CONSTITUTIVE PRINCIPLE

[A178/B221 Opposed to regulative principles. Constitutive principles are a priori and give "rules of synthesis" which determine "the manner in which something is apprehended in appearance". Constitutive principles thus concern the synthesis of empirical intuition; they specify the "element of a priori intuition" in empirical intuition, viz. by specifying according to which a priori rules of synthesis empirical intuitions will by synthesized together in the manifold of apprehension to form an appearance. (Regulative principles concern the "existence of appearances"--presumably the existence of objects in themselves which affect our sensibility in various ways to "give" us intuitions.)