Abstract and concrete

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In metaphysics, the distinction between abstract and concrete refers to a divide between two types of entities. Many philosophers hold that this difference has fundamental metaphysical significance. Examples of concrete objects include plants, human beings and planets while things like numbers, sets and propositions are abstract objects. [1] There is no general consensus as to what the characteristic marks of concreteness and abstractness are. Popular suggestions include defining the distinction in terms of the difference between (1) existence inside or outside space-time, (2) having causes and effects or not, (3) having contingent or necessary existence, (4) being particular or universal and (5) belonging to either the physical or the mental realm or to neither. [2] [3] [4] Despite this diversity of views, there is broad agreement concerning most objects as to whether they are abstract or concrete. [1] So under most interpretations, all these views would agree that, for example, plants are concrete objects while numbers are abstract objects.

Contents

Abstract objects are most commonly used in philosophy and semantics. They are sometimes called abstracta in contrast to concreta. The term abstract object is said to have been coined by Willard Van Orman Quine. [5] Abstract object theory is a discipline that studies the nature and role of abstract objects. It holds that properties can be related to objects in two ways: through exemplification and through encoding. Concrete objects exemplify their properties while abstract objects merely encode them. This approach is also known as the dual copula strategy. [6]

In philosophy

The type–token distinction identifies physical objects that are tokens of a particular type of thing. [7] The "type" of which it is a part is in itself an abstract object. The abstract–concrete distinction is often introduced and initially understood in terms of paradigmatic examples of objects of each kind:

Examples of abstract and concrete objects
AbstractConcrete
TennisA tennis match
RednessRed light reflected off of an apple and hitting one's eyes
FiveFive cars
JusticeA just action
Humanity (the property of being human)Human population (the set of all humans)

Abstract objects have often garnered the interest of philosophers because they raise problems for popular theories. In ontology, abstract objects are considered problematic for physicalism and some forms of naturalism. Historically, the most important ontological dispute about abstract objects has been the problem of universals. In epistemology, abstract objects are considered problematic for empiricism. If abstracta lack causal powers and spatial location, how do we know about them? It is hard to say how they can affect our sensory experiences, and yet we seem to agree on a wide range of claims about them.

Some, such as Ernst Mally, [8] Edward Zalta [9] and arguably, Plato in his Theory of Forms, [9] have held that abstract objects constitute the defining subject matter of metaphysics or philosophical inquiry more broadly. To the extent that philosophy is independent of empirical research, and to the extent that empirical questions do not inform questions about abstracta, philosophy would seem especially suited to answering these latter questions.

In modern philosophy, the distinction between abstract and concrete was explored by Immanuel Kant [10] and G. W. F. Hegel. [11]

Gottlob Frege said that abstract objects, such as propositions, were members of a third realm, [12] different from the external world or from internal consciousness. [1] (See Popper's three worlds.)

Abstract objects and causality

Another popular proposal for drawing the abstract–concrete distinction contends that an object is abstract if it lacks causal power. A causal power has the ability to affect something causally. Thus, the empty set is abstract because it cannot act on other objects. One problem with this view is that it is not clear exactly what it is to have causal power. For a more detailed exploration of the abstract–concrete distinction, see the relevant Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy article. [9]

Quasi-abstract entities

Recently[ when? ], there has been some philosophical interest in the development of a third category of objects known as the quasi-abstract. [ citation needed ] Quasi-abstract objects have drawn particular attention in the area of social ontology and documentality. Some argue that the over-adherence to the platonist duality of the concrete and the abstract has led to a large category of social objects having been overlooked or rejected as nonexistent because they exhibit characteristics that the traditional duality between concrete and abstract regards as incompatible. [13] Specifically, the ability to have temporal location, but not spatial location, and have causal agency (if only by acting through representatives). [14] These characteristics are exhibited by a number of social objects, including states of the international legal system. [15]

Concrete and abstract thought in psychology

Jean Piaget uses the terms "concrete" and "formal" to describe two different types of learning. Concrete thinking involves facts and descriptions about everyday, tangible objects, while abstract (formal operational) thinking involves a mental process.

Abstract ideaConcrete idea
Dense things sink.It will sink if its density is greater than the density of the fluid.
You breathe in oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide.Gas exchange takes place between the air in the alveoli and the blood.
Plants get water through their roots.Water diffuses through the cell membrane of the root hair cells.

See also

Related Research Articles

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In ontology, the theory of categories concerns itself with the categories of being: the highest genera or kinds of entities. To investigate the categories of being, or simply categories, is to determine the most fundamental and the broadest classes of entities. A distinction between such categories, in making the categories or applying them, is called an ontological distinction. Various systems of categories have been proposed, they often include categories for substances, properties, relations, states of affairs or events. A representative question within the theory of categories might articulate itself, for example, in a query like, "Are universals prior to particulars?"

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Existence</span> State of being real

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Idealism in philosophy, also known as philosophical idealism or metaphysical idealism, is the set of metaphysical perspectives asserting that, most fundamentally, reality is equivalent to mind, spirit, or consciousness; that reality is entirely a mental construct; or that ideas are the highest type of reality or have the greatest claim to being considered "real". Because there are different types of idealism, it is difficult to define the term uniformly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Metaphysics</span> Study of fundamental reality

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that examines the basic structure of reality. It is often characterized as first philosophy, implying that it is more fundamental than other forms of philosophical inquiry. Metaphysics is traditionally seen as the study of mind-independent features of the world, but some modern theorists understand it as an inquiry into the conceptual schemes that underlie human thought and experience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nominalism</span> Philosophy emphasizing names and labels

In metaphysics, nominalism is the view that universals and abstract objects do not actually exist other than being merely names or labels. There are at least two main versions of nominalism. One version denies the existence of universals – things that can be instantiated or exemplified by many particular things. The other version specifically denies the existence of abstract objects – objects that do not exist in space and time.

Ontology is the philosophical study of being. As one of the most fundamental concepts, being encompasses all of reality and every entity within it. To articulate the basic structure of being, ontology examines what all entities have in common and how they are divided into fundamental classes, known as categories. An influential distinction is between particular and universal entities. Particulars are unique, non-repeatable entities, like the person Socrates. Universals are general, repeatable entities, like the color green. Another contrast is between concrete objects existing in space and time, like a tree, and abstract objects existing outside space and time, like the number 7. Systems of categories aim to provide a comprehensive inventory of reality, employing categories such as substance, property, relation, state of affairs, and event.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Problem of universals</span> Philosophical question of whether properties exist and, if so, what they are

The problem of universals is an ancient question from metaphysics that has inspired a range of philosophical topics and disputes: "Should the properties an object has in common with other objects, such as color and shape, be considered to exist beyond those objects? And if a property exists separately from objects, what is the nature of that existence?"

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Philosophy of mathematics is the branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of mathematics and its relationship with other human activities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reductionism</span> Philosophical view explaining systems in terms of smaller parts

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Edward N. Zalta</span> American philosopher (born 1952)

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Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that investigates principles of reality transcending those of any particular science. Cosmology and ontology are traditional branches of metaphysics. It is concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world. Someone who studies metaphysics can be called either a "metaphysician" or a "metaphysicist".

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to metaphysics:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mathematical object</span> Anything with which mathematical reasoning is possible

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Rosen, Gideon (2020). "Abstract Objects". The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. Retrieved 4 January 2021.
  2. Honderich, Ted (2005). "abstract entities". The Oxford Companion to Philosophy. Oxford University Press.
  3. Craig, Edward (1996). "Abstract objects". Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Routledge.
  4. Abrams, Meyer Howard; Harpham, Geoffrey Galt (2011). A Glossary of Literary Terms. Cengage Learning. ISBN   978-0495898023 . Retrieved 18 September 2012.
  5. Armstrong, D. M. (2010). Sketch for a systematic metaphysics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 2. ISBN   9780199655915.
  6. Zalta 1983, p. 33.
  7. Carr, Philip (2012) "The Philosophy of Phonology" in Philosophy of Linguistics (ed. Kemp, Fernando, Asher), Elsevier, p. 404
  8. Ernst Mally – The Metaphysics Research Lab
  9. 1 2 3 Rosen, Gideon. "Abstract Objects". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy .
  10. KrV A51/B75–6. See also: Edward Willatt, Kant, Deleuze and Architectonics, Continuum, 2010 p. 17: "Kant argues that cognition can only come about as a result of the union of the abstract work of the understanding and the concrete input of sensation."
  11. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel: The Science of Logic , Cambridge University Press, 2010, p. 609. See also: Richard Dien Winfield, Hegel's Science of Logic: A Critical Rethinking in Thirty Lectures, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2012, p. 265.
  12. Gottlob Frege, "Der Gedanke. Eine logische Untersuchung", in: Beiträge zur Philosophie des deutschen Idealismus 1 (1918/19), pp. 58–77; esp. p. 69.
  13. B. Smith (2008), "Searle and De Soto: The New Ontology of the Social World". In The Mystery of Capital and the Construction of Social Reality. Open Court.
  14. Robinson, E. H. (2011). "A Theory of Social Agentivity and Its Integration into the Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering" (PDF). International Journal on Semantic Web and Information Systems . 7 (4): 62–86. doi:10.4018/ijswis.2011100103. Archived from the original (PDF) on Aug 10, 2017.
  15. E. H. Robinson (2014), "A Documentary Theory of States and Their Existence as Quasi-Abstract Entities", Geopolitics19 (3), pp. 1–29.

Sources