stating that,
Productive imagination establishes harmony between different faculties by means of generating both schemas (in the first Critique) and symbols (in the third Critique), which predelineate the look of things and make experience of them possible. In this regard, the function of productive imagination is fundamentally pro-creative. In contrast to reproductive imagination, which either replicates or reshapes images out of pre-existent materials, productive imagination reconciles the antagonism between different faculties by rendering the intuitive manifold fit for experience. Still, even though productive imagination does not rely on anything empirical, for Kant, productive imagination is not original in that it relies on understanding and sensibility and serves the function of reconciling the tension between them. (Geniusas, 2021, 30, emphasis mine. — N. A.)
As we will make it clear, it is the very pro-creative component of productive imagination that brings it closer to time.
1. THE GAP BETWEEN THE MANIFESTED (GIVEN) AND THE THINKABLE (NECESSARY) ONES AND ITS OVERCOMING
Kant starts his work on the side of consciousness. Yet, before we embark upon observing the activity of consciousness, before we construct the structure of consciousness and indicate the fundamental principle, let us pose the following question: what exactly is consciousness? Consciousness is that which knows that which already exists, is given. The reliability of my own thinking acts as the basis for reliability of such knowledge: acknowledgement that I am thinking and, along with it, I am thinking something. Thus, within myself I possess the basis for the manifestation (givenness), the connectedness of that which is given. In other words, consciousness acts as a connecting mechanism. It explains "unlocking" of the very consciousness, for where is the possibility that reliability of my own thinking acted as the basis for connecting that which was manifested; moreover, as long as I am dealing with that which is already-given, already-manifested, i.e., with something which is already-connected in my consciousness, I must distinguish between perceiving and thinking in order to explain the occurrence of a manifestation. Yet, the problem lies in a fact that perceiving and thinking are inseparable in actual experience. That which is perceived was somehow already-thought: to acknowledge the givenness is to know about the given one. For thinking is thinking about that which was somehow perceived, experience of thinking beyond and before any perceiving cannot be given, though it may be potential. In other words, Kant takes sensibility and understanding as given, and a gap of the very consciousness brings up a question of a common
root that might exist. The explication of subjective deduction based on interpenetrating of three syntheses, on the one hand, and the doctrine of schematism, on the other, are aimed at overcoming this gap.
Yet, in order to pose the question of the possibility of interconnecting sensibility and understanding, there must be something within consciousness which we could generally conclude about perceiving and thinking from. It means that consciousness must be somehow objectified, but since, as a self-closed sphere, consciousness can conclude only from itself and to itself (notably, about its own applicability), a mechanism of objectification must be located within the very consciousness, either on the side of perceiving (yet, in order for the perceived one to be perceived, it must be somehow already-thought, that is to say, the question of what I perceive turns into the question of how to think perceiving as perceiving), or on the side of thinking. Thus, it is thinking itself that turns out to be objectifying, and reflection is an objectifying mechanism.
* * *
The first edition of Critique gives the explication of subjective deduction that turns out to be a real observation over real work of consciousness. Considering the tripartite synthesis, denoting three subjective sources of knowledge, making possible understanding itself and whole experience through it, allows us to build a rigorous methodological construction that demonstrates a form of possible experience. Yet, reflection, aimed at activity of consciousness on keeping its own gap, both given (perceiving and thinking) and postulated (sensibility and understanding), destroys the imaginary discreteness of these syntheses, convenient for building up and describing a form of experience, yet not corresponding to a real situation. And as for a real situation, it deals with the interpenetration of these three syntheses on the grounds of the fourth one, which necessarily underlies each of them as well as lies at the basis of their interconnection, i.e., the productive synthesis of imagination.
Any knowledge (experience) is initially produced by synthesis. "Synthesis in general is <...> the mere effect of the imagination, of a blind though indispensable function of the soul, without which we would have no cognition at all, but of which we are seldom even conscious" (Kant, 1998, B 103). In other words, the synthesis of sensibility and understanding can be achieved only trough activity, moreover, through arbitrary, "blind," subjective activity of a productive imagination.
Yet, let us start by considering a correlation of three syntheses. The synthesis of apprehension in the intuition (Kant, 1998, A 99) is the synthesis of the apprehension of
the manifoldness in the intuition. Moreover, Kant reveals the synthesis of apprehension as the unity of a succesion: the intuition is made possible by the difference in time of impressions succeeding one another. Thus, the manifoldness is viewed as a succession of impressions. Therefore, a succession, as one of the distinctions of time, is the last reference for explaining the possibility of intuition. However, the second necessary side of the synthesis of apprehension is to bring the manifoldness together, that is, as that which is contained within a single representation. In regard to time, it means apprehending the moments of a succession as those which exist simultaneously.
Yet, in order for cognition to be achieved, it is not enough to apprehend the manifoldness in perception; it is also necessary to be able to reproduce it. Through activity of imagination, the manifoldness stays apprehended and therefore can be reproduced. The synthesis of reproduction in the imagination is also considered by Kant as apprehension of an accompaniment and a succession in imagination, that is to say, without the immediate presence of an object.
It is, to be sure, a merely empirical law in accordance with which representations that have often followed or accompanied one another are finally associated with each other and thereby placed in a connection in accordance with which, even without the presence of the object, one of these representations brings about a transition of the mind to the other in accordance with a constant rule. This law of reproduction, however, presupposes that the appearances themselves are actually subject to such a rule, and that in the manifold of their representations an accompaniment or succession takes place according to certain rules. (Kant, 1998, A 100, emphasis mine. — N. A.).
Thus, the description of the synthesis of imagination is introduced by Kant in a temporal language: the association of representations becomes possible due to the frequency (temporal characteristic) of their appearance in consciousness. An accompaniment and a succession here characterize not the unity of impressions of intuition, but the possibility of reproducing a certain order of succeeding of the very same representations. Thus, perception "assembles" a representation from impressions, while memory "assembles" an association from representations. Since Kant refers to the possibility of experience, the initial point of experience is the synthesis of apprehension in the intuition, which, according to Kant, "constitutes the transcendental ground of the possibility of all cognition in general (not only of empirical cognition, but also of pure a priori cognition)" (Kant, 1998, A 102). However, experience necessarily presupposes the reproducibility of phenomena, therefore, "the synthesis of apprehension is ... inseparably combined with the synthesis of reproduction" (Kant, 1998, A 102).
Before we proceed to the description of the third synthesis, (the synthesis of recognition in the concept), let us note that Kant speaks of syntheses of apprehension in
the intuition and reproduction in imagination in the language of time. In other words, time here is "a means of describing syntheses and, therefore, a means of measuring the depth of consciousness" (Molchanov, 1988, 17), since, "the deduction of the categories <.> necessitates such deep penetration into the primary grounds of the possibility of our cognition in general" (Kant, 1998, A 98).
Yet, executing a procedure of temporal description of the syntheses of consciousness, Kant considers time to be the fundamental layer of the "object" under description, i.e., consciousness. It is confirmed by the following quote:
Wherever our representations may arise, whether through the influence of external things or as the effect of inner causes, whether they have originated a priori or empirically as appearances — as modifications of the mind they nevertheless belong to inner sense, and as such all of our cognitions are in the end subjected to the formal condition of inner sense, namely time, as that in which they must all be ordered, connected, and brought into relations. (Kant, 1998, A 98-99)
And further, "This is a general remark on which one must ground everything that follows" (Kant, 1998, A 99).
The description of any property of consciousness (the description comes from the very consciousness itself) involves its implementation, and only its essential characteristics can act as means of describing consciousness.
The synthesis of recognition in the concept is distinguished by Kant as one of three syntheses, although the syntheses do not belong to the same level. The syntheses of perception and imagination do not reveal the principle of relation of consciousness to an object. Kant exposes this relation in the following way:
.it is necessary to make understood what is meant by the expression "an object of representations." <...> What does one mean, then, if one speaks of an object corresponding to and therefore also distinct from the cognition? It is easy to see that this object must be thought of only as something in general=X, since outside of our cognition we have nothing that we could set over against this cognition as corresponding to it. (Kant, 1998, A 104)
On the other hand, this X is something not letting our knowledge be arbitrary, and therein lies the moment of necessity in relation of cognition to an object, "since insofar as they are to relate to an object our cognitions must also necessarily agree with each other in relation to it, i.e., they must have that unity that constitutes the concept of an object" (Kant, 1998, A 104-105). Yet, since we have only the manifold of our representations at our disposal, and the very X, which must correspond to them and at the same time differ from all our representations, means nothing for us, Kant comes
concludes that, "the unity that the object makes necessary can be nothing other than the formal unity of the consciousness in the synthesis of the manifold of the representations" (Kant, 1998, A 105).
The manifold is already connected in intuition, and the synthesis of recognition in the concept brings the unity of the rule into this connection. However, herein Kant emphasizes that the synthesis of recognition is indissolubly related to the synthesis of reproduction:
All cognition requires a concept, however imperfect or obscure it may be; but as far as its form is concerned the latter is always something general, and something that serves as a rule. <...>. However, it can be a rule of intuitions only if it represents the necessary reproduction of the manifold of given intuitions, hence the synthetic unity in the consciousness of them. (Kant, 1998, A 106)
It's worth noting that Kant starts his considering of the synthesis of recognition in the concept, describing the synthesis of reproduction, "Without consciousness that that which we think is the very same as what we thought a moment before, all reproduction in the series of representations would be in vain" (Kant, 1998, A 103). Thus, Kant considers the synthesis of recognition as a necessary condition for the synthesis of reproduction, which is indissolubly connected to the synthesis of apprehension and, in its turn, acts a necessary condition for the latter being possible.
The synthesis of recognition in the concept, or transcendental apperception, is an objective verification of the manifoldness: the manifoldness gets recognized as the one existing according to rules, i.e., the lawful one, "... transcendental unity of apperception, however, makes out of all possible appearances that can ever come together in our experience a connection of all these representations in accordance with laws" (Kant, 1998, A 108).
However, consciousness verifies its unity in apprehending and reproducing the manifoldness, in other words, it recognizes itself as identical in every specific relation to objectivity. Here consciousness reaches the conceptual level, for a certain relation of consciousness to objectivity is nothing else than categories:
.the original and necessary consciousness of the identity of oneself is at the same time a consciousness of an equally necessary unity of the synthesis of all appearances in accordance with concepts, i.e., in accordance with rules that not only make them necessarily reproducible, but also thereby determine an object for their intuition, i.e., the concept of something in which they are necessarily connected. (Kant, 1998, A 108)
Thus, as it was noted by Viktor Molchanov "synthesis of recognition in the concept is not one of the syntheses along with perception and imagination, it participates
in the construction of each of them and gives them an objective character. Thanks to the synthesis of recognition in the concept, perception and imagination acquire the status of cognition" (Molchanov, 1988, 19).
In other words, the description given to the interpenetration of three syntheses resulted from Kant's real reflection on the real activity of consciousness. Since all our representations are getting ordered through the form of inner sense, that is to say, time, reflection is aimed at describing the structural potentialities of this ordering.
Kant primarily considers subjective sources of cognition (senses, imagination, apperception) in an empirical aspect, describing syntheses — here reflection is aimed at certain methods of empirical actions of cognition, in other words, Kant does not describe any specific perception, but a description of temporal characteristics of perception and reproduction is the result of reflection on certain single perceptions (and reproductions). Kant then makes "transcendental presupposition" about existence of corresponding a priori syntheses. Describing syntheses, reflection encounters a layer of consciousness that fully corresponds to the method of description. A succession and an accompaniment are the primary temporal relations; a succession cannot be described otherwise than as a succession, and an accompaniment otherwise than as an accompaniment. These are the primary structures of consciousness, which turn out to be both objects and means of description. Yet, the real activity of consciousness involves the unity of a succession and an accompaniment in perception and reproduction as the actions of consciousness that are indecomposable in analysis. It is this difficulty that forces us to consider syntheses in their interconnection, which proves that distinguishing the functions of sensibility and understanding in cognition is aimed at overcoming their apartness. Time acts as a concrete unity of sensible intuitions and concepts of understanding. However, it does not mean that the third synthesis — of recognition in the concept — is temporal. Transcendental apperception participates in intuiting, imparting unity to a succession of impressions, and in reproducing, imparting to the reproduced representations not only the sameness, but also the natural character to a succession of representations. Thus, if time is ordering of representations, then apperception is a necessary element of such ordering. In other words, as it was noted by V. Molchanov, "'I' is neither a temporal nor extratemporal structure, yet 'I' is a necessary condition for the temporality of consciousness" (Molchanov, 1988, 22).
In describing of the temporal characteristics of consciousness, reflection encounters its own limit, productive imagination, which does not depend on reflection, yet it reveals its fundamental properties only in reflection. Considering of correlation of three syntheses turns out to be insufficient for explaining the common root of sensibility and understanding. Interpenetrating of the main syntheses of consciousness
on the basis of primary temporal structures indicates only the interdependence of sensibility and understanding (perceiving and thinking), but says nothing about their basis. Moreover, the third synthesis — the transcendental apperception — certifies the objectivity and lawfulness of representations as a logical form of any cognition. As a result, we are given a description of purely intellectual cognition:
Actual experience, which consists in the apprehension, the association (the reproduction), and finally the recognition of the appearances, contains in the last and highest <...> concepts that make possible the formal unity of experience <...>. These grounds of the recognition of the manifold, so far as they concern merely the form of an experience in general, are now those categories. (Kant, 1998, A 125)
In other words, the transcendental apperception is necessary but it is not sufficient for explaining, for instance, the emergence of new knowledge or self-knowledge.
We keep in mind that an object, as Kant defines it, is nothing more than something (=X), a concept of which expresses necessity of synthesis.
Synthesis in general is <.> the mere effect of the imagination, of a blind though indispensable function of the soul, without which we would have no cognition at all, but of which we are seldom even conscious. Yet to bring this synthesis to concepts is a function that pertains to the understanding. (Kant, 1998, B 103)
The above quote makes it clear that Kant distinguishes between the power (faculty) of imagination and the function of understanding, which takes the name of apperception in describing the syntheses of consciousness. Apperception gives the principle of the synthesizing unity of the manifoldness in all potential intuitions:
We are conscious a priori of the thoroughgoing identity of ourselves with regard to all representations that can ever belong to our cognition, as a necessary condition of the possibility of all representations <...>. This principle holds a priori, and can be called the transcendental principle of the unity of all the manifold of our representations <...>. Now the unity of the manifold in a subject is synthetic; pure apperception therefore yields a principle of the synthetic unity of the manifold in all possible intuition. (Kant, 1998, A 117)
But the synthesizing unity presupposes the synthesis or implies it. Therefore, as written by Kant, "the principle of the necessary unity of the pure (productive) synthesis of the imagination prior to apperception is thus the ground of the possibility of all cognition, especially that of experience" (Kant, 1998, A 118).
Thus, the faculty of imagination is regarded as the basis of the unity of apperception. It must be emphasized that "productive" imagination does not "produce" anything in the true sense of the word. Its function involves only the arbitrary activity
of synthesis. In other words, the faculty of imagination is generally the ability of a priori synthesis, which solely empowers the elevation of a random empirical complex to the rank of an objective object to occurs.
We therefore have a pure imagination, as a fundamental faculty of the human soul, that grounds all cognition a priori. By its means we bring into combination the manifold of intuition on the one side and the condition of the necessary unity of apperception on the other. Both extremes, namely sensibility and understanding, must necessarily be connected by means of this transcendental function of the imagination. (Kant, 1998, A 124)
Thus, Kant considers interconnection of sensibility and understanding as temporal syntheses (with time as an intermediary of sensibility and understanding), and reveals the fourth synthesis that necessarily underlies both each of them and their correlation (the "common root" of sensibility and understanding). However, what do we know about this "common root"? Imagination turns out to be indefinite in its status, concealed: it is possible to detect imagination, but it is impossible to cognize it — imagination is self-reliant and therefore establishes a gap between reflection and thinking, acting as a boundary. There is nothing more that can be said about the imagination: it is that which gives the objective basis of knowledge, it is impossible to think, it is purely spontaneous, and in this sense the "common root" is just as known as it is unknown. Further, imagination can be attributed neither to a priori nor to a posteriori one: both are substantiated by it — in the first case, imagination appears under the name of the productive faculty of imagination and allows knowledge to be objectively based; in the second case, as the reproductive one, imagination makes it possible not so much to reproduce experience retrospectively as it makes possible (that is, provides the basis for) its further implementing.
Moreover, imagination turns out to be a source of paradox. Kant formulates this paradox as follows:
But how the I that I think is to differ from the I that intuits itself <.> and yet be identical with the latter as the same subject, how therefore I can say that I as intelligence and thinking subject cognize my self as an object that is thought, insofar as I am also given to myself in intuition, only, like other phenomena, not as I am for understanding but rather as I appear to myself, this is no more and no less difficult than how I can be an object for myself in general and indeed one of intuition and inner perceptions. (Kant, 1998, B 155)
Imagination cannot be reduced solely to the basis of cognition as such, being the basis of consciousness itself in its representation through thinking. The basis established outwardly is not the basis which one can derive or see the self-determinate-
ness from. In order for de-term-inateness to become possible, we must pose a question of the status of the limiting term itself. Imagination turns out to be independent of reflection, although it gets revealed solely through it — it represents a boundary, it is beyond experience and yet in it, the term limiting reflection, from which it becomes possible to distinguish the content of consciousness as self-reproducing ('I') and reproducing (content of experience). Since imagination is unaware of any doubt (the mechanism of spontaneity is not dissectible, not analyzable), it is true, and makes 'I' (the Self) the direct true givenness of thinking in the form of the self-representation. The question is, what exactly is our self- representation? It is impossible to come to conclusion from thinking to existence. Yet, it is absolutely impossible for 'I' (the Self) to be given to himself only as thinking (consciousness) or only as perception (corporality). By virtue of the unity of consciousness, everything that gets perceived is accompanied by "I think." However, before any corporeality, by virtue of the present faculty of imagination, I imagine myself, since I exist, but I'm not yet present in a possible experience. In this sense, imagination turns out to be truly the only thing explaining self-cognition.
Kant notes that, ".we intuit ourselves only as we are internally affected, which seems to be contradictory, since we would have to relate to ourselves passively" (Kant, 1998, B 153).
If in the case of the outer senses we admit that objects are getting cognized through them just insofar as we are influenced externally, then in the case of the inner sense we must also admit that we intuit ourselves through it only insofar as we influence ourselves internally (it is also impossible to cognize the external world without self-consciousness, it is generally impossible to intuit something as that which is opposed to me — in this sense, according to Kant, time represents a pure image of all objects of senses in general). Thus, the inner sense affects itself. Indeed, 'I' (the Self) (as an object of possible experience) for himself is just a phenomenon, but sensibility applied to itself is just a form of sensibility which, as Kant shows, is intuited. There is no contradiction here: the intuited form shapes representation of itself qua of a form, which then gets filled with the manifold of intuitions, which, in turn, are given exactly because they are accompanied by the concept of "I think" qua account of the given-ness. Transcendental apperception, considered beyond synthesis with the manifold of sensibility, completely blank, the non-objective 'I' ('Self'), pure zero. Thus, 'I' ('Self') that only thinks, and to that extent is equal to zero, must be connected with the sensible 'I' ('Self'), that is only thinkable, and therefore is not conscious of himself.
In other words, what is this intuited form? What and how gets synthesized in this intuition? "Under the designation of a transcendental synthesis of the imagination,
it [understanding] therefore exercises that action on the passive subject, whose faculty it is, about which we rightly say that the inner sense is thereby affected" (Kant, 1998, B 153-154).
The unity of consciousness, as the need for forms of intuition and the representation of "I think" is achieved through imagination, which is a blind function of the soul, synthesizing intuition of the form and 'I' (the Self) into the direct givenness of thinking in the form of the self- representation. If time (inner sense) is a means and, at the same time, the subject of reflection (consciousness appears to be temporally organized in reflection), then imagination, as the term limiting reflection, the boundary, is the only thing that explains the existence of self-consciousness. Thus, the paradox lies in the fact that time converges with the ability of imagination, "which not so much reinforces, as destroys an initially accepted schema of dividing cognitive ability into sensibility and understanding. Taking this division as the starting point for considering cognition, Kant shows then that they, as such, are not present in cognition' (Molchanov, 1988, 26).
2. TIME AND IMAGINATION AS THE BASIS FOR EMERGENCE OF NEW KNOWLEDGE
In the doctrine of schematism, Kant considers categorical cognition as a system of temporal syntheses. In this sense, it stays in principal line of Kant's thought, contained in subjective deduction.
Kant unveils functioning of categories in cognition as temporal schemas.
A transcendental temporal definition is a schema. By virtue of schemas our consciousness creates an object, something that has its image, some empirical sensual manifold, interconnected into a certain visible unity. However, a schema as such is not an image, but a method, an ability to construct an object. It is that very succession of certain moves, following which allows consciousness to receive an object as a result of an action.
Kant distinguishes between concepts (and between corresponding schemas) that construct certain objects and the concepts that are necessary for constructing any objects, that is, the concepts that are principles of construction in general. The first ones are empirical concepts (concepts-representations), the second ones are categories. The point is that beyond the limiting condition of sensibility, that is, beyond schemas, categories are left solely with logical the meaning exceptionally of the unity of representations, which, however, have no object and, therefore, no meaning that could provide a concept of an object (Kant, 1998, B 147).
Thus, in cognition, categories are nothing but schemas, and schemas are none other than "including" of categories into cognition.
A concept is insufficient for constructing an object, since a concept contains only the principle of the unity of actions that construct an object, but not the actions themselves, supposed by a schema. Consequently, the schema is the reality of the concept.
Now it is clear that there must be a third thing, which must stand in homogeneity with the category on the one hand and the appearance on the other, and makes possible the application of the former to the latter. This mediating representation must be pure <...>, and yet intellectual on the one hand and sensible on the other. Such a representation is the transcendental schema. (Kant, 1998, B 177).
And further,
... a transcendental time-determination is homogeneous with the category <...>, insofar as it is universal and rests on a rule a priori. But it is on the other hand homogeneous with the appearance insofar as time is contained in every empirical representation of the manifold. Hence an application of the category to appearance becomes possible be means of the transcendental time-determination which, as the schema of the concept of the understanding, mediates the subsumption of the latter under the former. (Kant, 1998, B 177-178)
Time acts as a concrete universality, with both the manifoldness (outness) and unity (innerness) as the determinateness moments of its. Thereby, it represents activity both in relation to empirical material and in relation to the forms of understanding. The activity that relieves both the one-sidedness of the manifoldness of the empirical content and the one-sidedness of the unity of the forms of understanding. Thus, time is reduced to the simplest action of interpenetrating of the united and the manifold ones. However, this very action brings to life determinations of forms of understanding which, in their own right, are inert.
As long as time puts concepts in its use, it itself also unfolds in the certain manifold, which Kant refers to as to the schematics of time.
Thus, a schema of a category is functioning of a category in the course of cognition. Kant demonstrates it in the following way, "The schema of actuality is existence at a determinate time" (Kant, 1998, B 184).
It implies that we refer to apprehending of the fact that an object exists at a determinate time, as to the actuality of this object. Likewise, we refer to apprehending of the fact that an object exists at all times as to necessity of an object; or to apprehending of the fact that there is a succession of the manifoldness subject to the rule as to
causality. Kant describes functioning of each category (description of schemas) in the same way as he describes three syntheses: the spontaneous activity of understanding gets revealed through temporal determinations.
However, and herein we must agree with V. Molchanov, "all Kant's schemas represent movements in a circle," which is most clearly shown through the schema of modality: its categories contain and make time itself representable as a correlate of the determination of an object, namely, whether object is temporal (whether it belongs to time) and how object gets "subsumed" under time (at some time—possibility, at determinate time—actuality, at all times—necessity)."The circle lies in the fact that 'time itself' contains variations (some, determinate, all), which represent modal characteristics of an object, and vice versa, distinguishing of these temporal variations already implies such characteristics of an object as possibility, actuality, necessity" (Molchanov, 1988, 32). According to Kant, it proves that categories in cognition have no other content than certain temporal relations, "The schemata are therefore nothing but a priori time-determinations in accordance with rules, and these concern, according to the order of the categories, the time-series, the content of time, the order of time, and finally the sum total of time in regard to all possible objects" (Kant, 1998, B 184-185).
Time invariably acts as a fundamental layer of consciousness both in the doctrine of schematism and in subjective deduction, for the unity of fundamental temporal characteristics—a succession and an accompaniment—is invariable. However, in schematism Kant not only gives temporal characteristics of each category, but he also reveals one more function of time: providing categories with meaning, ".. .the schemata of the concepts of pure understanding are the true and sole conditions for providing them a relation to objects, thus with significance <...>" (Kant, 1998, B 185). The abovesaid requires some explanation.
Time, as transcendental schemata, is a condition for assuming and understanding of the synthesis of the unity (the concept of understanding) and the manifoldness (the material of sensibility). It seems fair to say that time in general is the source of every synthesis. Every synthesis of concepts turns out to be meaningful only in relation to intuition, that is to say, in relation to time as the form of intuition closest to understanding. Let us recall that an indicating the faculty to pass judgments as the initial characteristic of the understanding is the starting point of transcendental logic. The ultimate task is to answer the question of how synthetic a priori judgments are possible. In order to do so, Kant makes "a dissection of the very faculty of understanding," in the course of which it turns out that it is not understanding that passes synthetic a priori judgments, they become possible through the unity of sensibility and understanding—time. It is time that represents the mediating link of all synthe-
tic judgments, it is time, as a form of inner sense, that allows us ".to go beyond the given concept in order to consider something entirely different from what it thought in it as in a relation to it" (Kant, 1998, B 193-194). Thus, time as meaning is the basis for possibility of obtaining new knowledge through categories. It means that time as a form of inner sense is the primary ordering of impressions as potential meanings; time as the transcendental schema, that is, the basis of the application of the categories to empirical intuitions, is a determined realization of meanings.
Here we must note that in the cause of considering the problem of the emergence of new knowledge time converges with imagination, ".the schema of sensible concepts <...> is a product and as it were a monogram of pure a priori imagination" (Kant, 1998, B 181).
As products of pure imagination, schemas are temporal determinations and, thus, carriers of meaning. Meaning of concepts is identified with their relation to objects, that is, meanings are associated with the empirical application of categories. Yet, it is precisely the empirical application of the categories that time acts as the basis in, insofar as it gives them meaning, but, on the other hand, it is productive imagination that acts as the basis for the empirical application. Convergence, or rather to say, identification, of time and imagination lies in the fact that they exercise an objective function: time as the possibility of the semantic formalization of objectivity, imagination as the basis of the possibility of any knowledge (however, knowledge is possible only as something that is significant for thinking, and thinking can give an account solely about such knowledge)1.
Understanding, in itself, turns out to be empty, it is filled with content by thinking and the faculty of imagination, the conditions of synthesis which solely it can
1 See S. Geniusas, ".the schematism of the pure concepts of understanding constitutes another framework, within which Kant addresses productive imagination (see Kant 2007, A137 / B176-A147 / B187). The problem Kant confronts here is that of explaining how intuitions are to be subsumed under the categories of the understanding and thus how categories are to be applied to appearances. In this framework, Kant draws a distinction between the empirical faculty of productive imagination and the pure a priori imagination. While the former produces images, the latter produces schemas of sensible concepts. In contrast to images, which are always concrete [...], schemas are general [...]. Schemas are of two different kinds: there are schemas of sensible concepts (for example, the schema of a dog) and there are schemas of pure concepts of understanding (for example, the schema of substance or the schema of a cause). According to Kant, images cannot correspond to the schemas of pure concepts of understanding. Such schemas are to be conceived as determinations of the inner sense in general (time). Kant identifies productive imagination as the power that enables consciousness to subsume intuitions under the concepts of understanding. In the absence of such subsumption, no experience would be possible. In light of this, one could qualify productive imagination as the power that shapes the field of phenomenality" (Geniusas, 2021, 28-29).
work under, as well as sensibility and reproductive imagination, that which is getting synthesized. As a result, we can speak of experience which has only a framework of the thing but not the thing itself (the thing in itself) represented in it. However, imagination, being at the basis of movement from thinking to perceiving as well as being the basis of consciousness itself in its representation through thinking, is the basis not only of cognition as such, but also the basis of the initial gap between the thing in itself and the phenomenon (between the appearance and the thinkable one). As a result of imagination being noticeable, the need to break through to the thing in itself, at least through the representation of the certain consciousness about it, arises. In this sense, imagination really acts as the limiting term of reflection, however, it is revealed only in reflection, and therefore it turns out to be connected with a fundamental layer of consciousness, which appears both as an object and as a means of describing reflection, i.e., as time2.
3. CONCLUSION
Thus, Kant starts his work on the side of consciousness, taking sensibility and understanding as a the givenness in order to explain occurrence of a phenomenon and, through the connectedness of phenomena, move on to thinking itself (to the givenness of consciousness, unlimited by experience), and then from pure thinking of reason (pure reason is actually practical) to conclude to the things in themselves, that is, to show the legitimacy and direction of thinking about them. In a word, the Kantian movement is the movement of the gradual removing of boundaries of consciousness created by consciousness itself, that is, the movement proceeding from perceiving to thinking. The question of what I actually perceive turns into the question of how to think perceiving as perciving, and then into the question of what is getting thought when perceiving is getting thought. Such self-closedness of consciousness makes a reverse move, from thinking to perceiving, possible. Pure reason as the highest cognitive faculty (which is limited by nothing, thus, it is only thinkable, but not cognizable),
"What, then, is productive imagination as conceptualized from the framework of Kant's philosophy? First and foremost, it has an intermediary status and is meant to perform a reconciliatory function. In the first Critique, its central function is to harmonize two seemingly irreconcilable spheres—those of understanding and sensibility, which one could qualify as proto-structures of experience. In the third Critique, it once again performs a reconciliatory function, this time establishing harmony between reason and sensibility. In the first Critique, productive imagination realizes the reconciliatory function by means of schematization; in the third Critique, productive imagination realizes the reconciliatory function, in contrast, by means of symbolization (see Zoller 2018)." Such summary is given by S. Geniusas in his chapter on Kant (Geniusas, 2021, 29-30).
2
unfolds its own content, and this unfolding results in revealing of all other levels of consciousness. If reflection is the mechanism of objectification of consciousness, then the reason concentrates within all the functions and levels of reflection, creates "the unity of the rules of understanding according to principles" and thereby constitutes "its own fair demands."
Reflection preeminently reveals its object (the certain consciousness), but at the same time, reflection itself can be revealed only by consciousness (in view of its clos-edness). Time as the most fundamental layer of the very consciousness, appears to be the only means of describing consciousness, that is, the description of consciousness forms and actualizes that which was intended to be described. Thus, in description of the "properties" of consciousness (which involves their implementation), reflection encounters its own limit and thereby reveals the characteristics of consciousness that are independent of the schemas which are already adopted in relation to consciousness. Such distinctiveness between thinking and reflection leads to dividing causality and the entire content of consciousness, in general, into two realms: the realm of nature and the realm of freedom. The self-sufficiency of thinking provides freedom, but its application to the possible one allows us to speak of nature. And since thinking provides only a schema, a form of possible experience, reflection works therein, possible experience represents a natural boundary of reason: one can always find arguments both in favor of free causality and against it. Yet, it is impossible to conclude to existence from thinking, therefore neither the presence nor the absence of free causality can pe proved, but there is no contradiction as well. Consciousness is self-identical and it does not contradict itself. In this sense, reflection and thinking, possibility and necessity do not contradict each other. Speculative reason shows us this consistency, but, at the same time, it reveals the absence of a fulcrum in pure speculation.
Understanding in itself turns out to be empty, it gets filled with content by thinking and the faculty of imagination, the conditions of synthesis which solely it can work under, as well as sensibility and reproductive imagination, that which is getting synthesized. As a result, we can speak of experience which has only a framework of the thing but not the thing itself (the thing in itself) represented in it. However, imagination, being at the basis of movement from thinking to perceiving as well as being the basis of consciousness itself in its representation through thinking, is the basis not only of cognition as such, but also the basis of the initial gap between the thing in itself and the phenomenon (between the appearance and the thinkable one). As a result of imagination being noticeable, the need to break through to the thing in itself, at least through the representation of the certain consciousness about it, arises. In this sense, imagination really acts as the limiting term of reflection, however, it is revealed only
in reflection, and therefore it turns out to be connected with a fundamental layer of consciousness, which appears both as an object and as a means of describing reflection, i.e., as time.
Each of the structures of cognitive ability has a "temporal background," and describing of the main functions of consciousness turns out to be describing of the functions of time, which, in turn, are the main means for achieving the goals of transcendental philosophy: to show the objectivity of concepts independent of experience and to show essential possibilities for the producing new knowledge.
REFERENCES
Geniusas, S. (2021). Phenomenology of Productive Imagination: Embodiment, Language, Subjectivity. Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag.
Kant, I. (1998). Critique of Pure Reason (P. Guyer & A. W. Wood, Trans., Eds.). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Molchanov, V. (1988). Time and Consciousness. The Critique of Phenomenological Philosophy. Moscow: Vysshaja shkola Publ. (In Russian)
