LOGICAL THINKING

lar quality to the exclusion of others, and that the abstract idea has no existence apart from the general idea of the object in which it is included. Sir William Hamilton Sir William Hamilton (1788–1856) was an influential Scottish philosopher and logician known for his work on metaphysics and "the quantification of the predicate." says: “We can fix original: "rivet" our attention on some particular characteristic original: "mode" of a thing—such as its smell, its color, its shape original: "figure", its size, and so on—and separate original: "abstract" it from the others. This may be called Modal Abstraction. The kind of abstraction we have just been considering is performed on individual objects and is, consequently, specific original: "particular". There is nothing necessarily connected with generalization in the act of abstraction; generalization is indeed dependent on abstraction, which it requires original: "supposes", but abstraction does not always involve generalization.”

II. Generalization, by which is meant the process of forming Concepts or General Ideas. It works by identifying original: "apprehending" the common qualities of objects, persons, and things, and then combining and uniting them into a single notion or concept original: "conception" which will comprehend and include them all. A General Idea or Concept differs from a specific original: "particular" idea because it includes within itself the qualities of that specific thing along with other similar things, and accordingly, it may be applied to any one of these