During skiing we acquire sensory data that our rational structure subsequently arranges and transforms into an object, such as sliding on the snow using a given technique. Thus, we elaborate a skiing ‘knowledge’ by means of a process that contains two great matrices: time and space.
The Kantian interpretation posits that we possess prior perceptions of time and space that are independent of the sensible, and that we organize our skiing reality through the utilization of categories of thought, i.e., basic conceptual frameworks that enable us to comprehend the physical environment.
In other words, Kant meant that we do not acquire the notions of time and space by perceiving both, but rather as ‘conditions’ prior to our sensible experiences, or forms of our sensibility, which is our method of intuiting things.
Time is the arrangement that we make of things, as time passes through us. In Kant’s words, “Time is not something objective and real, neither substance nor an accident, but is a subjective condition.”
We believe that what we perceive is ‘arranged‘ or ‘situated‘ within space. We see things like slopes, lifts, a mountain restaurant, rocks, trees, a snow machine, the other skiers and snowboarders. Furthermore, we become aware of a space and the things distributed in it.
In Kant, space is different; it is an a priori principle (prior to and independent of any sensible experience), called a matrix or mold that we use to arrange sensible data. We are, with our minds, the ones who ‘situate’ space as a large screen and project images on it.
We regard space as an additional component of our psychological framework, whereby by incorporating objects in a snowy setting, we construct our skiing environment. However, some things we place are not immobile since they move. They are here, and then they appear beyond, determining a before and an after. This is the time matrix.
Space is something independent of experience, because if it wasn’t, we would have to form our representation by breaking down the relations of up, down, forward or backward and then, by experiencing them, we would form our concept of space.
Kant posited that space is independent of experience, since in order to represent the mentioned relations, we must first suppose space, because such relations are spatial. Therefore, space is a priori to the experience of moving.
