The Regulative Role and the Cognitive Contribution of Reason in Kant’s Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic (revised)

Reason is considered to have a negative impact on cognition in Kant's cognitive theory. However, Kant emphasizes in the Appendix to the Transcendental Dialectic that reason and its ideas also make a positive contribution to cognition through their regulative function. This paper attempts to argue that the contribution of reason to cognition is not just auxiliary, but necessary. To this end, the paper will attempt to explain how the ideas of reason can have a transcendental deduction and schematism similar to the categories of understanding, while also elucidating how their role in human cognition differs from that of the categories.