Abstract vs Concrete Objects (Metaphysical Distinctions)
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- Опубликовано: 7 июл 2024
- An explanation of this philosophical distinction between abstract and concrete objects, including examples and various definitions offered by philosophers, such as the causal account and the spatiotemporal account.
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Information for this video gathered from The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy and more!
Information for this video gathered from The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy and more!
What a fascinating subject. I'm from a software engineering background and the difference between abstract and concrete classes of object has been part of my professional life on a near daily basis for the last twenty years. I had absolutely no idea there was a philosophical basis behind the concept. In object oriented software, all objects are instances of a concrete class of object. The programmer has the choice of what to restrict as abstract and what to permit instances of - thereby being concrete.
i love hearing about how different fields of study overlap and influence each other, even in simple ways
Concrete objects are those of the senses. Where as abstract ones are the generalizations we have created in order to categorize things.
In a sense, all physical objects that aren't fundamental are abstract since we give them labels that don't actually exist outside of our minds. I mean, a "chair" is only a "chair" relative to a conscious observer. Objectively, in the third-person, from the perspective of "the view from nowhere", chairs are just a bunch of fundamental particles in an objectively meaningless and function-less arrangement.
And if it turns out that what we call fundamental particles are actually made up of even more fundamental parts, then they don't really "exist" either.
I had a debate with a friend on an abstracts though he thought we were having a debate on logic. I see the differences in though processes.
1:19 what you looking for
3:42: "These are all different ways that people define abstract objects." I'm listening in a noisy environment and instead heard, "These are all different ways that people finance their doctorates." 😆
If you have a way to finance a doctorate with abstract objects I think there are a lot of people that would be all ears! :D
Why is it always one or the other it seems like people arrive at this conversation with a result in mind to then use in another argument... It seems to me that the abstract is simply that party of the concrete once you remove all the specifics. Not ideal forms as separate from reality, but rather that part of each specific that is shared amongst all with the abstract within it. A chair is not a chair because it can only be a chair or because some chair-ness has been put into it... a stone can be a chair... but a chair is that which has been stripped of most other things and is most a chair; the sitting place perfected.
Numbers are abstract objects as to why 9 times 0 is zero whereas if you have concrete objects like 9 apples times 0 the apples don’t disappear. Lol
Thanks for the video. As soon as I finish my accounting degree in 3 years I will start a philosophy degree LOL. One question, though... Mathematics, propositions, logic, first principles, morality, etc. Are they objects? If not, what are they and how would abstract and concrete objects be separated? If they are, are these abstract or concrete objects? If they are abstract, how are they separated from constructed objects such as the English language or a game of golf?
The economy is an abstract thing which I honestly debate whether its real or not... in other words, the economy is just different components of capitalist economics that people correlate as one i.e. the economy
a social profile or a bank account what kind of object ? Abstract or concrete ?
Good question. The physical location where your data is stored is a concrete object. The account itself is probably abstract.
@@CarneadesOfCyrene I don't think so , Because An account is a object type that can be instanated by many accounts like a concrete object ... account data also can stored in database , although this is not exist in real world but exist in virtual computer . abstract object type never can instanate but can inherit in a concrete object type as a guideline ,,suppose a building architecture model which is not instance of any class is may be an abstract object .. If you make a base model class for that bulding model then it will be concrete ..
Surely These Great Philosophers Had Helped to build Such Great Programming Languages Great I Salute!!!
+Priyam Banerjee Especially in logic. Truea and falses are jusy 1s and 0s.
Good To Hear That
to me, the degree of abstractness of a given object is inversely related to the quantity of the pre-existing structures needed to provide a complete description of the said object.
Are there physical manifestation of abstract entities?
Surely abstract and concrete objects share a common ground in that both are classes of objects. Shouldn't a definition of objects be established before considering a distinction?
I consider an object to be something that can be identified in space and time. For that matter I'd contend to the notion of abstract objects as nothing more but ideas.
And this is the reason people can be messed up about both.. they equally work hand in hand... If only we can learn how to use both and knowing why we would use them , I believe will create a better understanding as a whole... I think adstract and I also understand concrete. Probably which is y people think I'm weird to a certain degree.
It's great to have you back! Does this mean that the situation where you are has been settled?
What situation?
John Karavitis
He lives somewhere in west Africa. There has been some political instability there that required him to be evacuated and has thrown off his schedule, according to his Facebook page.
+Josh Cottle Has he mentioned the recent Sam Harris / Jordan Peterson discussion on Truth? I'm sure Carneades.org's analysis would be both enlightening & fascinating &that he could succinctly put a descriptive thumb on the break in their workdviews.
It seems as if one could say that concrete objects also have concrete quantities (mass, length, etc), but that the terms (numbers, quantifiers, etc) that are used to describe those quantities are abstractions of those same quantities.
But the question is, what is mass itself? What is a particular number? What is "quantity"? What does it mean for something to be an abstraction?
Is there a third category or a third realm in between abstract and concrete. So taking water as an analogy it seems our thinking is rather crude or concrete i.e frozen ice-like or it is nebulous and airy like steam as a representation of abstract thinking. Yet we are mostly water so it seems as if we as creatures consisting of almost 80% water would be trying to think of ourselves and our planet in binary terms of either solid ice or vaporous steam. A more fluid flux state is needed maybe called the morphic in between abstract and concrete to describe the reality we inhabit. Such a morphic category could be located within the realm of pure potentiality and probability post-Heisenberg.
Brazilian philosopher Mario Ferreira dos Santos claims that the present object, which we see, feel an touch, is the abstract. Only the complete existence of the object may be the concrete object. Thus he uses the terms concrete and abstract only for adhoc purposes, not as defenitely categories.
I think that the abstract can causally affect the concrete. Some abstract objects cause beliefs (for example, the belief on the existence of that object). If believing involves states of the brain, then it follows that some abstract objects cause states of the brain.
Is it those objects causing that belief? I'm not so sure. It probably is some neurons being influenced by impulses from the senses. Unless you are claiming that the form of triangle came in an touched your mind, you formed a belief about it because you read someone's argument about it, or saw a concrete instantiation of it, not because it causally affected the world. How do you think that the abstract objects influence the concrete ones?
Carneades.org Good question indeed. I think that in order to say that the view I defend is right, it suffices to show that: if abstract objects did not exist, we would not have some beliefs we actually have about them. If you assume a counterfactual theory of causation, then you can agree that this would prove a causal influence of abstract objects on the mind. So, let's limit ourselves to the case of math, and suppose that we live in a world where the class of mathematical abstract objects do not exist. Would we still have the same beliefs we currently hold about them nonetheless? I believe that this question is equivalent to another: is it possible to derive all of mathematics from sense-data (i.e. from our knowledge of non-abstract objects)? In other words: is a nominalist math possible? I know the debate here is far from settled, but I am inclined to think not. Notice that I am talking about rational beliefs (beliefs deduced from other beliefs via the laws of logic), but I don't think this makes any harm to the argument. BTW, you have a big fan right here, I love your channel!
And so,abstract is just inside your head ,that is unless someone says that your head is a dung heap.A word for people who find it difficult to understand those that create in different levels of complexity.Is a cat thinking in abstract terms when it goes back to fetch the last kitten ,She won’t go back agen cose she has the rite number.Some society’s can think only of few or meny or pherapes cannot conceive dimensions,and yet make sculptures that are,well they speak for themselves.
How can a table only be a concrete object, when it is just as essentially the realization of a concept?
A particular game of golf is concrete, right? Isn't a game of golf an event? Are particular processes and events objects, and are events and processes concrete?
This RUclips video is concrete. However, my listening to it and understanding what you're saying.... What dat?
John Karavitis
Your listening to the video is just an action, not an object. Obviously you are a concrete object and the vibrations of your speakers and the air around them are as well.
What your understanding is will really depend on your theory of philosophy of mind (and if you were talking about the sensation of noise you experienced when you said listening, the same applies.) For a physicalist they're probably going to say that your mental processes are a concrete object, reducible to a certain brain state.
For the dualist:
•the epiphenomenalist would likely say they're an abstract object, they would need to drastically change the "typical" understanding of concrete objects otherwise
•the interactionist could go either way (but they'd probably need a different definition of concrete or abstract objects. If the mental is abstract, then abstract objects have causal power, if the mental is concrete then not all concrete objects have a spatial location)
This was a bit of a quick gloss over, but really there are many positions you could take on the question depending on your ideas about what the mind actually is.
cheers [abstract ...if existent]
How intelligent am I?
I'm 5 intelligent
I reject the false dichotomy and arbitrary distinction between what are popularly classified as abstract objects and concrete objects. The supposed differences are epistemological errors of one's perspective of paradoxical reality and falsely assuming different properties of both these things
Why do you think that this is a false dichotomy? Do you think that one category does not exist? Do you think that these categories do not form "Natural Kinds" (ruclips.net/video/dXgnn8u5Hho/видео.html)? Do you think that objects actually cannot be sorted into these categories, i.e. that there are things which are either both abstract and concrete or neither?
I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm skeptical of such things too, I'm just curious of why you think this is a false dichotomy.
Calling things abstract objects is a misnomer. They're constructs, concepts, abstractions, ideas, activities, qualities etc. A noun isn't necessarily an object. A question, a title, a play, a speech, a song, an occupation, or a faculty are all nouns -- but not objects. This is the frailty of man. He must create confusion and debate or he isn't happy.