Types of scientific abstraction. Abstraction - what it is and how abstract thinking (abstraction) helps to see the essence. What is abstraction? Definition

Specific concepts - These are concepts that denote integral objects or their classes that have independence. Reflect objects, processes, phenomena: things "table", living things "Human", fantasy products "centaur", events "war", natural phenomena "earthquake". In Russian, words expressing specific concepts, as a rule, can be used in the plural: diamonds, oaks, lawyers, explosions, wars. Designata (volume) are not difficult to determine. If a set of features that make up the semantic meaning is known, then we can point to objects that have these features.

Abstract concepts - These are concepts that denote properties or relationships abstracted from objects, conceived as independent objects. That is, we think not of the object itself, but of any of the signs, taken separately. The properties of objects or relationships between objects do not exist independently, without these objects. Properties: "hardness"(diamond), "durability"(oak), "competence"(lawyer), "blue"(seas); relationship: " equality"(women and men), " social partnership"(between employees and employers), " citizenship"(stable legal connection of a person with the state, expressed in the totality of their mutual rights and obligations), " friendship"(between people). In Russian, words expressing abstract concepts do not have a plural form: they do not say: "Diamond has many hardnesses" or “Oak has a lot of durability", A “A lawyer has a lot of different competencies.”

One should not confuse concrete concepts with individual ones, and abstract ones with general ones. General concepts can be both concrete and abstract: "intermediary"- general, specific; A "mediation" - general, abstract. A single concept can be abstract: "United Nations"- single, specific; "Captain Gastello's courage"- singular, abstract.

Determining the designata of specific concepts is not difficult; if the set of features that make up the semantic meaning is known, then you can point to the objects that this concept denotes. But with abstract concepts everything is different; what they denote does not exist in material form; although they have a semantic meaning, they do not have an objective meaning. It is believed that the content of an abstract concept is the property or relationship that it denotes, and the volume is the set of objects that have this property, or the set of objects between which there is a certain relationship. Therefore, the whiteness of the snow and the whiteness of the tablecloth should be considered as designates of the concept "white", and the equality of the quantities X and Y and the equality of the country's citizens before the law - as designata of the concept "equality".

Dividing concepts into concrete and abstract - relatively. If an abstract concept reflecting a property is used in relation to the objects themselves that have this property, then it acquires a plural form. The concept " sweetness"- abstract, if only a property is thought of in it, and "oriental sweets"- this is a specific concept applied to the products themselves that have this property. Abstract concepts can be part of more complex concrete ones and vice versa. They are distinguished by the leading concept: "lawyer incompetence"- abstract, although it includes the concrete as an element - "lawyer", A "victim of incompetence" - concrete, although it contains the abstract - "incompetence".

Examples concrete and abstract concepts: “citizen” - “citizenship”, “employee” - “professionalism”, “wages” - “payment”, “court” - “criminal record”.

Concepts non-relative and correlative

Irrelevant concepts – These are concepts that designate objects in themselves, regardless of their relationship to other objects: “farmer”, “rule”, “village”, “justice”, “nature”. An irrespective concept is retained by an object from the moment it is named until the moment it disappears (“man” in relation to a single human individual is retained by him from birth to death).

Correlative concepts – These are concepts that designate not independent objects, but objects as members of a relationship. One object of thought presupposes the existence of another and is impossible without it, therefore they have meaning as long as this relationship exists, and lose it as soon as this relationship is destroyed: concepts "parents" And "children": You cannot be a son or daughter without parents; in turn, it is children who make us fathers or mothers; “bride-groom”, “boss-subordinate”, “plaintiff-defendant”, “right-obligation”, “judge-defendant”, “plaintiff-defendant”.

Example: concepts "three" And "five"- irrelevant, but if you draw a horizontal line between them, you get fraction three fifths– 3 is the “numerator”, and the number 5 is the “denominator” - these are already correlative concepts. To revive them as independent numbers, it is necessary to destroy the ratio, as a result of which its moments - the numerator and denominator - will cease to exist. The terms “generation” and “destruction”, to characterize correlative concepts, have not a physical, but a logical meaning.

Hello, dear readers of the blog site. Remember boring classes at school or university in which you wanted to sleep. What did they have in common? An abundance of scientific concepts and vague formulations.

The introductory theoretical lesson involves working with abstractions. Because of them, it is so generalized, as if divorced from the subject.

What is abstraction? Why is it needed? And how is it related to other complex concepts: abstraction, abstract thinking? In this article we will analyze all the questions in detail. Go!

Abstraction and abstraction are a simplification of reality

Abstraction is a thought that was born in the process of abstraction (the process of eliminating and separating what is unimportant at the moment in order to see the main thing). The disappointed reader probably thought: “Well, again there is no clear definition, but only a vague phrase.” Be patient, there's only a little time left.

The word “abstractio” has three translation options from Latin:

abstraction;
exception;
department.

These are mental operations that the brain performs on objects in the real world in the process of abstraction. And abstractions appear.

Here are a few examples for understanding.

You went outside and looked up. What were you thinking? “A gas envelope of five layers of water vapor, containing 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen, and so on.” Yes, you can go crazy!
To prevent this from happening, you are distracted from unimportant aspects, properties and connections of the object. You throw out the layers of the atmosphere, the chemical composition from your head and form a general thought - “sky”.
So, “sky” - this is an abstraction. You can go further and highlight other significant features of the object: color, weather, time of day. Then the following abstract concepts will arise: “blue sky”, “cloudy sky”, “night sky”.
At the end of the month, you withdrew your salary from your bank card. Now your general thought is “money.” This is also an abstraction. In the process of abstraction, you mentally excluded (separated) the unimportant connections of the object.
For example, connections with a banking institution and employer. Do you wonder how long the title units have traveled before ending up in your wallet? Hardly. The important thing is that it's money.

So you constantly abstracting and generate abstractions. Without this process, my head would simply burst with thoughts.

Then why is it so difficult to sit through boring lectures?

Abstract concepts are the highest form of abstraction

It is possible to generalize not only objects of the real world, but also the abstractions themselves. This is how they are formed high order abstractions– abstract concepts. They are used by fundamental and exact sciences to describe complex patterns.

Let's look at a simplified example of how an abstract concept is born.

Precipitation of ice crystals fell to the ground. This is snow. The sky is completely covered with clouds. The sky and snow are white. It's white outside.

“Whiteness” is an abstract concept. Try to generalize it. Will not work. Other examples of abstract concepts: truth, justice, time, matter, information.

From simple abstraction to its highest form, sometimes there are so many mental stages that the abstract concept turns out to be very divorced from reality and difficult to perceive.

This is why it is so difficult to listen to the teacher’s theoretical lectures.

Types of abstractions

Abstraction is a mental process that pursues a specific goal. Isolate some essential feature, get a general picture of a phenomenon, or develop an ideal scheme.

Depending on the purpose of abstraction, three types of abstractions are distinguished.

Insulating.
The goal is to highlight an essential feature of an object and focus attention on it. There is an orange on the table. You notice that the fruit is orange or sweet and sour.
Generalizing.
The goal is to get a general picture of the phenomenon. To do this, you are distracted from private signs. An example of a generalizing abstraction is mathematical equations. They are decided according to certain rules. There is no point in mentally “splitting” mathematical equations into numbers, plus, minus, equal sign, variable.
You've probably noticed that success in solving any mathematical problem depends on the ability to look at the problem as if from above, to see the big picture.
Idealization.
The goal is to develop an idealized schema of the object, discarding unimportant real attributes. Idealization is a method of cognition, without which exact and natural sciences cannot do. Remember the notorious “spherical horse in a vacuum”.
In reality there are no isolated points, straight lines, or time. Separated from a specific object, they cannot be touched or measured. These are abstractions that are used in mathematics and physics to describe the patterns of real phenomena.

If abstraction is the process of developing abstractions, then abstract thinking is the operation of them.

A strict examiner criticizes a young man who answers too extensively: “Let’s get closer to the subject of the ticket.”

Why does a student throw out clever phrases like that? To hide gaps in knowledge, or even their complete absence. And this is the essence of abstract thinking.

A person's knowledge of the real world is not complete, exhaustive, or specific. But he needs to somehow navigate among unknown phenomena and things, so he thinks abstractly.

If there was no concept of time, how would people arrange meetings? How would scientists describe new galaxies without any idea of shape, distance, speed, or substances? How would science interact without common concepts?

Abstract thinking is a form of cognition that allows you to get out of an intellectual dead end, at least at a general level to describe unknown phenomena. With its help, they make guesses and see the problem from different angles.

You have witnessed a family quarrel. Your friend’s wife calls him on the phone, crying, screaming, swearing. What conclusions does the brain make?

Concrete thinking: a friend’s wife is hysterical;
Abstract thinking: perhaps a friend offended his wife, she endured it for a long time, but now she cannot restrain her emotions.

Brief summary

So, speaking in very simple language, the term in the title of this article is a general idea that brings us closer to the essence of the object (phenomenon).

Abstraction is an intermediary between a person and a complex world with its secrets and laws.

It is stupid to contrast concrete concepts with abstract ones, because without the latter concepts are impossible.

Good luck to you! See you soon on the pages of the blog site

Books

, S. V. Kodzasov, O. V. Krivnova. The work provides a critical analysis of American phonological theory of the 50-70s. The first part sets out the main provisions of the standard version of generative phonology, criticizes...
Modern American phonology, Kodzasov S.V.. The work provides a critical analysis of the American phonological theory of the 50-70s. The first part sets out the main provisions of the “standard” version of generative phonology, criticizes...

They have similarities and differences.

That in which objects are similar or different from each other acts as their signs .

Signs that express the fundamental nature (essence) of objects, distinguishing them from objects of other types, are reflected in the process of cognition as essential features .

Contents of the concept is revealed as a set of essential features of objects reflected in the concept.

Depending on the content, they can be concrete and abstract, positive and negative, irrespective and correlative.

For example, the scope of the concept “ student” are all university students, the scope of the concept “state constitution” is all state constitutions existing in the world.

The content and scope of the concept are interconnected. This relationship is expressed in the law of the inverse relationship between the volume and content of concepts , which is formulated as follows: “ If the volume of a concept increases, then its content decreases accordingly and vice versa».

Let's take, for example, the two concepts “student” and “student of a polytechnic university.” The scope of the first concept is greater than the scope of the second concept, since there are generally more students than students at polytechnic institutes. And the content of the second concept is broader than the content of the first, since in addition to the main attribute “to be a university student,” a specific attribute “to study at a polytechnic institute” is added here.

Depending on the scope of the concept can be single, general, empty.

Let us consider in more detail general, singular and empty concepts.

General are concepts whose scope includes two or more homogeneous objects (phenomena, events).

Single are concepts whose scope includes only one subject (phenomenon, event).

Empty are called concepts whose scope does not include a single object (phenomenon, event).

Example:

The concept " city» — general , since the number of cities existing on Earth is more than two.

The concept " largest city in the world» — single, since only one single object can have this property of “being the largest city in the world.”

The concept " round square», « centaur» — empty(or with zero volume), since in reality we will not find a single object that would have the attribute “to be a round square”, “to be a centaur”.

General concepts can be registered or non-registered.

Registered is a concept in which the number of objects conceivable in it is amenable to real accounting, registration, for example, “city of Russia”, “works of L.N. Tolstoy”.

General concepts relating to an indefinite number of objects are called unregistered , for example, “man” - all people who have lived, are living and will live are thought of.

In the process of reasoning, general concepts can be used in a collective and separative sense. If a statement applies to the entire class of objects taken in their unity, and is not inapplicable to each object of the class separately, then such a use of concepts is called collective .

If the statement refers to each object of the class, then this use of the concept is called dividing .

Example:

When expressing the thought “All people are mortal,” we use the concept “people”in a disjunctive sense, since this statement applies to every person.

In the statement “the average life expectancy in Russia is 70 years” we use the concept “average life expectancy in Russia”in a collective sense, since it is not applicable to each resident of Russia individually, since individual life expectancy may be more or less than 70 years, and in some cases may coincide with this statement.

Concepts in which generalized specific objects and phenomena of reality according to certain characteristics are called specific . For example, the concepts “book” and “plant” are concrete.

Concepts in which the properties of objects or relationships between them are thought of are called abstract . For example, the concepts of “whiteness” and “courage” are abstract concepts.

Positive and negative concepts.

Concepts that reflect the inherent characteristics of an object are called positive . Examples of positive concepts could be: “literate”, “speaking English”, “order”.

Concepts in which the features that make up the content of positive concepts are denied are called negative . In Russian, negative concepts are usually expressed by words with particles “not”, “without”; in words of foreign origin - most often with words with a negative prefix “a”: “asymmetry”, “amorphous”, “immoral”. The terms “illiterate”, “non-English speaking”, “mess” are negative.

Irrelative and relative concepts.

Irrelevant concepts describe objects that exist separately and are therefore perceived without connection with other objects. The content of such concepts does not indicate the relationship to other objects, for example: “tree”, “book”, “state”.

IN correlative concepts objects are reflected that exist only interconnectedly and simultaneously with each other and therefore cannot be thought of one without the other. For example, the concept of “parents” and “children”, “boss” and “subordinate”, “cause and effect”.

Determining what type a particular concept belongs to means giving it a logical characteristic. The logical characteristics of concepts clarify their meaning and the use of words with which these concepts are described.

) - mental distraction, isolation from certain aspects, properties or connections of objects or phenomena to highlight essential features.

The word "Abstraction" is used in two senses:

Abstraction- process, the same as “ abstraction»
Abstraction - « abstract concept», « abstract", the result of abstraction.

An abstract concept is a mental construction that represents a certain concept or idea that can personify certain objects or phenomena of the real world, but at the same time abstracted from their specific embodiments. Abstract constructions may not have direct analogues in the physical world, which is typical, for example, of mathematics (in general, probably the most abstract science).

The need for abstraction is determined by the situation when the differences between the nature of the intellectual problem and the existence of the object in its concreteness become apparent. In such a situation, a person uses, for example, the opportunity to perceive and describe a mountain as a geometric shape, and a moving person as a certain set of mechanical levers.

Some types of abstraction, by type of non-essential:

generalizing abstraction- gives a generalized picture of the phenomenon, abstracted from particular deviations. As a result of such abstraction, the general property of the objects or phenomena under study is highlighted. This type of abstraction is considered fundamental in mathematics and mathematical logic.
idealization- replacement of a real empirical phenomenon with an idealized scheme abstracted from real shortcomings. As a result, the concepts of idealized (ideal) objects are formed (“ideal gas”, “absolutely black body”, “straight line”, “spherical horse in a vacuum” (from an anecdote about idealization), etc.)
isolating abstraction- isolating the phenomenon under study from some integrity, abstracting from options that are not of interest.
abstraction of actual infinity- abstraction from the fundamental impossibility of fixing every element of an infinite set, that is, infinite sets are considered as finite.
constructivization- distraction from the uncertainty of the boundaries of real objects, their “coarsening”.

By purpose:

formal abstraction- identification of properties important for theoretical analysis;
meaningful abstraction- identification of properties that have practical significance.

The concept of “abstract” is contrasted with the concrete (concrete thinking - abstract thinking).

See the epistemological law “Ascent from the abstract to the concrete”.

Abstract thinking involves operating with abstractions (“man in general,” “number three,” “tree,” etc.), which can be considered a more developed level of mental activity compared to concrete thinking, which always deals with specific objects and processes ( “brother Vasya”, “three bananas”, “oak tree in the yard”, etc.). The ability for abstract thinking is one of the distinctive features of a person, which, apparently, was formed simultaneously with language skills and largely thanks to language (for example, it would be impossible to even mentally operate with the number “three in general” without having a specific linguistic sign for it - “three”, since in the world around us such an abstract, unattached concept simply does not exist: it is always “three people”, “three trees”, “three bananas”, etc.).

In the field of mathematical software, abstraction refers to an algorithm and method of simplifying and separating details to focus on some concepts at a time.

Types of scientific abstraction. Abstraction - what it is and how abstract thinking (abstraction) helps to see the essence. What is abstraction? Definition

Abstraction and abstraction are a simplification of reality

Abstract concepts are the highest form of abstraction

Types of abstractions

Brief summary

Books

see also

See what “Abstract” is in other dictionaries:

Books