PRINCIPLE OF ASSOCIATION

[A121] In the Deduction in A Kant speaks of the "unity of association" of representations as having both a subjective and an objective ground, that latter which explains why it is not "entirely accidental that appearances should fit into a connected whole of human knowledge". Kant connects the principle association with transcendental synthesis, the productive imagination (spontaneity), and affinity; he distinguishes it from intellectual synthesis (carried out by the understanding along) and reproductive imagination (which is purely empirical). Cf. Affinity.