| Let it be supposed that a composite thing (as substance) consists of simple parts. |
| Inasmuch as all external relation, consequently all composition of substances, is possible only in space; the space, occupied by that which is composite, must consist of the same number of parts as is contained in the composite. |
| But space does not consist of simple parts, but of spaces. |
| Therefore, every part of the composite must occupy a space. |
| But the absolutely primary parts of what is composite are simple. |
| It follows that what is simple occupies a space. |
| Now, as everything real that occupies a space, contains a manifold the parts of which are external to each other, and is consequently composite--and a real composite, not of accidents (for these cannot exist external to each other apart from substance), but of substances--it follows that the simple must be a substantial composite, which is self-contradictory. |
| The second proposition of the antithesis--that there exists in the world nothing that is simple--is here equivalent to the following; The existence of the absolutely simple cannot be demonstrated from any experience or perception either external or internal; and the absolutely simple is a mere idea, the objective reality of which cannot be demonstrated in any possible experience; it is consequently, in the exposition of phenomena, without application and object. |
| For, let us take for granted that an object may be found in experience for this transcendental idea; the empirical intuition of such an object must then be recognized to contain absolutely no manifold with its parts external to each other, and connected into unity. |
| Now, as we cannot reason from the non-consciousness of such a manifold to the impossibility of its existence in the intuition of an object, and as the proof of this impossibility is necessary for the establishment and proof of absolute simplicity; it follows that this simplicity cannot be inferred from any perception whatever. |
| As, therefore, an absolutely simple object cannot be given in any experience, and the world of sense must be considered as the sum total of all possible experiences; nothing simple exists in the world. |
| This second proposition in the antithesis has a more extended aim than the first. |
| The first merely banishes the simple from the intuition of the composite; while the second drives it entirely out of nature. |
| Hence we were unable to demonstrate it from the conception of a given object of external intuition (of the composite), but we were obliged to prove it from the relation of a given object to a possible experience in general. |
| OBSERVATIONS ON THE SECOND ANTINOMY. |
| THESIS. |
| When I speak of a whole, which necessarily consists of simple parts, I understand thereby only a substantial whole, as the true composite; that is to say, I understand that contingent unity of the manifold which is given as perfectly isolated (at least in thought), placed in reciprocal connection, and thus constituted a unity. |
| Space ought not to be called a compositum but a totum, for its parts are possible in the whole, and not the whole by means of the parts. |
| It might perhaps be called a compositum ideale, but not a compositum reale. |
| But this is of no importance. |
| As space is not a composite of substances (and not even of real accidents), if I abstract all composition therein--nothing, not even a point, remains; for a point is possible only as the limit of a space--consequently of a composite. |