  We can now understand in more detail why Kant said that the subjective deduction is inessential (Axvii). Since the objective deduction is about the conditions of representations having objects, a better name for it might have been ‘deduction of the object’. Similarly, a better name for the subjective deduction might have been ‘the deduction of the subject’ or ‘the deduction of the subject’s nature’. The latter enquiry was inessential to Kant’s main critical project because the main project was to defend the synthetic a priori credentials of physics in the objective deduction. From this point of view, anything uncovered about the nature and functioning of the mind was a happy accident.