Single Idea 10731

[catalogued under 18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / b. Concepts as abilities]

Full Idea

For abstractionists, concepts are essentially capacities for recognizing recurrent features of the world.

Gist of Idea

For abstractionists, concepts are capacities to recognise recurrent features of the world

Source

Peter Geach (Abstraction Reconsidered [1983], p.163)

Book Reference

'Knowledge and Mind', ed/tr. Ginet,C/Shoemaker,S [OUP 1983], p.163


A Reaction

Recognition certainly strikes me as central to thought (and revelatory of memory, since we continually recognise what we cannot actually recall). Geach dislikes this view, but I see it as crucial to an evolutionary view of thought.