Claim. Unification epistemology’s method is the give-and-receive principle: cognition takes place when an external image (sense content from the object) is collated against an internal prototype already possessed by the subject, with judgment of agreement or disagreement constituting cognition — making it a ‘theory of collation,’ distinct from Marxist ‘theory of reflection’ and Kantian ‘theory of synthesis.’
Elaboration. Lee names the method explicitly: ‘Marxist epistemology was a theory of reflection and Kant’s epistemology was a theory of synthesis,’ whereas ‘cognition, per se, takes place through collation’ (2. Understanding Stage of Cognition). The mechanism is two-stage and proceeds through a four-position-foundation. First, an outer give-and-receive action between subject and object reflects the content (attributes) and form (forms of existence) of the object into the subject’s sensory centers, producing a ‘sense image’ or ‘external image.’ Second, an inner give-and-receive action takes place between this external image and the prototype (internal image) already held by the subject — the spiritual apperception compares the two and judges their agreement or disagreement.
The structural difference from prior schools is precise. For Kant, content comes from the object and forms come from the subject — so cognition synthesizes them into a new constructed object. For Marx, both content and form come from the object — the subject is just a mirror. For Unification Thought, both content and form belong to BOTH subject and object (3. The Method of Cognition). The subject possesses content (material attributes of cells/tissues, since the human is a microcosm) and form (forms of existence of the body); the object possesses content (its attributes) and form (its forms of existence). Cognition is the collation of these matched pairs.
Lee explicitly notes that Unification epistemology absorbs both rivals: ‘there is an element of copy theory in the outer give and receive action, and there is an element of the transcendental method in the inner give and receive action. Thus, within Unification epistemology the dialectical method (copy theory) and transcendental method (Kantian method) are unified.’
The collation model has structural affinities with pattern-matching theories of perception and with rationalist innatism (the prototype plays a role like Plato’s recollection or Descartes’s innate ideas), but Lee insists the prototypes themselves develop empirically as well, yielding ‘complex prototypes’ (a priori + empirical). Worth threading against contemporary predictive-processing models of cognition, which similarly invoke internal templates checked against sensory input.
See also. prototype-as-standard-of-cognition, kant-synthesis-as-collation, ut-critique-of-marxist-reflection-theory-requires-interest-and-prototype