Synthesized answer
Abstraction is a process or faculty where the mind focuses on certain attributes of a thing while disregarding others [3]. This process is fundamental to how humans gain knowledge, as generalizations are formed by identifying common phases or attributes shared by different objects [1, 3]. The mind can then manipulate these abstract concepts, similar to algebraic symbols, for scientific and philosophical inquiry [1].
There are different views on how abstract concepts are formed. One perspective, associated with the Associationist school, suggests that general ideas arise from blending individual impressions [2]. However, Scholastics, following Aristotle, believe the mind possesses an "Active Intellect" that extracts essential, universal elements from concrete representations, leaving behind the particular and material aspects. This process is spontaneous and immediate, not merely a grouping of similar things [2]. The resulting concepts represent universally realized elements, and their universality is formally recognized through further observation and comparison [2].
Synthesized from the book passages below. Chat with the book on Feynman for follow-up.
From the book
generalizations depend upon the abstraction from different objects of some phase, or phases, which they have in common. A further and most important step is taken when the mind reaches the stage where it can handle its abstractions such as extension, motion, species, being, cause, as a basis for science and philosophy, in which, to a certain extent at least, the abstracted concepts are manipulated like the symbols in algebra, without immediate reference to the concrete. This process is not without its dangers of fallacy, but human knowledge would not progress far without it. It is, therefore,…
are in substantial agreement. But they differ widely concerning the nature and validity of abstract concepts themselves. A widely prevalent view, best represented by the Associationist school, is that general ideas are formed by the blending or fusing of individual impressions. The most eminent Scholastics, however, following Aristotle, ascribe to the mind in its higher aspect a power (called the Active Intellect) which abstracts from the representations of concrete things or qualities the typical, ideal, essential elements, leaving behind those that are material and particular. The concepts…
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i). Now it is at the very time of conception, or fecundation, that the embryo begins to live a distinct individual life. For life does not result from an organism when it has been built up, but the vital principle builds up the organism of its own body. In virtue of the one eternal act of the Will of the Creator, Who is of course ever present at every portion of His creation, the soul of every new human being begins to exist when the cell which generation has provided is ready to receive it as its principle of life. In the normal course of nature the living embryo carries on its work of…
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