It depends on what you mean by "experience". If you restrict the term to mean "consciously experienced" and I agreed with that restriction then I would agree with you. However I don't. I think the point is that an object as we experience it is a function of our interaction with it which would include its affects on our senses. The ding an sich as I understand is intended to denote whatever the thing is in itself beyond its potential to affect our senses. On account of the dialectical nature of our thinking we can think such a thing. It doesn't follow that the thought is a coherent one.

Real thing as opposed to apparent thing is a common misconception, yes, which makes the comparison by means of them, moot.

But in light of this…..

“…. At the same time, it must be carefully borne in mind that, while we surrender the power of cognizing, we still reserve the power of thinking objects**, as things in themselves. For, otherwise, we should require to affirm the existence of an appearance, without something that appears, which would be absurd…”

……is found tacit acknowledgement that the thing that really exists that we do cognize, as first it appears, is the thing of the ding as sich, which also must really exist, but is not cognized because it isn’t that which appears.

This is what Bob was trying to get at by saying the thing-in-itself is the ground of the thing we perceive. The problem is, the thing we perceive is “…the undetermined object….” of intuition, which just says while it may be the case there is a ground for it, we have no means to determine anything about it, so …..like….who cares? If the perceived object is undetermined, what is there to say about its ground?
(Hegel and Schopenaur did, but that’s another can of transcendental worms altogether.)

** from which comes thing in itself “…considered by reason alone…”, which….(sigh)….was the A/B pagination clue I left for Bob.

Thanks. I see it's a rather delicate point. So I read that qualification as an admission, yes, there are real objects independent of our sensory grasp of them (so as not to give ground to complete solipsism or skepticism), but still, they are known by us as appearing objects under the categories etc etc. I still think there's a frequent tendency amongst those who encounter Kant to want to 'peek behind the curtain' so to speak, or penetrate the mystery of 'what really is'. But he's actually pointing out a kind of limit, or even limitation, of knowledge, which requires a certain humility to accept. A Kant primer says:

Kant's introduced the concept of the “thing in itself” to refer to reality as it is independent of our experience of it and unstructured by our cognitive constitution. The concept was harshly criticized in his own time and has been lambasted by generations of critics since. A standard objection to the notion is that Kant has no business positing it given his insistence that we can only know what lies within the limits of possible experience. But a more sympathetic reading is to see the concept of the “thing in itself” as a sort of placeholder in Kant's system; it both marks the limits of what we can know and expresses a sense of mystery that cannot be dissolved, the sense of mystery that underlies our unanswerable questions. Through both of these functions it serves to keep us humble. — Emrys Westacott

Note also that many or all of Kant's criticism of rationalism were directed at the philosophers of his day (Christian Wolff and others) who proposed various teleological, ontological and other 'proofs of the existence of God'. This kind of proof was what Kant said reason could not establish. It doesn't mean that he doesn't believe in God, but, as he said, he had to declare a limit to knowledge to make room for faith. (I personally think there is another cognitive mode altogether, connected with religious insight, but that is yet another transcendental can of worms altogether.)

A sense of mystery indeed. The raison d’etre for the first Critique was to first, reign reason in from its proclivity for seeking the unconditioned, and second, prove the possibility and validity of synthetic a priori cognitions.

With respect to the first, granting possibility of knowing about the thing in itself promises knowledge of everything whether it be experience or not, which is immediately contradictory, insofar as we are constantly learning.
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Does this other cognitive mode happen to have a typically south-central Asian name?

So as to not facilitate solipsism and radical skepticism, yes, I agree with that.

…..but still, they are known by us as appearing objects….. — Wayfarer

If the thing-in-itself is known to us as appearing objects, why is it said things-in-themselves are unknown to us?

If the thing-in-itself appears, it isn’t in-itself. It is isn’t in itself, and it is something that appears, then it must appear to us, which becomes phenomenon in us, which becomes an object of experience for us, and the entire transcendental aesthetic contradicts itself.

So either Hegel and Schopenhaur were right, or, the transcendental aesthetic does not contradict itself.

Six of one, half dozen of the other?

Ahh, i see where you're going. Ok, it may just be that we disagree about hte limits of the concept of experience (as opposed to what Kant is treating in the CPR - actual limits of possible experience). Nice catch on that.

The ding an sich as I understand is intended to denote whatever the thing is in itself beyond its potential to affect our senses — Janus

The underlined is where I, not so much as disagree, but can't understand how this could refer to anything, inferred or otherwise. It seems to want to obtain certainty of the existence of something which is claimed to have zero effect on our experience - which, clearly, cannot be the case. If we have literally no connection, whatever, to the thing, it doesn't exist. But it is required for Kant's system to get off the ground, so it seems(on my reading, and account) that Kant would not accept this, but instead say:

it may be the case there is a ground for it, we have no means to determine anything about it, so …..like….who cares? — Mww

That's what I was trying to illustrate Kant actually said, as opposed to claiming there's no connection (which I think is counter to reason, Kant and sensibility viz It would result in no experience, or nothing to be said about it anyhow - and there's an entire CRP LOL.

It must, necessarily, be that from which experience derives rather than arises, to have any aspect whatsoever. The only aspect is it's logical necessity as a grounding for experience, whether or not we can cognize anything at all beyond the necessity for it to exist. Add in the a priori's and we can, at least, see "ding en sich->perception->experience" holds for Kant, regardless of the murkiness, and potentially un-speakable nature of hte first "->". It's this, which the a priori categories are required to fill. And, i think Kant does a good job.

If the thing-in-itself is known to us as appearing objects, why is it said things-in-themselves are unknown to us? — Mww

I think a better version would "Known to exist but nothing about it need, or could be known". Not 'known' in the sense phenomena are known - It's just logically sound to infer it (the above goes some way to elucidating why that's the case).

Does this other cognitive mode happen to have a typically south-central Asian name? — Mww

It's made more explicit in them, but it's also there in the Western traditions. I often feel that in Asia there is not so much of a gap between the ancient and modern.

If the thing-in-itself is known to us as appearing objects, why is it said things-in-themselves are unknown to us?

If the thing-in-itself appears, it isn’t in-itself. It is isn’t in itself, and it is something that appears, then it must appear to us, which becomes phenomenon in us, which becomes an object of experience for us, and the entire transcendental aesthetic contradicts itself. — Mww

Check out this blog post.

I think the inference is that what we can possibly know of things does not exhaust their being.

There has been a well-known disagreement between Kant scholars as to whether Kant intended a 'two world ' interpetation or a 'two aspect' interpretation. I favour the latter. Its just a logical distinction between what things are for us and what they are in themselves. Of course the latter cannot be anything for us by definition apart from being the mere logical counterpoint to phenomena.

Einstein? The more you post the more evangelistic your approach becomes. This is a site for philosophical argument. Evangelism is literally against the rules. — Leontiskos

My claim is that the scientific evidence shows that naive realism is wrong, and I support this claim by referring to experts in the field, such as Einstein, who best know what the scientific evidence shows.

Are you claiming that Einstein and I are wrong in claiming that the scientific evidence shows that naive realism is wrong, or are you claiming that the scientific evidence itself is wrong?

We are not talking about some abstract thing, like a Platonic form, that exists in a supersensible realm nor are we merely talking about a concept in our brains nor minds—we are talking about a real object, a physical object, which simply is not cognizable by us. — Bob Ross

No, we don't know what it is. We don't know if its an object, if its physical, if it many things, or something beyond our imagination or comprehension. All we know is there is some 'thing', and 'thing' in only the loosest and most abstract sense. All of those words you used to describe it are words formed from physical sensations, or interpretations.

A ball is not a thing in itself for example. If we were to comprehend what the thing in itself was behind the sensations which lead us to interpret it as a ball, it could be a magical unicorn spinning in an endless circle spewing rainbows and evil demons that dance the cha cha. We don't know. We CANNOT know. It is a logical limit of knowledge.

'A thing in itself' is simply a logical abstract to point out this limit. It is not a 'thing' 'in' or 'itself'. It is a phrase of limitations. It is the constant understanding that everything we know is a representation, and 'the unknowable' the 'thing in itself' could counter our representations at any moment.

I am not following. If you agree that your brain has to know how to intuit and cognize objects in space independently of any possible experience that it has, then you cannot disagree with the idea that some knowledge our brains have are without experience. — Bob Ross

No, our brain does not have to know how to intuit and cognize objects in space independently of any experience it has. It has the capacity to do so. Just like our minds have the capacity to take light and concentrate on aspects of them. We have the ability to discretely experience, but that ability is not knowledge. We can know that we are discretely experiencing. We can learn that some of our discrete experiences can be applied to the world without contradiction, while some cannot. But we don't know which ones can until we apply them.

Think of it like this. A newborn has the capacity to be able to walk one day. Does it know how to do so apart from experience? No. It doesn't know how to walk until it tries to stand repeatedly and learns how to balance. It doesn't know how to talk until it babbles, gets responses from others, and learns language. It doesn't know how to do math until its shown a symbol called 'one', and shown this thing called 'addition'.

When you speak of knowledge without experience, you must speak of a newborn. Because every second after that new experiences are flooding that child's mind as it tries to make sense of the world. There is instinct and potential in a child, but the actual knowledge that a child has is gleaned from every experience they have.

E.g., your cognition has a priori knowledge on how to construct objects in space because it clearly does it correctly (insofar as they are represented with extension).

This is the part I disagree with. A child does not know how to construct things in space. It has the potential to. It then can know that it has, and can believe that its constructs match reality. Only after applying these construct to reality, can it know that its constructs are either concurrent with, or not contradicted by reality. But we can never truly know what reality 'is', because its always a representation of it.

Skimming over a couple of the other replies here, I think its the term 'thing' that's throwing people. We can rephrase a 'thing in itself' to 'the unknowable reality' Its not a 'thing' like an 'object'. Its just a logical conception that we always interpret reality, and we cannot know reality as it is uninterpreted. That's all.

Edit: I just realized there's other simple ways to explain it. The brain in the vat. An evil demon. The matrix. All of these are 'things in themselves' that we could never know. Its just the same type of argument.

This is helpful: I am also wondering if this is what @Mww is talking about. I am viewing the thing-in-itself as the thing as it really is. What is your interpretation, then, of the ding an sich?

The thing in itself is the thing considered by reason alone. As the referenced quote says.

I guess I didn’t follow it: can you elaborate more on this?

I am thinking that we use reason to determine that there must be a thing-in-itself which is the ground for our experience of some thing; and that this is a claim in concreto about the thing as opposed to in abstracta. I think, now, you may be saying vice-versa.

Yes, and no. Limits, but not as relates to rationalism vs empiricism.

That was the whole underlying context of the CPR. Kant was addressing philosophers like Descartes, Wolf, etc. and Locke, Hume, etc. with respect to their long standing disputes about knowledge.

The limitation is proof for the impossibility of an intelligence of our kind ever cognizing the unconditioned.

So, the thing-in-itself to you is not real? The thing as it is unconditioned isn’t real?

Experience is not sensations. Sensations are the raw data which is intuited, judged, and cognized into a representation which, as a result, is your experience. E.g., a ball excites your senses by "impact" of whatever it is in-itself exciting your sensibility, and then sensations of that excitation are passed to your brain to interpret...there's nothing contradictory going on here.

……whether Kant intended a 'two world ' interpetation or a 'two aspect' interpretation. — Janus

“…..which has always two aspects, the one, the object considered as a thing in itself, without regard to the mode of intuiting it (…), the other, the form of our intuition of the object, which must be sought not in the object as a thing in itself, but in the subject to which it appears….”

A bone of contention that shouldn’t be. I mean….as long as one trusts the translator(s).
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……the mere logical counterpoint to phenomena. — Janus

Logic belongs to understanding, the faculty of thought/cognition, noumena are understood as logically counter to things-in-themselves….

“….. At the same time, when we designate certain objects as (…) sensuous existences*, thus distinguishing our mode of intuiting them from their own nature as things in themselves**, it is evident that by this very distinction we as it were place the latter, considered in this their own nature, although we do not so intuite them, in opposition to the former, or, on the other hand, we do so place other possible things, which are not objects of our senses***, but are cogitated by the understanding alone, and call them intelligible existences (noumena).…..”
* because we are affected by them;
**the above mentioned two-aspect dichotomy;
***a very different kind of two-aspect dichotomy.

…..we see “other possible things which are not objects of our senses” to be not sensuous existences, from which follows if not sensuous existence then intellectual existence, but existence nonetheless, in opposition to phenomena which are nothing but representations of existences given from the mode of being intuitions. As well, “but are cogitated” must implicate things, or objects, in order to maintain dialectical consistency with the beginning “when we designate certain objects”. That is to say, when we designate certain objects as sensed must relate to certain objects as cogitated. As found here:

“…. things which the understanding is obliged to cogitate apart from any relation to our mode of intuition, consequently not as mere phenomena, but as things in themselves….”

……things and objects of course, being equal and things-in-themselves always being apart from any relation to our mode of intuition, which is representative by means of internal imagination, yet always part of the causality of that which appears to those modes, which is sensuous by means of external reality.

So….understanding forced to cogitate things not as phenomena but as things-in-themselves…..but understanding cannot cogitate objects as things-in-themselves, insofar as things-in-themselves belong to reason alone. And here is the ground of ***, the very different kind of two-aspect dichotomy, which obviously isn’t going to work.

This whole exposition in CPR is to show understanding, with respect to human knowledge, has no business thinking objects on its own, which is to say cognitions with noumena as their objects are illegitimate, even if constructed with non-contradictory conceptions. And it is the illegitimacy of those cognitions by which noumena and things-in-themselves are confused with each other, insofar as both are futile attempts at representation, albeit under different conditions.

Now, and quickly because looking around I don’t see anybody still here….things-in-themselves belong to reason and noumena belong to understanding because reason is the only fully transcendental faculty, whereas….

“…. We have seen that everything which the understanding draws from itself, without borrowing from experience, it nevertheless possesses only for the behoof and use of experience….”

…..and nothing in experience, as such, is transcendental. It follows that things-in-themselves, because they can never be for the behoof and use of experience as such under any conditions whatsoever, while noumena would be if only our faculty of intuition was intellectual rather than sensuous, can only belong to that faculty which does not concern itself with experience as such, but only the construction of pure a priori principles by which the manifold of experiences are arbitrated with respect to each other and to reality itself.

IknowIknow…..shades of R.E.M.? I’ve said too much I haven’t said enough.

I agree with your comment therein; it was a very well done exposition.

I am thinking that we use reason to determine that there must be a thing-in-itself which is the ground for our experience of some thing…. — Bob Ross

Good enough superficially….

…..and that this is a claim in concreto about the thing as opposed to in abstracta. — Bob Ross

…..and superficially because reason cannot do in concreto claims, but is transcendental, which is itself either theoretical or speculative. Even practical reason has a pure aspect, and while not always transcendental, re: with respect to moral judgements, is still entirely in abstracta.

So it is that reason does inform the system that for a thing that appears a thing-in-itself is a necessary condition, but makes no concrete claims with respect to that condition.
————

Kant was addressing philosophers (…) with respect to their long standing disputes about knowledge. — Bob Ross

Yes, addressing, but not in relation to one opposed to the other, but one combined with the other, re: human empirical knowledge requires both a rational and an empirical aspect, and, conversely, no empirical knowledge is at all possible without some determinable aspect of both. But, and more importantly, a priori knowledge is both possible and valid without any empirical content whatsoever, but relies nonetheless on empirical conditions for its justifications, re: pure mathematics.
————

“The limitation is proof for the impossibility of an intelligence of our kind ever cognizing the unconditioned.”
-Mww

So, the thing-in-itself to you is not real? The thing as it is unconditioned isn’t real? — Bob Ross

By definition the real is that which is contained in reality, and by definition reality is that of which the susceptibility to sensation is given. The thing-in-itself does not meet the criterion of susceptibility to sensation hence is not real. But it can still exist as a necessary condition for that which follows from it. Just as space and time are not real, but suffice as necessary conditions, in this case, as pure intuitions a priori, necessary for the construction of phenomena.

Also, as transcendental ideas given from reason, things-in-themselves are not real, in the same sense as things are real.

Also, the thing as it is unconditioned is a contradiction, in that sensibility is always conditioned by appearances. If the thing didn’t appear it couldn’t be a thing, hence the reality of a thing serves as the condition for its appearance. Space and time are the conditions for the experience of the thing, not for the appearance of the thing.

But to answer the question, no, things-in-themselves are not real to me. Or anybody else, iff he finds himself under the auspices of this particular speculative epistemological methodology. It does not follow from the condition that reason proposes a real existence, that there must in fact necessarily be one that corresponds to it.

Metaphysical reductionism, or, a dog chasing his tail. One must chose what to make of philosophy in general, right?

The thing-in-itself does not meet the criterion of susceptibility to sensation hence is not real. — Mww

I invite you to reconsider. That, or this a high short lob for you to smash back.

In one of the translator prefaces to Kant - maybe or not Beck - he observes that the ding an sicht is more usually ding an sicht selbst (dass): from thing-in-itself to thing-in-itself-as-it-is-in-itself. A difference that makes a difference. To be maybe too brief, it seems to me the obscured question with a confused answer is to the nature and accuracy of the details of the sensation. That a dass is sensed - perceived - cannot reasonably be doubted. What can be doubted is the accuracy of the correspondence of the perception to the dass itself. Hence the dass is real. We just - as scientists - have to be mindful of how we talk about it; as ordinary folk, not so much.

…..thing-in-itself-as-it-is-in-itself….. — tim wood

I’ve seen that myself, but don’t remember, and couldn’t find, where I saw it. I thought Guyer/Wood’s marvelous intro, but, no luck. Anyway….good point.

What can be doubted is the accuracy of the correspondence of the perception to the dass itself — tim wood

Absolutely. And we depend on Mother to make us aware our inaccuracies, hopefully not at too great an expense.

…..as ordinary folk, not so much. — tim wood

Funny, innit. An ordinary folk looks out, is perfectly convinced he sees a tree, but you the metaphysician tell him, nahhhh, you don’t. You see a thing, and that thing is only called a tree because somebody, somewhere, some long time ago, said so, and you’re just regurtitatin’ what’s been taught to you.

But then, there’s markedly more ordinary folk than there are metaphysicians, so…..there ya go. “I see a tree” rules the day.

Funny, innit. An ordinary folk looks out, is perfectly convinced he sees a tree, but you the metaphysician tell him, nahhhh, you don’t. You see a thing, and that thing is only called a tree because somebody, somewhere, some long time ago, said so, and you’re just regurtitatin’ what’s been taught to you.

But then, there’s markedly more ordinary folk than there are metaphysicians, so…..there ya go. “I see a tree” rules the day. — Mww

A relevant passage from here:

Here is a kind of puzzle or paradox that several philosophers have stressed. On the one hand, existence questions seem hard. The philosophical question of whether there are abstract entities does not seem to admit of an easy or trivial answer. At the same time, there seem to be trivial arguments settling questions like this in the affirmative. Consider for instance the arguments, “2+2=4. So there is a number which, when added to 2, yields 4. This something is a number. So there are numbers”, and “Fido is a dog. So Fido has the property of being a dog. So there are properties.” How should one resolve this paradox? One response is: adopt fictionalism. The idea would be that in the philosophy room we do not speak fictionally, but ordinarily we do. So in the philosophy room, the question of the existence of abstract entities is hard; outside it, the question is easy. When, ordinarily, a speaker utters a sentence that semantically expresses a proposition that entails that there are numbers, what she says is accurate so long as according to the relevant fiction, there are numbers. But when she utters the same sentence in the philosophy room, she speaks literally and then what she asserts is something highly non-trivial.

Relevant indeed.

Existence questions are hard, and Kant among others, doesn’t bother with them.

There’s a world, it’s really a world…..so what? World being, of course, an abstract entity. Sorta like Rawls (?)….where’s the university.
(Crap. I can't remember the author or the name of the paradox. Maybe identity. Guy sees all the accoutrements which constitute a university, but wants to know where the university he came to visit is located.)

Its just a logical distinction between what things are for us and what they are in themselves. Of course the latter cannot be anything for us by definition apart from being the mere logical counterpoint to phenomena. — Janus

Yes, that is also how I read it. Perhaps something is getting lost in whatever is wrong with the language i'm using. I don't propose there are two worlds - I propose that the 'ding en sich' must logically arouse whatever causes phenomenon to occur in us, and so i guess I just allow for a transitive relation that sounds more robust than a simply logical inference. The below strikes me as entirely sensible, and 'correct', but could be giving the inferences that I would reject. Appreciate if anyone could see where I'm losing it:

The thing in itself is, essentially, the same 'thing' as what is represented in phenomena, but it is not represented and so is, in fact, 'the thing' and not the representation, which is, in fact, the phenomena.

Unfortunately I can find nothing to disagree with there.

:up: Yes it seems that whatever we say about this there will be a way or ways of interpreting it that will make it look aporetic.

There’s a world, it’s really a world…..so what? World being, of course, an abstract entity. Sorta like Rawls (?)….where’s the university.
(Crap. I can't remember the author or the name of the paradox. Maybe identity. Guy sees all the accoutrements which constitute a university, but wants to know where the university he came to visit is located.) — Mww

Gilbert Ryle's category mistake from The Concept of Mind.

Regarding Kant's ding an sich, I think this quote provides a simple account of it:

And we indeed, rightly considering objects of sense as mere appearances, confess thereby that they are based upon a thing in itself, though we know not this thing as it is in itself, but only know its appearances, viz., the way in which our senses are affected by this unknown something.

As an analogy to this that the direct realist can accept; we do not see magnetic fields, only the affects that magnetic fields have on other things such as metal.

Kant (and other indirect realists) simply apply this same reasoning, arguing that metal is to phenomenal experience as the magnetic field is to metal (except, at least with respect to sight, there is not even direct physical contact between metal and the sense organ).

Of course, we are able to formulate mathematical models of this magnetic field, use these models to try to predict observable phenomena, either falsify or fail to falsify our models, and in doing so can be said to "know" something of the "thing in itself", but I'm not sure if this sense of knowing the thing in itself is the sense that is relevant to Kant's remarks above.

But then even if scientific realism is inconsistent with transcendental idealism, one can be an indirect realist and a scientific realist, so if this discussion is trying to equate indirect realism with transcendental idealism and argue that any problems with the latter are also problems with the former then I think it commits a fallacy. Much like the scientific realist, an indirect realist can accept that we can know something about things that we cannot directly perceive.

D’accord.
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Hey….I got the R right.

Thanks.
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I think this quote provides a simple account of it:

“And we indeed, rightly considering objects of sense as mere appearances, confess thereby that they are based upon a thing in itself, though we know not this thing as it is in itself, but only know its appearances, viz., the way in which our senses are affected by this unknown something.” — Michael

The quote is self-contradictory:
….objects of sense as mere appearance, yes;
….based upon a thing-in-itself, yes;
….know not this thing-in-itself, yes;
….but only know its appearance…..no. The thing-in-itself does not appear; if it did, it wouldn’t be in-itself. It would be that object of sense as mere appearance, hence the contradiction.

Under what authority do we “rightly confess”?

….but only know its appearance…..no. The thing-in-itself does not appear; if it did, it wouldn’t be in-itself. It would be that object of sense as mere appearance, hence the contradiction. — Mww

You should read the next part:

viz., the way in which our senses are affected by this unknown something.

i.e. the only thing we know about distal objects is how they affect our senses.

the only thing we know about distal objects is how they affect our senses. — Michael

I considered that part irrelevant, insofar as we know nothing of a thing by its effect on our senses, except that is “…an undetermined something….”. To say we know how they affect our senses is already given by sensation, which only informs as to which sense it is, but nothing whatsoever about the thing, except its real existence.

I am getting closer to understanding what you are saying, but I am still not quite there.

Here’s the core of our issue:

By definition the real is that which is contained in reality, and by definition reality is that of which the susceptibility to sensation is given.

I understand better now why you deny the existence of things-in-themselves: you are operating under a false understanding of what reality is. Reality is not itself the totality of that which is, at least in principle, capable of being sensed—that’s what’s called our limits of sensing reality.

Do you really believe that all objects in reality are possible objects of sense for humans? I find that obviously and patently false. There’s absolutely nothing about reality that entails that there isn’t an object which we are incapable of sensing.

If you take that reality is the totality of existence, on the contrary, then you find that things-in-themselves, as properly understood, are the things which comprise that totality.

No, we don't know what it is. We don't know if its an object, if its physical, if it many things, or something beyond our imagination or comprehension. All we know is there is some 'thing', and 'thing' in only the loosest and most abstract sense. All of those words you used to describe it are words formed from physical sensations, or interpretations.

Agreed, to some extent. By physical, I do not mean material: I mean mind-independent.

Even if we could not even know that it is mind-independently existing; the thing as it is in-itself is not purely logical (in that case): we are talking about some ‘thing’ which exists—we are talking in concreto.

No, our brain does not have to know how to intuit and cognize objects in space independently of any experience it has. It has the capacity to do so.
Just like our minds have the capacity to take light and concentrate on aspects of them. We have the ability to discretely experience, but that ability is not knowledge.

Correct me here @Mww. I would say that my example was bad insofar as the intuition aspect of representation in space is non-cognitive (so there is no knowledge in that regard), but that our faculty of judgment, understanding, and cognition must formulate justified, true, beliefs in relation to the a priori principles and conceptions in order to actually represent the objects in space, according to spatial-mathematical relations.

Think of it like this. A newborn has the capacity to be able to walk one day. Does it know how to do so apart from experience? No

A newborn does not have the capacity to walk: the biological structures required are not there (e.g., muscle, bone density, etc.). Now, once it has that capacity, of course, I agree it still has to learn how to walk; but this is disanalogous.

When you speak of knowledge without experience, you must speak of a newborn

Everything described in the transcendental analytic applies to newborns. E.g., newborns know how to cognize objects in space and time, to cognize in accordance with logic, to cognize in according with math, etc.

Obviously, the newborn doesn’t have the self-reflective knowledge about it (that would be needed to solve a math problem at school).

This is the part I disagree with. A child does not know how to construct things in space. I

This is an equivocation. We are talking about the child qua its representative faculties; not its self-reflective reason.

Skimming over a couple of the other replies here, I think its the term 'thing' that's throwing people. We can rephrase a 'thing in itself' to 'the unknowable reality' Its not a 'thing' like an 'object'. Its just a logical conception that we always interpret reality, and we cannot know reality as it is uninterpreted. That's all.

Edit: I just realized there's other simple ways to explain it. The brain in the vat. An evil demon. The matrix. All of these are 'things in themselves' that we could never know. Its just the same type of argument.

True.

C’mon, Bob. You asked if things-in-themselves are real for me, I said no (by definition), and now you say I said things-in-themselves don’t exist for me. That’s not even wrong, as my ol’ buddy Wolfgang used to say.

I’ve never denied the existence of things-in-themselves, for to do so is to question the very existence of real things, insofar as the mere appearance of any such thing to human sensibility is sufficient causality for its very existence, an absurdity into which no one has rightfully fallen.

Do you really believe that all objects in reality are possible objects of sense for humans? — Bob Ross

Why would you not?

There’s absolutely nothing about reality that entails that there isn’t an object which we are incapable of sensing. — Bob Ross

Yes, agreed. Which calls into question why you might think it not possible that all objects in reality are possible objects of sense in humans. I mean….all any one of them has to do, is appear to our senses, and VOILA!!!!….we’re capable of sensing it. Doesn’t mean they will or must, but iff they do.
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If you take that reality is the totality of existence, on the contrary, then you find that things-in-themselves, as properly understood, are the things which comprise that totality. — Bob Ross

Hmmmm. Might this be backwards? If, instead, you take existence as the totality of reality, there remains the possibility of existences that are not members of reality, hence not members of that which is susceptible to sensation in humans, i.e., dark energy. Quarks. And whatnot.

Added bonus…if you let the totality of existence contain all of reality, that of which reality is not a condition may still be contained in it. Then you have justification for permitting things-in-themselves as existing but not for being real. Not to mention, we conceived the idea of e.g., dark energy, from its effects, so by the same token the idea of things-in-themselves is conceivable by their effects, re: things.
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…..the intuition aspect of representation in space is non-cognitive (so there is no knowledge in that regard)…. — Bob Ross

Yes.

…..our faculty of judgment, understanding, and cognition must formulate justified, true, beliefs in relation to the a priori principles and conceptions…. — Bob Ross

Yes.

….in order to actually represent the objects in space, according to spatial-mathematical relations. — Bob Ross

Ehhhh…not so sure about that. According to spatial-mathematical relations is a form of knowledge, which flies in the face of what was already given as the case, re: there is no knowledge in regard to representation in space.

Objects are already represented in space by intuition, and are called phenomena. The in order, then, for these first two, is for the possibility of empirical knowledge, or, which is the same thing, experience.

And a minor supplement: justified true beliefs…assuming one grants such a thing in the first place….are given as stated, but in relation to a priori principles and conceptions is close to overstepping the purview of understanding, which, as afore-mentioned, is for the behoof and use of experience alone. While understanding may be in relation to such principles and conceptions, they do not arise from it, which hints there’s much more to the overall system.