Ryder Holmes Wilson Mattey 2/3/12 Apodeitic Autopoeisis: Categories & Cognitions of Math, Science, and Metaphysics Whence

does knowledge arise: solely from experience, or from the mind itself? Kant would say we have innate, a priori concepts, that our minds are naturally disposed to (45 Cr). But then how do these concepts apply to our intuitions presentations of specific objects when all intuitions are sensuous presentations, and the a priori concepts are merely within the understanding? In order to evaluate these questions, we must understand two different types of judgments of knowledge: synthetic and analytic. While analytic judgments can only be a priori (10 Prl), synthetic judgments can be a priori or a posteriori, and thus one can make analytic a priori judgments, synthetic a priori judgments, and synthetic a posteriori judgments. One of Kant's primary contributions to philosophy is that not only are synthetic a priori statements possible, but they are the basis of math, science, and metaphysics, and they occur in the mind by following certain categories of cognition (55 Cr). Kant believed a priori knowledge is that which is universal and necessary, although many philosophers think these terms mean nearly the same thing (46 Cr). Since a posteriori cognitions cannot lead to judgments of universality, because we can never know that anything will be so without an exception purely from experience, a concept that applies to all of reality must be a priori (11 Prl). It is the basis for the Understanding, that part of our mind the forms concepts, such as the idea of a water bottle. The sensibility, however, is only capable of intuitions, such as the sight of a specific water bottle (although Kant argues in the Transcendental Aesthetic that the sensibility adheres to a priori principles of space and time [77/86 Cr]). Intuitions and concepts are cognitions made by either the understanding or sensibility. The understanding spontaneously synthesizes concepts an autopoeitic, self-organizing system of cognition while the sensibility is our receptive capacity for empirical intuitions. Using these cognitions, we make judgments as relations between two mental entities. This

relationship would be between either two concepts, a concept and an intuition, or two judgments. An analytic judgment will merely 'break down' a concept, relating two ideas that are already contained within each other from the meaning of the terms we use alone. All bachelors are unmarried is analytic because unmarried is implied from bachelor. All analytic statements are birthed from the principle of contradiction, such that the terms must not negate one another. (10 Prl) A synthetic judgment is one where the predicate truly expands on the subject. Synthetic judgments also adhere from the principle of contradiction, but not merely so. Bodies have weight, is synthetic because weight is not inherent in the concept of a body. One could imagine a body without having weight to it. All judgments of experience are synthetic, because one cannot define the terms relating to experience without first expanding them with the knowledge of experience. At first sight, it would appear that only a posteriori judgments could be synthetic, because making a synthesis seems to require some element, provided by experience. In fact, philosophers believed this until Kant introduced the idea of synthetic a prior judgments to philosophy. Furthermore, he suggests these type of judgments are the principles of mathematics, natural science, and metaphysics. Kant argues that through universality and necessity, all science has an a priori basis (55 C) . While empirical cognitions often provide the elucidation of scientific concepts, their apodeictic necessity entails that a priori concepts be the fundamentals of science. Furthermore, many of them are synthetic because the meaning of the predicate of a judgment is an expansion of the subject. In the mathematical proposition '3 + 4 = 7', the concept of 7 is not contained within the idea of the sum of 3 and 4, because no matter how hard one ponders '3', '4', and 'sum,' one will never find 7 without the help of intuitions (e.g., our fingers, or dots). Thus, 3 + 4 = 7 is a synthetic judgment. At first it would appear that the requirement of using intuitions would make the proposition a posteriori, but the intuitions are only needed to reveal our a priori dispositions to the concepts of numbers and addition. Intuitions help us elucidate the complex concepts of the understanding. Natural science has synthetic a priori judgments like: matter is permanent. It is not within the meaning of matter to be permanent, thus the

statement is synthetic, and it is a priori because the permanence of matter is universal and necessary. The metaphysical phrase: everything has a cause is similarly an a priori synthetic judgment. A question that might be asked is how do we come to form these synthetic a priori concepts? Kant believes our thoughts are spontaneously formed according to certain 'categories' of thinking (132/3 CP). These are the categories of quantity, quality, modality, and relation. Through complex biological functions, our brain autopoeitically synthesizes empirical data to form presentations: cognitions, perceptions, sensations, and so forth. Although Kant knew little of the brain, I believe modern neurobiology is supportive of a theory of categorical a priori synthesis of thought. Specialized neurons, such as mirror neurons, may manifest the categories of thought on a micro scale, while the macro structures shape our actual thoughts and presentations. For example, the lateral geniculate nucleus is generally thought of as where our brain actually forms the images that we see. Yet, only a mere 10% of the synapses come directly from the retina, where the data for our vision actually comes (LST, slide 4). While most of the remaining 90% of the inputs might in a sense also have their origins in the retina, much of that percentage also speaks to a priori processing (because why else would there be all this processing if it was just raw data from the eye?) To speak of where these a priori concepts come from Kant called transcendental philosophy, so perhaps one might see modern neurobiologists as conducting transcendental research (80 CP)! It is remarkable that Kant was the first to make a strong case for a priori synthetic principles. While not intuitive (in the modern sense of the word), the theory of these principles allows there to be some potential of conducting metaphysics. If the empiricists had prevailed, metaphysics would have been doomed. The categorical synthesis of our thoughts is an elegant answer to how we think. Our understanding of the brain is supportive of Kant's theory, and perhaps one day the exact mechanics of his categories will be revealed.

Citations

Lab for Software Technology (LST). Lecture Slides. 2008. http://www.lst.inf.ethz.ch/teaching/lectures/ws05/229/LectureSlides/Lecture%205%20Cortical %20Vision%20Processing%20given.pdf

Kant, Immanuel. Pluhar, Werner. The Critique of Pure Reason. 1781. Hackett Publishing.

Kant, Immanuel. Ellington, James W. Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics 2nd Edition. 1772. Hackett Publishing.