Echoes of Kant’s Ideas in Modern Cognitive Research
- DOI
- 10.5922/0207-6918-2026-1-4
- Pages
- 78-96
Abstract
This article examines Kant’s ideas on the a priori character of space and time in the context of modern cognitive research and neuroscience. Proceeding from the Kantian view of space and time as forms of sensibility, I look at how neurobiological data confirm and simultaneously modify classical philosophical nativism. I pay particular attention to empirically-confirmed, inborn cognitive mechanisms such as the “sense of number” and the supposed “sense of space” which have ontogenetic and neural foundations. I look at discoveries pertaining to the brain’s navigation systems, including “place” cells, which point to the existence of a functionally autonomous “geometric” (and not just a “number”) module. This module has been shown to play a key role, not only in one’s orientation in physical space, but also in the formation of abstract concepts, semantic structures, and social ties. I examine data on the independence of basic geometric intuition from cultural and sensory experience, including research on spatial representations in born-blind individuals. A special section is devoted to the analysis of the Spatial-Numerical Association of Response Codes (SNARC) effect: its possible influence on the character of the writing system, and, conversely, of script configuration on spatial-numerical and cognitive associations. This phenomenon demonstrates an interconnection between the perception of numbers and direction in space, which is partly determined by cultural features: people with left-to-right writing associate numbers of a larger magnitude with the right side, while people who write from right to left have the reverse association. Thus, human perceptions of space and time are the result of intricate interactions between congenital properties of the nervous system and extra-personal cultural influence. In conclusion, I stress the prospectivity of the concept “biocultural co-constructivism”, according to which congenital neuron structures and cultural practices are in dynamic interaction, and which promises deeper insight into the meaning of the Kantian research programme as implemented in modern neuroscience.
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