On Abstraction

Part I

Abstraction?  Simply put: a word with many nuances.  The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as such:

“1.             Trans. To withdraw, deduct, remove, or take away (something); euphem. to take away secretly, slyly, or dishonestly; to purloin.

b.             absol. To deduct; to derogate; to take away

c.            Chem. To separate an essence or chemical principle by distillation, etc.; to extract. Obs.

2.            Trans. To draw off or apart; to separate, withdraw, disengage from.

b.            absol. To withdraw (the attention), divert.

3.            refl., and intr. with refl. meaning. To withdraw oneself, to retire from. lit. and fig.

b.            abstracting from: withdrawing in thought from, leaving out of consideration, apart from. Obs. or arch.

4.            To separate in mental conception; to consider apart from the material embodiment, or from particular instances.

5.            To derive, to claim extraction for. Cf. ABSTRACT a. 1. Obs

6.            To make an abstract of; to summarize, epitomize; to abridge.”

My apologies, I abstracted from my responsibility to keep the reader’s attention (see above definition 2b. If the reader is prone to definition 2b., then I humbly ask the reader to bear with me). The word derives from the Latin abstractus, or “drawn away.”  Is it not the case that definition is an abstraction or a drawing away? Or language trying pin down the fullness and dynamics of reality? Or, paradoxically, the capitalization, or the pinning-down, of some event or motion?

One need only consider money. What does money represent? Does it represent some property, resource, or good? A standard or token, such as gold or silver? The market mechanism of supply and demand, the backbone of modern economics? The amount of money in circulation? The actual paper on which money is usually printed because money now is represented digitally in the stock market? Although the reader and certainly myself may not be an expert or well-versed in economic theory, I assure the reader that these questions do, in fact, arise in such study. However, most likely anyone faced with this question would answer plainly “stuff,” by which they would mean “wealth” with the presupposition that he or she had the ability to buy stuff. In any case, with further study, defining money and its constituent value is a daunting task, that includes consideration of all the afore-mentioned questions. Over the course of history, money has represented intrinsic utility and portability in local and international economies, acceptability, purchasing power defined by the amount of currency in an economy, future or “speculative” utility, among other various abstractions (see Philip Goodchild’s article “Capital and Kingdom” for the history of money and its continual abstraction from social, ecological, and “real” limits). Money, in the modern world, continually disengages from reality. Therefore, money’s definition over time transcends its natural root

Other than money, many entities, their descriptions, and uses are abstractions. In fact, let’s step back and ask an even more fundamental question: is representation – or re-presentation, the presenting again – an abstraction? With each subsequent abstraction, or attempt at definition, the re-interpretation and re-presentation loses something of the original. In any given moment, I can attempt to describe my perceptions. When someone asks, “What are you perceiving?” I might attempt to describe everything “perceptible,” but an exposition of every sound, taste, color, sight, and feeling would be a seemingly impossible task, even with the naked eye, given the infinite number of possible “representations” and combinations thereof. And even if I were to explain every possible affect on my senses, such a task would certainly outlast the moment. Therefore, as Ferdinand de Saussure posited, every representation or interpretation is an abstraction of our perception, a division into particular, relevant categories. From that point forward, Saussure, his linguistic legacy, and those subsequent thinkers in the Continental tradition defined language, our ability for abstraction, as actual perceiving, knowing, and thinking, where knowledge has no positive value, a sign or symbol actually corresponding to one actual thing in the world, but only has negative value, a sign or symbol that is contrasted to another sign or symbol. Thus, to know is to abstract, that is, to have capacity for language.

If language works in such a way, what then of systematic studies? What do we make of intense study that is divided and interpreted according to a particular modern, specialized subject? What, essentially, do we make of interpretations of representations, or abstractions of abstractions? Consider the philosophical study of Formal Logic; one can express either a logic value or a truth-value, denoted by the following examples:

Truth Value Syllogism

All men are mortals.

Socrates is a man.

Therefore, Socrates is mortal.

Logical Value Syllogism

All birds can fly.

A penguin is a bird.

Therefore, a penguin can fly.

The former example is sound because one “truly” recognizes that Socrates, a man, is mortal. However, the latter is only valid because the two statements “All birds can fly” and “A penguin is a bird” are both sound, but the conclusion “Therefore, a penguin can fly” is certainly not true but it does follow from the two premises. This entire “intellectual” study creates an abstraction from an original language, which is itself intrinsically abstract (more to follow in subsequent posting). This entire study of formal logic has now bred a number of “informal” logical investigations, as if the former was not already formless. Logical value then may be an abstraction from what actually is or how anything exists.  Formal or Symbolic Logic– an examination of knowledge, or Epistemology – separates itself from Metaphysics – the study of being or existence, or Ontology. Why would any “reasonable” study remove itself from truth, or the way the world actually is? Why would anyone want to lose the original, that is, the truth? Does abstracting the abstraction remove one further and further from the truth? Is abstraction violent, or a negation of negation? Is systematic study in any field merely a series of compounded negations?

As shown above, all intellectual investigation, all educational study, all argument, or all language for that matter, is an abstraction. When I hear the term “abstract,” only Picasso and awkwardly arranged shapes come to mind, as if I am looking at pieces of a Mr. Potato Head set lay scattered on the floor. Abstraction does not always sow definition and reap clarity, but it can also re-arrange something and wreak havoc, or disassemble structure and leave only chaos.

What practical or material application does this “abstraction” talk possess? One may note the example of money above or ponder the nature of American ideology. Americans, generally, quickly avoid any talk of tradition, totality, custom, etc. (although American mythology and economy ironically institute such conformity). American political philosophy proudly promotes individuality, freedom, and independence – very stretched abstractions indeed. One promotes the Self above Other, an entire economy and policy of self-interest, capitalistic accumulation, radical individuality or freedom of choice, although acted on a homogenous stage of democracy. Should ethical abstraction, an incessant drive for radical individuality, freedom, and independence slow down and reconsider the place from which they came? The point from which they abstracted? These “fundamental” notions of democracy offer infinite room for self-grooming, self-development, and self-expansion, but each movement towards those notions is an “abstraction” from a prior, more fundamental, or temporally-original state.

So what of abstraction? Is it a move away from “truth,” “origin,” “standard,” “perception,” etc.? Or is it an adventurous journey into the desirous, exotic, and beautiful infinite? Or is it falling into the abyss of nihilism? Is it good? Peaceful and harmonious? Bad? Violent? Necessary? My contention, for that which is to follow in subsequent posts, is that abstraction is necessary, it can be harmonious or it can be violent, but it is certainly neither necessarily harmonious nor necessarily violent. Abstraction is not a negation, rooted in loss, but a product of overabundance.

More to follow.

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