We can point out that abstraction is a process by which the human intellect draws universal concepts out of individual object, regardless of their spatial-temporal characteristics. Plato placed among the function of dialectics that of distinguishing an idea from another so that it can be accountable to itself and others. The dialectic consists in the interaction between two opposing theses or principles (symbolically represented in Plato's dialogues by two real people) and is used as an investigative tool of truth.
Aristotle believed that the intelligible forms existed only in the sensitive objects, as sources of their universal characteristics, and that the soul could, by abstraction, make them stand out in their purity so as to achieve the ability to know them.
Dialectics has for Hegel two meanings closely related: in a first sense it is the process by which the Absolute is recognized in reality that, at first, appeared to it as alien or opposed, removing or conciliating precisely that opposition; in a second sense it is the process by which reality, overcoming the divisions, stays peaceful - as Hegel says – in the unity of the Whole.
Of the latter, arranged in detail by Aristotle the term is used to demonstrate the operation that takes the intelligible into the sensible.
Wikipedia reports that - in Aristotle – the term is a central moment of the cognitive process and because it is applied to data derived from sensation, allows intelligible knowledge. In Duns Scotus and William of Occam the theory of abstraction undergoes a profound change. Supported as an indispensable basis of abstraction, the intellectual knowledge of the singular, it takes those characters that will be maintained throughout the modern speculation, both rationalistic and empiricist; i.e. becomes a process by which the general concepts or ideas are obtained by comparing more particular elements and isolating the common features.
Reports of this new conception of abstraction with the linguistic level were put particular emphasis by J. Locke, according to whom the origin of the universals, ideas or terms, representatives of all objects of the same species, which takes place through abstraction, leads to the introduction of corresponding general names.
As part of a comprehensive review of the old logical-epistemological positions, the traditional theory of abstraction was subsequently criticized by T. Dewey, who has taken a distinction already introduced by CS Peirce. Two aspects are so clearly distinct in abstraction: one ‘prescissive’, i.e. emphasizing the selective character of its abstractive process, the other hypostatic, that characterizes the creation of abstract entities, especially in mathematics.
Socratic research of definitions of things, just as is reported by witnesses, is certainly an example of knowledge by abstraction offered to hold the unity in the multiplicity of the real. The same "theory of ideas" of Plato is an attempt to abstract a form stable and unchanging over time, by altering things in the world.
Aristotle distinguishes three degrees of abstraction. There is a physics abstraction, which captures what is characteristic of a number of material bodies. This form of abstraction does not rise above the physical world; it only detects a kind of common footprint to several concrete things. The second level of abstraction is the mathematical one that rises above the purely material level and identifies the immaterial characteristics common to the corporeal things. In other words the mathematical abstraction takes into account the real, under the geometrical and physical aspect. In the end the metaphysical abstraction that is independent from the general characteristics of the matter, rises above the extension of the bodies to capture the essential features, the immaterial aspect (that is to declare the truth) of what is.
St. Thomas in the Middle Ages saw in abstraction the capacity to know universals that exist as models of things in the divine and are present in the things themselves, that incorporate them, getting as abstract universal concepts from things themselves.
The possibility that the process of abstraction being able to grasp the essence of things, has been criticized harshly by modern empiricism, especially through the work of Berkeley and Hume. For them, the abstractive process is a way through which the intellect assumes special representations as a symbol of other special representations; this point of view manifests a radical skepticism in the possibility of access to the real by the human mind. The idea that certain determinations are truer than others is a kind of intellectual prejudice.
Only by the matching of perceptual structures with sensitive objects, consciousness is generated. In Hegel and in the idealistic tradition abstraction takes on a special significance: it is the act by which the concept is formed. According to the German philosopher, the concept of a particular thing is the truth of the thing itself; in the concept every single element loses its individual particularity and reveals its true nature. To Hegel, specific entities are part of a whole that exceeds and contains them; as in a mosaic any single piece acquires meaning in the overall image of which it is a part, in the same way through abstraction every particular entity is part of a universal being, which embraces and transcends all reality.
By contrast, Locke considered abstraction as the capacity of intellect to separate the attributes common to several objects from those specific to each one, which allows to reach a universality that in itself is nothing but a product of ' intellectual activity'. Abstraction in this way is the same right to give names to the general phenomena which are observed frequently in similar circumstances. In general this thesis is a characteristic of empiricism.
A new conception of abstraction is given by Hegel: abstraction, abstracting thinking, were no longer considered as the pure ‘to put aside’ what is sensitive to the subject to grasp the intelligible, according to the conception of the Aristotelian tradition. The abstract itself was seen by Hegel as that which is separated from the totality and therefore is finite and limited. Thus we are witnessing in Hegel an evaluation of abstraction that is positive and negative at the same time.
As I said in the Comment, abstraction is a process by which the human mind constructs concepts universally valid through the analysis of specific elements in isolation from the context of space and time. Plato in De Republica placed abstraction among the functions of dialectics to distinguish an idea from another one, The origin of this method in the discussion of philosophical theses can be found already in Zeno of Elea, who, in the footsteps of Parmenides, argued the thesis of the immutability of Being refuting the antithesis of opponents by a ‘reductio ad absurdum’. He used dialectics as a means of contrast on the basis of the principle of non-contradiction, using paradoxes.
A similar method can be found in Plato's dialogues, where Socrates tries to find a contradiction in the argument of the interlocutor, decomposing the statements and comparing them with higher levels of knowledge. The initial advantage left to the weaker interlocutor is the dialectic instrument by which the opinion of the master emerges brightest and final.
The Socratic research of the definitions of things, just as reported by witnesses, is certainly an example of knowledge by abstraction, aimed at seizing the unity in the multiplicity of the real. The same "theory of ideas" of Plato is an attempt to abstract a form stable and unchanging over time, from the mutable things in the world.
Mainz, Germany
Dear Tucci,
I wonder, reading through your question and explanation of it, whether one does best to focus, in this way on "abstraction" as contrasted with, say, "conceptualization."
To my way of thinking, this has to do with the contrast between early modern empiricisms, as in Locke and Hume, for instance and contemporary empiricism. Berkeley, of course, famously rejected the notion of "abstract ideas." While the early modern doctrine was, typically, that all knowledge "arises from" experience, and could, in principle be traced back to experience, The contemporary forms of empiricism typically insist, more modestly, that knowledge or knowledge claims must meet the test of experience.
Many more distinctions and reflections could surely be brought in to a discussion of the contrast, but I think that the contrast is basically sound. The implication is that concepts, not "arising from" experience may still have their validity, so long as overall theory, involving and requiring them, can be successfully brought to the test of experience. In natural science, proper, of course, this becomes a matter of the testing of predictions.
H.G. Callaway
Dear Tucci,
For Aristotle, understanding in intimatly linked to imagination which is instrinsic to perception. For him, the process of understanding nature is possible because human nature is about understanding the world and that the world actively seeks to be understood. So human nature is to participate into a love relationship with the world. The body of a living organism is a state in the actualization process of a speicies-form. The human thinking process is conceived as the higher level of actualization of the form actualization processes in nature. When a scientist perceives and studies a frog, he gradually begins to know what a frog is. For Aristotle, the frog knowing process in the scientist mind is the frog-form itself at its highest level of actualization, a higher state of actualization than the one found in the frog itself (Lear 1998). The perceptual generative process itself re-enact the form actualization in the observer.
This is a historical conception of understanding as form generative re-enactment. Many philosophers have emphasized the central historicism dimension of understanding: Vico, Goethe, Dilthey,Bergson, Croce, Collingwood, Lukacs, etc.
All roads lead to Rome. So it may be useful to try out a variety of pathways hoping to approach nearer, if not to Rome, then to an answer to the question about the nature of abstraction as a moment of the cognitive process. In the following I suggest and explore briefly one such pathways. it has not originated from philosophy but from cognitive psychology and linguistics. It has proceeded from the working assumption that both language and cognition can be conceived of as representational systems that are used to represent the same world. Hence, (quasi) universal features of language may reflect (quasi) universal features of cognition. In this way, it has been shown that pronominal categories reveal the possibility to have two alternative representations of the world, one related to the first-second person dichotomy (I-thou), another to what in many languages has become the "third person" (he, she, it). More details can be found in the attached article "Person and non-person" in which particular philosophical implications are discussed.
My actual suggestion is that "abstraction" may be dealt with as cognitive processing consistent with the "third person" (third-person anchored thinking). At least, that pathway may lead, if not to Rome, to the same point as stressed by H. G. Callaway in his comment. Third-person thinking enables to construe alternative models of the world that do not resemble the world representation of our daily experience, but that possibly stand the test of specific careful replicable laboratory experiences better than does the world representation of our daily experience.
Actually, the pathway may even lead to some spots in Gianrocco Tucci's argument. One implication of the "third person" is that the distinction between self and other is ignored. Dealing with an entity as a "self" to be distinguished from "other" entities makes that the entity is handled as a singular "being in itself." For instance: the tree in front of my window appears to me as a unique singular object. However, if I ignore the distinction between that tree and other trees, I realize the concept of tree. this concept can be handled in turn as an entity in itself to be distinguished from other entities (concepts) such as animals, stones, and so forth. this seems exactly what Gianrocco has written about Plato's concept of abstraction: "distinguishing an idea from another so that it can be accountable to itself and others" resulting in a higher level of knowledge.
A question may be where in this story we could find Aristotle. After reading Louis Brassard's comment, I am inclined to look for him close to the self-other shaped cognition that marks our daily experience. Aristotle proceeds to refined third-person shaped thinking, but the resulting "model of the world" does not move away from the world of daily experience resulting neither in an assumed separate higher-order reality (Plato's ideas) nor in an ingenious mathematical representation as in today physics. It respects the daily experience and deepens it by revealing its assumed "essence."
Peeters, G. (1989a). Person and non-person as basic concepts underlying alternative discourses about reality. An analysis based on the social-psychological relation-pattern model and Greimas' semiotic square. Ultimate Reality and Meaning. Interdisciplinary Studies in the Philosophy of Understanding, 12, 113-132. (copy attached)
Access to more recent reviews of predominantly experimental research based on the suggested approach can be found in: Peeters G (2015). Commentary on: “Agency, time, and casuality”. Front. Psychol. 6:329. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00329. http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00329/full
I might suggest Brian Massumi's book Semblance and Event, especially chapters 3 and 4 (but don't miss the setup chapters). Massumi takes from Peirce, Whitehead, and his experience translating Anti-Oedipus from Deleuze and Guattari (among others) and proffers what he terms an "activist philosophy." He seems to have enough background in neurology to connect the (virtual or actual) process of "seeing" to the cognitive abstraction that fosters understanding.
Dear Da Bouchette,
Thanks for the reference to Massumi. He is among the few who locates abstraction within experience. He says that he is a ''radical empiricism''.
It is fundamental because to have abstracted and to have formed a concept there would have been some discernment of differences and a delineation drawn between common and unique elements. From which a categorization and ordering of knowledge is established. Without abstraction there is no knowledge but at the most a constant stream of consciousness.
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