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Strategies of abstraction

Biology and Philosophy volume 21, pages 741–755 (2006)Cite this article

In the analysis of economic forms, moreover, neither microscopes nor chemical reagents are of use. The force of abstraction must replace both.

Karl Marx

author’s preface to Das Kapital

Abstract

Abstraction is seen as an active process which both enlightens and obscures. Abstractions are not true or false but relatively enlightening or obscuring according to the problem under study; different abstractions may grasp different aspects of a problem. Abstractions may be useless if they can answer questions only about themselves. A theoretical enterprise explores reality through acluster of abstractions that use different perspectives, temporal and horizontal scales, and assumes different givens.

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Notes

  1. Marxists see contradiction as process in time, as opposed to the standard view in analytic philosophy which sees contradiction as a static, set-theoretic relation. The relationship between these concepts is discussed in the last chapter of The Dialetical Biologist.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Instituto de Ecología y Sistemática, Boyeros, Havana, Cuba

    Richard Levins

  2. Harvard School of Public Health, 677 Huntington Ave., Boston, MA, 02115, USA

    Richard Levins

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  1. Richard Levins
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Correspondence to Richard Levins.

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Levins, R. Strategies of abstraction. Biol Philos 21, 741–755 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-006-9052-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10539-006-9052-8

Keywords

  • Abstraction
  • Models
  • Modeling
  • Complexity
  • Systems