old as parts of an object constructed, and
the process of synthesis involved will be that by which the object is
constructed. This process of synthesis will have nothing to do with
knowledge; for since it is merely the process by which the object is
constructed, knowledge so far is not effected at all, and no clue is
given to the way in which it comes about. If, however, we accept the
second alternative, we have to allow that while relatedness to an
object has to do with knowledge, yet it in no way implies a process of
synthesis. For since in that case it consists in the fact that we are
conscious of the manifold as together forming an object, it in no way
implies that the object has been produced by a process of synthesis.
Kant, of course, would accept the third alternative. For, firstly,
since it is knowledge which he is describing, the phrase 'relatedness
to an object' cannot refer simply to the _existence_ of a combination
of the manifold, and of a process by which it has been produced; its
meaning must include _consciousness_ of the combination. In the second
place, it is definitely his view that we cannot represent anything as
combined in the object without having previously combined it
ourselves.[35] Moreover, it is just with respect to this connexion
between the synthesis and the consciousness of the synthesis that his
reduction of knowing to making helps him; for to make an object, e. g.
a house, is to make it consciously, i. e. to combine materials on a
principle of which we are aware. Since, then, the combining of which
he speaks is really making, it seems to him impossible to combine a
manifold without being aware of the nature of the act of combination,
and therefore of the nature of the whole thereby produced.[36] But
though this is clearly Kant's view, it is not justified. In the first
place, 'relatedness of the manifold to an object' ought not to refer
_both_ to its combination in a whole _and_ to our consciousness of the
combination; and in strictness it should refer to the former only. For
as referring to the former it indicates a relation of the manifold _to
the object_, as being the parts of the object, and as referring to the
latter it indicates a relation of the manifold _to us_, as being
apprehended by us as the parts of the object. But two relations which,
though they are of one and the same thing, are nevertheless relations
of it to two different things, should not be referred to by the same
phra