Abstract and Concrete

Important pair categories that reveals the laws and methods of man’s thinking activity. Rising from the abstract to the concrete is one of the basic methods of dialectical thinking and a higher form of dialectical thinking. Abstraction is a simple determination of thinking, which is a summation of the attributes of some aspects of objective things in thinking. When one makes such an abstract determination, the attributes and relations of the various aspects of the object are separated from the unity, extracted and reflected separately. The meaning of “concrete” refers to the unity of the diverse. Marx said: “The concrete is concrete because it is the concentration of many determinations, hence unity of the diverse.” As a whole the real thing is a unity of the diverse, it is concrete. There are two different types of concrete knowledge in the process of knowledge, one is the sensuous concrete, and the other is the concrete in thought. The sensuous concrete is the full conception of things, i.e., the concrete in conception, which is the point of departure of the process of logical thinking. Objects of knowledge are concrete things that can be felt by sensation, i.e., seen, heard, tasted, smelt, and touched. Concrete things form a full conception in the human brain through human sensation and perception, and such full impression of objective things is sensuous concrete knowledge. Sensuous concrete knowledge cannot reveal the essential determination of things and their internal connections, and cannot make a profound and comprehensive exposition of the inner connection of things and phenomena.

The concrete in thought is the point of destination of the way of logical thinking, the rational concrete reproduced in the human mind through thinking on the basis of abstract determinations. The concrete of thinking is different from both the sensuous concrete and the abstract determinations. On the one hand, the concrete in thought is the organic synthesis of diverse abstract determinations about a certain object, rather than a unity of sensuous contemplation like the sensuous concrete. The sensuous concrete is only a “chaotic conception”, which does not delve into the level of essence of the object, while the concrete in thought not only delves into the level of the essence of things, but also synthesizes and unifies the essential determinations of things, and is a high-level concrete that has re-achieved unity after analysis. On the other hand, the concrete in thought is higher than abstract determinations. Abstract determinations are the intermediate link from the sensuous concrete to the concrete in thought by which the subject of knowledge decomposes the contemplative whole into various parts through analysis, distinguishes necessary essential aspects from accidental phenomena, and extracts from them each necessary essential factor in order to achieve the knowledge of a certain essential aspect of a concrete thing. This process is the process from the sensuous concrete to abstract. But to truly arrive at a comprehensive concrete knowledge of the concrete thing, it is also necessary to use the method of synthesis, by which the knowledge of the essence of all aspects of things are connected, a knowledge of the whole thing is formed so that the abstract determinations lead towards a reproduction of the concrete by way of thought. This process is a rise from the abstract to the concrete. Thinking activity can access a knowledge of truth of things by moving from the sensuous concrete to the abstract, and then from the abstract to the concrete in thought.