Claim. In every act of cognition a ‘prototype’ — a mental image already possessed by the subject — functions as the standard of judgment, composed of an a priori element (protoimage and image of relation) and an empirical element (acquired ideas), with the two together forming the ‘complex prototype’ that actually operates in daily cognition.
Elaboration. Lee structures the prototype as having three constituents (Elements Making Up a Prototype): (1) the protoimage — the image of the attributes of the body’s cells and tissues reflected in protoconsciousness; (2) the image of relation (form of thought) — the form of existence of those attributes reflected in protoconsciousness, which guides and restricts thinking; (3) empirical ideas acquired through prior experience and added into memory. The first two are a priori (the ‘original prototype’); the third is acquired (the ‘empirical prototype’); their combination is the ‘complex prototype,’ and Lee notes that ‘all the prototypes in our daily life are actually complex prototypes.’
The doctrine handles a classic problem of innatism — that newborns clearly do not have rich cognitive content. Lee writes: ‘The original prototypes (protoimages and images of relation) with which people are born are imperfect in the case of a newborn baby because the cells, tissues, organs, nerves, sense organs, brain and so on, of the infant, are not well developed yet; therefore, the infant’s cognition can not but be vague’ (Pre-existence of the Prototype, and Its Development). As the body develops, the protoimages and images of relation become clearer. New empirical ideas are added through experience. So the prototype grows both in quality (clarity) and in quantity (memory).
This is positioned explicitly against Kant: ‘Kant maintained that the forms possessed by the subject of cognition are a priori, whereas Unification epistemology asserts the pre-existence of the prototype which is possessed by the subject.’ The difference: Kant’s a priori is just forms (categories of thought); Lee’s a priori is forms AND content (protoimages of attributes). The prototype thus does more work than Kantian categories — it provides not just framework but matchable content.
The move ties principle-of-creation doctrine (microcosm thesis) directly to epistemology: the prototype contains the protoimages of bodily attributes which themselves correspond to the attributes of all things, so the standard of judgment is pre-fitted to reality. Critics typically engage on whether ‘protoimage’ is doing genuine explanatory work or simply renaming what cognitive science calls memory/representation.
See also. ut-cognition-as-collation-not-reflection-or-synthesis, prototypes-require-purity-of-mind-and-education, ut-subject-object-necessary-relationship-grounds-cognition