Laura Davis

In his lecture on logic, Kant puts forth his most detailed account of concept formation. Here Kant maintains that concepts are the result of a three-step process: comparison, reflection, and abstraction. Though most commentators acknowledge that this particular passage leads to a number of interpretive difficulties, it is almost unanimously accepted that: (1) concepts are composed of features which are shared by a multiplicity of objects and (2) that it is in virtue of these features that concepts apply to a “plurality of objects”. I reject both of these claims. In what follows I will argue that the dilemma is the result of an illicit interpretive slide between the discussion of the form and content of concepts. The aim of this paper is to propose an alternative reading of Kant’s account of logical form—universality. I will argue that in the relevant passages, Kant’s account of concept formation is concerned not with a comparison, reflection, and abstraction of sensible features or marks but rather with the apprehension of the manifold (or the mode of bringing the manifold to the unity of consciousness).